Some inmates already in prison for crimes related to crack cocaine are entitled to leniency now that sentencing disparities between crack-related offenses and crimes involving powdered cocaine have been addressed, Attorney General Eric Holder said on Wednesday.
Holder appeared before the U.S. Sentencing Commission, which oversees guidelines for federal sentences, to urge retroactive application — at least in some cases — of the Fair Sentencing Act, which Congress passed and President Barack Obama signed into law last August. That act addressed what was widely acknowledged to be an unfair discrepancy between sentences linked to crack, often involving black offenders, and powdered cocaine, more typically involving white offenders.
“This new law not only reduced the inappropriate 100-to-1 sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine offenses – a disparity that this Commission itself found to be unjustifiable and repeatedly recommended should be amended – it also strengthens the hand of law enforcement and includes tough new criminal penalties to mitigate the risks posed by our nation’s most serious, and most destructive, drug traffickers and violent offenders,” Holder said in a statement. “Because of the Fair Sentencing Act, our nation is now closer to fulfilling its fundamental, and founding, promise of equal treatment under law.”
But to be truly fair, the new guidelines must be applied retroactively, at least in the cases of non-violent offenders who demonstrate that they merit leniency, Holder told the commission.
“Of course, in considering retroactive application of this amendment, protecting the American people is – and will remain – the Administration’s top priority,” Holder said. “President Obama and I, along with leaders across the Administration, understand how illegal drugs – including crack – ravage communities. Crack offenders – especially violent ones – should be punished.”
Holder said the issue was “deeply personal” to him. “While serving on the bench, here in Washington, D.C., in the late ‘80’s and early ‘90’s, I saw the devastating effects of illegal drugs on families, communities, and individual lives,” he said. “I know what it is like to sentence young offenders to long prison terms, and I did so to protect the public from those who were serious threats and who had engaged in violence. However, throughout my tenure as this city’s U.S. Attorney, I also saw that our federal crack sentencing laws did not achieve that result. Our drug laws were not perceived as fair and our law enforcement efforts suffered as a result.”
Holder said he rejected any suggestion that the commission lacks the authority, without Congressional approval, to make the guidelines retroactive. Four of the six members of the commission would have to endorse Holder’s recommendation for it to take effect. If it does, one in every 18 federal inmates — about 12,000 altogether — could have their sentences reduced by an average of three years, the Associated Press estimated.
