Human Rights Watch concludes that these sentences are in many instances “cruel and inhuman” under international human rights law because they are so disproportionate to the crimes they are intended to punish.
This summer, Attorney General Eric Holder made history when he acknowledged the over-severity of these sentences and announced that prosecutors should avert charges with mandatory minimum sentences in some low-level drug cases, particularly the sort of sentencing enhancements they use to ratchet up the sentence. Holder even added in September that this should apply to pending cases. But Human Rights Watch questions not only whether Holder’s guidance is enough to effectively alter this system, but also whether prosecutors have even changed their ways. The report provides an example of one man, Roy Lee Clay, who was sentenced to life without parole for conspiracy to distribute cocaine in Baltimore after Holder’s announcement. Human Rights Watch notes that Clay’s crime did not include any allegations of violence nor the presence of a gun. Yet when Clay didn’t take a deal, prosecutors added enhancements for two previous cocaine offenses of possession with intent to distribute. This was enough to ratchet up his sentence from ten years to life. As in countless other cases, the judge called the sentence “extremely severe and harsh,” but the prosecutor explicitly claimed that his charges fell within Holder’s guidance, even though he would not explain why he deserved a life sentence.
As with so many other problems in the criminal justice system, these mandatory minimum sentences are key to sustaining this system of plea deals. Without these laws, prosecutors would not hold the power to sentence, and could not use that as leverage in negotiations. Human Rights Watch calls for eliminating them entirely, and several bipartisan bills now pending in Congress would go a long way toward that goal by giving judges significantly more discretion to deviate from these sentences — much farther than Holder’s limited, discretionary guidance to prosecutors.
Article Appeared @http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2013/12/05/3021391/drug-prosecutions-post/