No politician wants to be called “soft on crime.” It happens in every election. One of the worst cases was in 1988 when Massachusetts Democratic Governor Michael Dukakis got blasted for a furlough program in his state that let prisoners out before completing their jail sentence—something about good behavior. (In fact, most of the states with a similar program, were lead by Republican governors.) One of those prisoners was Willie Horton. You may remember that name. Horton got out, broke into a house, raped a woman and beat her husband in Maryland. Dukakis got killed in the campaign by the Republicans. They accused him of being weak, soft, and coddling criminals. Even though that was almost two decades ago, the ghost of “Willie Horton” lives on in the New Jersey Legislature.

Currently there is an effort to take a serious look at mandatory sentencing laws in New Jersey—what works and what doesn’t. For years, criminal experts and those who know the justice system have said that taking virtually all discretion away from judges in certain drug related offenses has caused tens of thousands of stone cold drug addicts—junkies—to be put in jail when in fact what they really need is rehabilitation. Once these drug users go to jail, a very high percentage of them become hardened criminals. They join or solidify their ties to gangs in order to protect themselves. When they finally get out, you can rest assured they are better at crime than ever before. They are also probably still drug addicts, now with strong ties to violent, anti-social gangs. All of this guarantees that this same ex-offender will soon wind up back in the corrections system when he commits his next crime.

But don’t expect the New Jersey Legislature to deal directly with these alarming facts and trends any time soon. Several Democrats and Republicans in the Statehouse are deathly afraid of some far-left liberal judge going easy on a drug addict / alleged criminal who then commits an even worse crime than using or selling drugs. You can bet that the New Jersey media will be all over it, and then it is only a matter of time before media-panderers like Bill O’Reilly or Nancy Grace will pile on by profiling this particular judge as weak, soft and coddling criminals.

The same thing is true when it comes to the current drug laws regarding mandatory sentences for those who sell narcotics within 1,000 feet of a school. The legislature did this to make them look tough on drugs and appear to protect school age children. The only catch is, from a practical point of view, the law makes no sense and it winds up disproportionately prosecuting those who sell drugs in urban areas. Think about it. While I am in no way condoning the sale of drugs, if you are going to be such a creep selling drugs in a city beyond 1,000 feet of a school is nearly impossible. There are schools everywhere, which is not the case in most suburban or rural areas. So if you are unlucky or dumb enough to get caught selling drugs in a city, you are going to get the mandatory jail sentence, where in a suburban or rural area, you might get a slap on the wrist, even though both offenders were selling drugs.

So what’s the upshot? The vast majority of those who get mandatory sentences for selling drugs near schools are Black and Hispanic because Blacks and Hispanics disproportionately live in cities. So when criminal experts argue that the boundaries should be reduced to 200 or 500 feet from a school in order to treat drug offenders equally, many in the legislature balk, fearing that they will be accused in the next election by their opponent of supporting a law that promotes the sale of drugs near our schools.

So the irony here is that once again many legislators refuse to address a serious problem, not because they don’t think change isn’t necessary, but because they are afraid of a negative reaction from the masses and the media. Yet, at the same time, we in the media blast politicians for promoting the status quo on mandatory sentencing laws and many citizens argue that our politicians aren’t doing anything to make things better.

None of this makes sense. Then again, promoting the status quo always seems safer, even though our jails are terribly overcrowded with drug addicts who clearly need rehab and education as opposed to hard time, and Black and Hispanic urban dwellers get treated more harshly than white suburbanites—even though they are all drug dealers—just because of the collective cowardice of our legislative leadership.

Saying you are tough on crime and you are against those who are soft on drugs is easy. That’s bumper sticker politics. But actually doing something to make things better, fairer and saner, that’s hard. The last time I checked, that’s why we elect people to public office.

Steve Adubato, Ph.D. is a commentator, lecturer and former state legislator. Dr. Adubato is also an Emmy Award-winning television anchor and syndicated columnist.
He can be reached by fax (973) 509-1659 or e-mail him at sadubato@aol.com.

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