HomeMy WebLinkAboutCOM 1018.007 2004-2006
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08/23!2006 14:54 3015995056 CRMNL JUST POL FDN
The Criminal Justice Policy f=oundation
2096 M 23 Aft 8 SI
I
Eric E. starting, President
8730 Georgia Avenue. Suite 400
Sitvar spring. MO 20910.3649
301.589.6020
Fax: 301.569.5056
Email: esterling@01-org
Web: www olorg
'i
Statement of Eric E. Sterling, J.D.
President, The Criminal Justice Policy Foundation
to the
Hawai'i County Council
7N .
Hilo, Hawai'i
August 23, 2006
Re: Communication 1018
MetbamDhe ine ieat:.,« Act of 2006
,m
W. Chairman Higa Members of the Council, thank you very much for accepting my
statement today. My name is Eric E. Sterling. I am President of The Criminal Justice Policy
Foundation, headquartered in Silver Spring, Maryland.
of the Third
On August 16, 2006,1 spent the morning observing the Drug Court
t Judicial District of Hawai' i, Chief Judge Ronald iharra presiding, sitting in Kealakekua. I
had been in Hawai'i this month to attend the meeting of the Standing Committee on
Substance Abuse of the American Bar Association at the ABA's Annual Meeting in.
Honolulu, to visit with my in-laws who live in Kealakekua. and to vacation in Hawai'i.
I encourage you to take action to properly guide the use of your scarce law
enforcement resources in your county along the lines of the Methamphetamine Eradication
Act of 2006, but especially to increase the investigation and prosecution of burglary, motor
r vehicle theft and larceny theft. In the area of anti-drug investigations, while the police are
doing more to combat meth amphetamine, they are allowing themselves to be heavily
distracted in marijuana enforcement, especially in possession cases.
a
Setting the priorities of local law enforcement agencies is one of the most important
responsibilities of local legislative bodies, and a foundation of our federal system of
government.
- 1
Comm. No. 0
Ref. ioAes
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In comparing the harms to your community from the misuse of methamphetamine
with the harms from the misuse of marijuana, it is clear that the destruction of family life,
and the contribution to property and violent crime from methamphetaminc misuse ranks it
with alcohol misuse as your top substance abuse problem. In the Hawai'i County Drug
Court, overwhelmingly the offenders' leading substance abuse problem was with the
smoking of "ice." The court personnel with whom I spoke were unanimous in identifying
methamphetamine as, the primary drug problem, and as the drug that is contributing most to
other criminal activity.
Yet the statewide data on police activity from the Attorney General of Hawai'i shows
that there was a 9.3 percent increase in marijuana arrests in 2004 over 2003.
Nationwide, public officials are encouraging law enforcement managers to focus
more on methamphetamine than marijuana. And in Hawai'i~ the police should be
commended for substantially increasing their efforts against methamphetamine.
On April 26, 2006, U.S. Senator Charles Gzasslcy (R-Iowa), the highly respected
Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, the Chairman of the Senate Caucus on
International Narcotics Control, and third ranking member of the Senate Judiciary
Committee called upon President Bush to fire John Walters, the Director of the Office of
National Drug Control Policy at the White House for fogusipy too much on marijuana and
not on methamnheta'nes. (Cedar Rapids Gazette, Apr. 27, 2006,
http://www-mar)iac.org/drugiieNys/YO6/ri525/al3.litn)t'>25234 9). He was joined in his call by
U-S. Senator Tom Harkin (D-lowa).
Similarly, in February 2006, members of the Subcommittee on Criminal Justice,
Drug Policy and Human Resources of the House of Representatives Committee on
GOVernment Reform strongly criticized the Administration for neglecting the
methamphetamine problem by focusing excessively on marijuana.
Hawai'i: A top crime victim state
Comparing state crime reports, in 2003, Hawai'i was first among the fifty states in
the rate of eommision of larceny-theft, a crime associated with the misuse of
methamphetarnine. In the same year, Hawai'i was third nationally in the rate of motor
vehicle theft. (Hawai'i's Attorney General, Crime in Hawaii 2004,
http://hawaii.gov/ag/cpia/main/rs/Foldcr.2005-12-05,291O/Folder.2006-02-09,1123/C1H04.pdf ,
P. 5)
These crimes directly affect the economic well-being of your constituents. These
crimes raise the cost of insurance for drivers, rental car companies, and businesses. All of
this means higher prices in addition to higher cost of living Hawai'ians face from living
2500 miles from the mainland.
These crimes directly hurt your tourism based economy. Guidebooks for tourists
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warn about crime when parking at your tourist attractions. inside the trunk of my rental car
was a gigantic poster, "DO NOT LEAVE VALUABLES IN TRUNK." I have never seen
such a warning in years of renting cars around that nation - even in Florida in the 1980s at
the height of the cocaine wars.
Yet in response to Hawai'i's crime problem, over the past decade, statewide, the
number of arrests for larceny and motor vehicle theft have declined dramatically.
