More crack attention at two decades

In addition to this NPR report, today brings other discussions of crack sentencing to “celebrate” the 20th anniversary of harsh federal mandatory minimum sentences for crack cocaine crimes.  As detailed here, the Justice Roundtable held a Senate Staff Briefing on the topic. 

Meanwhile, the American Civil Liberties Union today issued this sizable report entitled “Cracks in the System: Twenty Years of the Unjust Federal Crack Cocaine Law.” The ACLU report stresses discriminatory effects of the harsh crack sentencing.  Here is one of many telling nuggets from the report:

In 1986, before the enactment of federal mandatory minimum sentencing for crack cocaine offenses, the average federal drug sentence for African Americans was 11% higher than for whites.  Four years later, the average federal drug sentence for African Americans was 49% higher.