Senate Reduces Crack Cocaine Disparity
In an Historic Move, Senate Reduces Crack Cocaine Sentencing Disparity
March 17, 2010
The Sentencing Project
Under unanimous consent, the Senate today for the first time passed legislation that would end the controversial 100 to 1 disparity between crack and powder cocaine sentencing. The Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 would decrease the quantity disparity to 18 to 1. The bill moves on to the House for action.
Last week, after senators Richard Durbin (D-IL) and Jeff Sessions (R-AL) reached a compromise, the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary unanimously passed the bill which raises the trigger amount of crack cocaine for the 5-year mandatory minimum from 5 grams to 28 grams, and the trigger for a 10-year mandatory minimum from 50 grams to 280 grams.
The Sentencing Project is amongst a host of organizations that, for two decades, has advocated for the complete elimination of the sentencing disparity that has doled out excessive and harsh penalties and created unwarranted racial disparity in U.S. prisons. Under current law, selling 500 grams of powder cocaine subjects defendants to a mandatory 5-year prison term, whereas even possessing as little as 5 grams of crack cocaine subjects defendants to the same penalty.
Last July, the House Judiciary Committee passed the Fairness in Sentencing Act of 2009 which completely eliminates the disparity between crack and powder cocaine. The Sentencing Project is pleased to see reform moving forward and urges the House of Representatives to take up the Senate bill and move it swiftly towards passage.
