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More Reefer Madness by ERIC SCHLOSSER Marijuana gives rise to insanity-not in its users but in the policies directed against it. A nation that sentences the possessor of a single joint to life imprisonment without parole but sets a murderer free after perhaps six years is, the author writes, "in the grip of a deep psychosis" IGHT years ago Douglas Lamar Gray bought a offenses. In Montana a life sentence can be im- pound of marijuana in a room at the Econo Lodge posed for growing a single marijuana plant in Decatur, Alabama. He planned to keep a few or selling a single joint. Under federal ounces for himself and sell the rest to some friends. law the death penalty can be im- Gray was a Vietnam veteran with an artificial leg. Asa posed for growing or selling a young man, he'd been convicted of a number of petty crimes, large amount of marijuana, none serious enough to warrant a prison sentence. He had even if it is a first offense. stayed out of [rouble for a good thirteen years. He now The rise in marijuana owned a business called Gray's Roofing and Remodeling use among American Service. He had a home, a wife, and atwo-year teenagers became old son. The man who sold him the drug, Jimmy Wilcox, was a felon just released ~ from prison, with more than thirty con- e', victions on his record. Wilcox was also i an informer employed by the Morgan County Drug Task Force. The pound of marijuana had been supplied by the local ~ a prominent sheriff's department, as part of a sting. Af- ` x. issue during last year's ter paying Wilcox $900 for [he pot, which - presidential campaign, fueled seemed like a real bargain, Douglas Lamar by Republican accusations that President Gray was arrested and charged with "trafficking in Bill Clinton was "soft on drugs." Teenage mari- cannabis." He was tried, convicted, fined $25,000, sentenced Juana use has indeed grown considerably since 1992; by one to life in prison without parole, and sent to the maximum- measure it has doubled. But that increase cannot be attributed security penitentiary in Springville, Alabama-an aging, to any slackening in the enforcement of the nation's marijuana I overcrowded prison filled with murderers and other violent laws. In fact, the number of Americans arrested each year for inmates. He remains there to this day. Under the stress of his marijuana offenses has increased by 43 percent since Clinton i imprisonment Gray's wife attempted suicide with a pistol, took office. There were roughly 600,000 marijuana-related ar- survived the gunshot, and then filed for divorce. Jimmy rests nationwide in 1995-an all-time record. More Ameri- i Wilcox, the informer, was paid $100 by the county for his cans were atrested for marijuana offenses during the first three services in the case. years of Clinton's presidency than during any other three-year Gray's punishment, although severe, is by no means un- period in the nation's history. More Americans are in prison usual in the United States. The laws of az least fifteen states today for marijuana offenses than at any other time in our his- now require life sentences for cettain nonviolent marijuana tory. And yet teenage marijuana use continues to grow. !111 ~~~u,~rauou. by 5cnn .b7cnchin u•ni1 rn'~"