Infectious Myth – Life for Drugs – 10.27.15

In Episode 78 David the over-criminalization of drugs in the United States with Amy Povah. It is not just that recreational drugs are criminalized, but the sentences are sometimes absurd. Amy received a 24 year sentence in the 1990s largely because she refused to infiltrate her ex-husband’s ecstasy manufacturing operation. Her sentence was so egregious it was covered by Glamour magazine and the television show, “60 Minutes”, and her sentence was eventually commuted by President Clinton after she had served 9 years. She started helping some of the women she was in jail with, and eventually broadened the scope of her organization to other women, and then to men who also commonly received these lengthy sentences. One of her most shocking observations is that a single witness can produce a conviction, even if the witness has a motivation to lie, to receive a lesser sentence for themselves, and even if the victim of the false testimony is not a bit player in the conspiracy, but an innocent pawn. Amy describes several shockingly unjust convictions and talks about how the war of drugs is finally starting to wane, but there are still of millions of Americans in jail for non-violent drug convictions, and even if marijuana is legalized, people serving life for small quantities of marijuana won’t necessarily be released.

Amy runs the Can Do foundation (http://www.candoclemency.com) and is making the film called Four Twenty.

Other useful resources are:

• Life for Pot: http://www.lifeforpot.com  
• Law Enforcement Against Prohibition: http://www.leap.cc
• Cut 50: http://www.cut50.org
• November coalition: http://november.org