Arrests for serious property crime are plummeting
Larceny arrests have plummeted from 7,935 in 1995 to 4,543 in 2004, a decline of
42.7 percent. (Ibid. p. 102)
Motor Vehicle Theft Arrests have declined 55-7 percent since 1995
Throughout the state, the number of arrests for motor vehicle theft has declined
dramatically over the past decade except fora bump up in 2001 and 2002. In 1995, motor
vehicle theft arrests were 1,934. In 2002, motor vehicle arrests were down to 1,508. By
2004, they dropped to 856 this is a decline of 43.2 percent over two years, and 55.7
percent since 1995- (ld.)
Burelarv nests have declined by 57.8 percent since 1997
The number of burglary arrests by the police has steadily declined since 1997 from
1,519 to 641, a decline of 57.8 percent. (Id.)
Burglary is one of the most serious crimes because people feel their home is violated,
and it directly costs EVERY Hawaiian more money in higher property insurance premiums,
Homeowners and renters pay more for their own insurance if they have it, and they pay
higher prices because businesses have to pay more for insurance as part of their overhead.
Police Productivity
Simply making an arrest takes a lot of time of the criminal justice system. - not only
for the arresting officer, but for other criminal justice personnel. Clerks enter arrest data. A
judge arraigns the suspect. Bail officials interview the accused. A prosecutor reviews the
arrest. Even cases that are quickly and screened and dismissed entail many hours and
hundreds of dollars of personnel time.
One measure of police productivity, and the demands facing the criminal justice
system is the number of arrests. Comparing these numbers for various offenses is important
for a comparison of the importance the criminal justice system assigns to various cases.
Obviously this is affected by the number of offenses reported to the police. There are few
murder and rape arrests obviously, because relatively, the number of offenses is low. Drug
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arrests, unlike violent and property crime arrests, are not a response to criminal activity that
is reported by crime victims. They are mostly self-initiated by the police, and therefore
discretionary.
2004 Arrests Statewide
Murder 41
Forcible Rape 85
Robbery 320
Aggravated Assault 846
Burglary 641
Motor Vehicle Theft 856
Marijuana offenses 666
Nonnarcotic offenses 1627
Conclusion: Setting Police Priorities
One of the most important responsibilities of local government is the management of
the police. The determination of policing priorities should be made by the local legislative
authority, and not simply left to the unsupervised discretion of officers on patrol.
In many jurisdictions unfortunately, respect for the bravery of police officers and the
challenge they face misleads legislators to believe that oversight of law enforcement is
criticism. In addition, highly trained police managers frequently resist appropriate public
oversight as unwarranted meddling in their area of expertise.
Yet we expect publicly elected boards of education to make choices about curriculum
and to set priorities for schools.
We expect county legislators to make sophisticated decisions about planning and
dcvelopment, about the capacity of public infrastructure to absorb population growth.
Local govcnunent legislators have an obligation, when a public safety problem is
acute, to set appropriate priorities for law enforcement agencies.
Hawai'i County police cannot do everything. They must get direction from you.
Their top priorities to protecting the public must be the investigation of crimes of violence,
serious property crime, and methamphetamine cases. Marijuana arrests, such as the 556
Possession arrests in 2004 (statewide data), are a waste of scarce crime fighting resources.
My Oualifications
From 1979 to 19891 served as counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives
Committee on the Judiciary, principally responsible for Federal. Controlled Substances Law.
On the staff of the Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, and then for eight years on the staff of
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the Subcommittee on. Crime, l reviewed almost all of the bills introduced in the House of
Representatives to amend the Controlled Substances Act, or to govern the operations of the
Drug Enforcement Administration. From the 961" through the 100" Congress, i directly
participated in the drafting of most of the bills enacted with respect to illegal drugs. I was
also responsible for Federal laws regarding gun control, organized crime, money laundering,
pornography, arson, and other issues. I played a major role in drafting the Comprehensive
Crime Control Act of 1984, the Firearms Owners Protection Act of 1986, the Anti-Drug
Abuse Act of 1986, and the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988. 1 have been commended by the
U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service for
my assistance to their law enforcement missions.
Since 1989,1 have been the President of the Criminal Justice Policy Foundation, now
based in Silver Spring, MD. I work on a wide variety of criminal justice issues, and drug
policy matters. I am regularly consulted by Members of Congress and state legislators from
around the nation. I am a section liaison to the Standing Committee on Substance Abuse of
the American Bar Association, and past chair of the criminal justice committee of the ABA
section of individual rights and responsibilities. My analyses have been published in law
reviews and other journals around the nation.
I have worked on numerous bills to address the nation's methamphetaminc problem,
inclWding the Chemical Diversion and Trafficking Act of 1988 to control methamphetamine
precursors, provisions to require DEA and the Environmental Protection Agency to develop
a memorandum of understanding to handle the toxic waste of illegal meth labs, and
mandatory minimum prison terms for major methamphetaminc traffickers.
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