The only way to stop drug lords from reaping billions from the drug trade is to end drug prohibition, says a former leader of the drug war. The same applies to private prison companies reaping millions.

Tony O’Neill wrote 14 June 2011 in The Fix, Why Growing Numbers of Police Are Slamming Drug Prohibition:

For decades, police were convinced that total prohibition was the only way to end America’s deadly drug wars. Now thousands of cops are not only having second thoughts but actually taking to the streets in protest.

“I was pro-prohibition: that’s what my training was about!” says Major Neill Franklin, Executive Director of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP), who previously served for 33 years with the Maryland State Police and the Baltimore police forces on the front line of America’s longest running war. “Even though I grew up in Baltimore and saw what was going on, we were taught and trained to believe that if we push hard enough, if we lock up the people involved, then this will eventually dissipate, or at least be reduced to a manageable level.” He gives a long, world-weary sigh. “Of course back then I had no clue…You just can’t tell somebody not to use and they’re gonna stop using! As long as there are people willing to buy, and as long as people don’t have employment, then you’re going to have an illicit drug trade. I saw that we made these arrests—we locked up dealers and users alike—and it might get quiet for a few days, or even a couple of weeks, but give it time and it all starts up again.”

The War on Drugs has failed. Like alcohol prohibition before it, it breeds more violence. Law enforcement against it just makes it worse:

In the late ‘80s and the ‘90s, the Baltimore drug business “became a lot more violent. A big reason for that was that law enforcement—with the persuasion of federal government and financial grants and other money coming from the Department of Justice—started to dismantle the many drug organizations that were out there. Many of these organizations in Baltimore were huge.”

These successes brought unexpected consequences, Franklin explains. “When we started infiltrating these organizations and breaking them up, we left a huge void in the market. The demand for the drugs has always been there and will always be there—so many young entrepreneurs saw this as an opportunity to come in and grab a share of the market. That’s when we saw the advent of the open-air drug markets. These younger guys realized they had to arm themselves to protect their share and that brought about a massive upturn in street violence.

It’s time to end the violence by ending drug prohibition, thus ending the massive money flows that fuel the violence. Legalize, regulate, and tax.

And for those who don’t think it will happen:

Those of us who agree that prohibition has been a failure can sometimes get sucked into pessimism. But when you speak to a man who has lost friends in this war and is still willing to risk alienating his old comrades by speaking out, it’s hard not to feel inspired.

It took Franklin years to change his views, but it was his front-line experience leading the drug war in Baltimore that did it. If he can change his tune, anyone can. This is the song he’s singing now:

“You can say what you want about why we don’t change our drugs laws,” Franklin muses, after we talk about how hard it can be to change hearts and minds, “and sure, we always here a lot of stuff from the other side about how we do this to save the children or whatever, but the simple reason is this: too many people are making literally billions from the illicit drug trade. And believe me, it’s not those young men standing out on the corners who are making it. They are the ones getting the least of what’s being generated. If we were really serious about helping our kids and our communities, we’d put our energies into education and treatment, and teach people, so they make the right decisions, period.”

We don’t need a private prison in Lowndes County, Georgia. Spend those tax dollars on rehabilitation and education.

-jsq

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