Posted on 07/25/2008 8:49:03 PM PDT by bamahead
After being caught twice with a "baggie" of marijuana, 23-year old Rachel Hoffman was reportedly told by police in Tallahassee, Florida that she would go to prison for four years unless she became an undercover informant.
The young woman, a recent graduate of Florida State University, was murdered during a botched sting operation two months ago.
"The idea of waging a war on drugs is to protect people and here it seems like we're putting people in harm's way," said Lance Block, a lawyer hired by Rachel's parents.
The Florida Attorney General's office says it is reviewing the procedures and protocol of the Tallahassee police.
"I'm calling her a criminal," Tallahassee police chief Dennis Jones told 20/20, who maintains that both drug dealers and drug users are considered criminals to his department.
Under Florida law, possession of more than 20 grams of marijuana is a felony.
The Tallahassee police chief says Rachel was suspected of selling drugs and she was rightly treated as a criminal.
"That's my job as a police chief to find these criminals in our community and take them off the street, to make the proper arrests," Jones told 20/20.
Rachel's case also is raising questions about how police recruit and use informants in undercover operations.
"There need to be some safeguards here," said Block, the Hoffman family lawyer.
The young woman received no training before being sent to an undercover meeting to buy a large amount of drugs and a handgun from two suspects.
Police says Rachel was killed by the very handgun she was supposed to buy.
"I don't think she understood the risk or danger that she was in," said Block.
Rachel was in a drug court diversion program when she became an informant.
(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...
Not under the color of law.
Abraham Lincoln:
A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government was founded.
Abraham Lincoln:
Prohibition goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man’s appetite by legislation, and makes a crime out of things that are not crimes.
Drug prohibition is a failure just like alcohol prohibition was.
I don’t remember who asked this but I’ve never see a good answer.
“If the government can’t keep drugs away from inmates who are locked in steel cages, surrounded by barbed wire, watched by armed guards, drug-tested, strip-searched, X-rayed, and videotaped – how can it possibly stop the flow of drugs to an entire nation?”
You do understand that if it were not a crime.....there would be no criminal element associated with it. Don't you? Various reasons of course....but mainly no gigantic illegal profits. I guess it all boils down to....where would you rather have users buy their drugs....from Rexall and Thrifty? Or would you rather have them continue dealing with the "Bloods and the Crips"?
If someone wanted a weekend high they would then be able to afford it from their paycheck.....probably. This then, would not require them ripping off your stereo and T.V. sets ......fencing them to get money to support their stupid habits.
No! I don't do drugs.....never have. Grew up in the sixties and found that it was always available for a price. Like any commodity.....it will be supplied if there is a demand. When you make something illegal that is in demand.....the price goes up....and the criminals enter the equation.
We need a president that will collapse the tunnels under the border. And use 60mm HE rounds on any living thing that comes within 3 feet of our border.
If drugs were legal....tunnels wouldn't be needed. People would grow it themselves or buy it at the drug store. We could then take those billions of dollars we spend on asset forfeiture, Lawyers, DEA, Judges, diversion programs and Policemen.... cancel the programs and fire the rest of them!
We have not learned a thing from "Prohibition"....except that we will continue to repeat history without learning from it.
There is a very real war going on across our southern border between drug families. Tijuana, Baha were pleasant places to visit at a time in the past. Not any longer.
##
Yes because prohibition has made the profits so high that the criminals can afford a war. There is no war between Coors and Miller or between Jack Daniels and Jim Beam. But there were wars between bootleggers during alcohol prohibition. Alcohol prohibition made people like Al Capone and Joe Kennedy very rich.
End drug prohibition and those drug wars you are worried about will stop.
Be prepared to receive your answer.
FOLLOW THE MONEY! Without a drug war they cannot tax us to fight it. Their big salaries and benefits will then go by the wayside. It is in the government's best interest to have this war on drugs to continue the assault on the liberty of the American people.
The prison system is much the same. Drugs placate convicts. The government (prison system) wants placated inmates. The government takes it cut.....and the drugs flow in.
This is not rocket science!
A free market would solve the energy problem. A free market would also solve the drug problem. Freedom always works....where ever its tried.
I misspoke, I meant I’ve never heard a good answer to how the drug war can stop the flow of drugs into the whole nation.
Of course you are right. The market would take care of it just like repeal of alcohol prohibition stopped the beer wars.
Under the pretense of harmlessness.
i lol’d this thread is still going.
So only potheads do B&E? LOL
“The growth of drug-related crime is a far greater evil to society as a whole than drug taking. Even so, because we have been seduced by the idea that governments should legislate for our own good, very few people can see how dangerously absurd the present policy is.”
- John Casey
They also murder confidential informants.
And no drug thread would be complete without fake Lincoln quotes.
Just like it solved the slavery problem.
lol
“Prohibition will work great injury to the cause of temperance. It is a species of intemperance within itself, for it goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man’s appetite by legislation, and makes a crime out of things that are not crimes. A Prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government was founded.”
-Abraham Lincoln (1809-65) U.S. President.
The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations is licensed from Columbia University Press. Copyright 1993 by Columbia University Press.
Columbia University Press disagrees.
It’s a fake quote. Undated too.
Yup....you're correct. In a free society, free men will not tolerate slavery. I guess the "War Between The States" proved that....didn't it. It took about 200 years on this continent with the auspices of various intolerant governments, but finally the concept of freedom for all men prevailed. It would have happened much earlier without the sanction of freedom stifling despots and old world monarchies.
LOL Why do they do that? Is it because they are protecting their profits that are artificially high because of prohibition? Why aren’t Coors and Miller killing informants today? Humm?
Why aren’t Jack Daniels and Jim Beam having wars and shootouts? Drug prohibition is a failure just like alcohol prohibition was. It’s affect on society is worse than the problem it is supposedly designed to cure.
They can’t keep drugs out of prisons. Turning the United States into one huge prison will not keep drugs out and only make the profit higher causing the violence to increases.
People aren’t killing informants who turn them in for J-walking. The war on drugs has caused the drug wars and the attending violence as well as reducing our rights.
Potheads behave like criminals because they are criminals. They killed Rachel. Admit it.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.