DEA Seeks Prosecutors To Fight Opioid Crisis; Critics Fear Return To War On Drugs
An advocacy group says a move at the Drug Enforcement Administration to hire prosecutors is another signal of how the Justice Department is changing under Attorney General Jeff Sessions
The Drug Enforcement Administration has proposed hiring its own prosecutor corps to bring cases related to drug trafficking, money laundering and asset forfeiture — a move that advocacy groups warn could exceed the DEA’s legal authority and reinvigorate the 1980s-era war on drugs.
Citing the epidemic in opioid-related overdoses, the DEA said it wants to hire as many as 20 prosecutors to enhance its resources and target the biggest offenders. The DEA said the new force of lawyers “would be permitted to represent the United States in criminal and civil proceedings before the courts and apply for various legal orders.” The agency would use money it gets from companies that manufacture and dispense certain kinds of prescription drugs under the federal Controlled Substances Act.
The agency’s proposal, published in the federal register in March, received little if any public attention. But it would represent the first time the DEA had its own, dedicated prosecutors to go after drug-related offenses. Those lawyers would be shared or “detailed” to U.S. attorney’s offices and the main Justice Department, after an assessment of which regions needed the most help.
In an interview, DEA spokesman Rusty Payne described the plan as an outgrowth of the destruction that opioids have wreaked.
“We’re losing 90 people a day to opioids and about 140 a day to drugs altogether,” Payne said. “It’s pretty clear we’ve got to use the tools we have at our disposal to attack this. We’ve got to hold accountable the people who are facilitating addiction and heartache.”
“In this notice, the DEA effectively proposes a power grab and is trying to end-run the congressional appropriations process,” said Michael Collins, deputy director at the Drug Policy Alliance.
Collins said the special account at DEA is intended to keep prescription drugs safe and available to patients who need them, not to pay for prosecutors to target drug offenders. He said the rule is yet another warning signal that the Justice Department is shifting its approach to drug criminals under new Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
Sessions, who was a U.S. attorney in Alabama in the 1980s, frequently decries the danger from drugs and gangs and uses rhetoric with echoes from the height of the cocaine epidemic.
“If the Sessions DOJ wants to abandon criminal justice reform, and escalate the war on drugs, that conversation should happen above board and in public; not in some arcane rulemaking document that very few people read or understand,” Collins added.
Filed under: General Problems
For those of you who actually believed Trump was going to be your savior.
To those of you who voted Party preference over your needs.
Finally, to all of you who believed that “Voting the BUMS OUT” was a waist of time and just stayed home on election day.
You all OWN THIS, but you OWN IT for all of us.
Beauregard Jefferson Sessions is the most Racist uncaring about the little guy, cross between Mad Magazine and Elmer Fudd looking Piece of Shit Prick in politics. Tom Price equally doesn’t give a Damn about anyone of us either and the list goes on and on with the catering to the rich so who cares about the Sick and Poor Assholes in the Trump Regime.
To all of you who did go and attempted to “Vote the Bums Out” and tried to make our lives better. For everyone who Makes Calls and Writes Letters & Emails to your sitting representatives. THANK YOU and please keep it up.
Sessions , PeaWhee Hermond, is a joke. This guy doesn’t have a clue. Are we stupid keeping someone like him in office. I’m sorry but I just get a brain freeze every time I hear this guy talk. No one says a word about what he says not a word either way.
It will work , vote the bums out. Write letters. We can not give up because they will fight us to keep collecting pay checks from us. We have to stop paying for their , families, health insurance. Please keep on this one why are we paying for this. They vote their own pay raises pay insurance for them and their families. They work when they want to.
Vote the Bums Out write a letter and let them know you are forming groups against them. “Sessions”!
Sandrag
WHAT IS IT GONNA TAKE???OR ARE WE FIGHTING AND WE ARE JUST DEALING WITH A GOVERNMENT,,THAT,””””””’A FORM OF GOVERNMENT THAT EVINCES BY DESIGN TO REDUCE IT CITIZENS,MEDICALLY ILL TO ABSOLUTE DESPOTISM,”
maryw