NYCLU: Rockefeller Drug Laws Create Racial Disparities in Rochester

Testifying today at a legislative hearing in Rochester, the New York Civil Liberties Union illustrated the stark racial disparities and enormous taxpayer burden the Rockefeller Drug Laws cause in Monroe County.

Gary Pudup, director of the NYCLU’s Genesee Valley Chapter and a retired Monroe County Sheriff’s police lieutenant with 29 years of law enforcement experience, testified at the joint hearing of the State Assembly’s standing committees on codes, judiciary, correction, health, alcoholism and drug abuse, and social services.

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“I am a 29-year veteran of drug law enforcement in upstate New York, and it is my opinion that the state’s approach to the drug problem has been ineffective and harmful,” Pudup said. “If the individuals arrested, prosecuted and incarcerated under the Rockefeller Drug Law had received treatment and rehabilitation services, many, if not most, would never have become enmeshed in the criminal justice system.”

Using a map created by the NYCLU and the Justice Mapping Center, Pudup showed legislators that 25 percent of adults sent to prison from Rochester came from areas with only 7 percent of the city’s population. Nearly one and three is imprisoned on drug offenses and 92 percent are black or Latino.

According to the most recent census data, whites outnumber blacks in Monroe County by 81 percent to 15 percent. Yet, only six of every 100,000 white county residents are in prison on drug offenses compared to 175 of every 100,000 black county residents. This disparity occurs despite research indicating that whites are the principal users and purveyors of drugs in New York State.

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A second map showed that state taxpayers will spend more than $27.5 million to imprison Rochester residents convicted of drug offenses in 2006, which accounts for 22 percent of all incarceration costs for Rochester residents sent to prison that year.

“This represents and unconscionable waste of scarce resources that would be much better spent on treatment programs, economic development and community renewal in those neighborhoods most adversely affected by the war on drugs,” Pudup said.

Enacted in 1973, the Rockefeller Drug Laws mandate extremely harsh prison terms for the possession or sale of relatively small amounts of drugs. Supposedly intended to target drug kingpins, most of the people incarcerated under these laws are convicted of low-level, nonviolent offenses, and many of them have no prior criminal record.

“The Rockefeller Drug Laws have neither curbed drug use nor enhanced public safety. Instead, they have ruined thousands of lives and annually wasted millions in tax dollars in prison costs,” said NYCLU Executive Director Donna Lieberman, who did not testify. “Our lawmakers must act now to end these inhumane and unjust laws and restore judicial discretion to drug sentencing.”