Friday, December 18, 2009

Why is Marijuana Illegal? An Insightful History of the Criminalization of Marijuana

According to an insightful article i found in the history of marijuana laws, I found the following article at drugwarrant.com. Why is Marijuana Illegal?

7000-8000 B.C.

First woven fabric believed to be from hemp.
1619

Jamestown Colony, Virginia passes law requiring farmers to grow hemp.
1700s

Hemp was the primary crop grown by George Washington at Mount Vernon, and a secondary crop grown by Thomas Jefferson at Monticello.
1884

Maine is the first state to outlaw alcohol.
1906

Pure Food and Drug Act is passed, forming the Food and Drug Administration. First time that drugs have any government oversight.
1913

California, apparently, passes the first state marijuana law, though missed by many because it referred to “preparations of hemp, or loco weed.”

1914

Harrison Act passed, outlawing opiates and cocaine (taxing scheme)
1915

Utah passes state anti-marijuana law.
1919

18th Amendment to the Constitution (alcohol prohibition) is ratified.
1930

Harry J. Anslinger given control of the new Federal Bureau of Narcotics (he remains in the position until 1962)
1933

21st Amendment to the Constitution is ratified, repealing alcohol prohibition.
1937

Marijuana Tax Act
1938

Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act
1951

Boggs Amendment to the Harrison Narcotic Act (mandatory sentences)
1956

Narcotics Control Act adds more severe penalties
1970

Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act.
Replaces and updates all previous laws concerning narcotics and other dangerous drugs. Empasis on law enforcement. Includes the Controlled Substances Act, where marijuana is classified a Schedule 1 drug (reserved for the most dangerous drugs that have no recognized medical use).
1972

Drug Abuse Office and Treatment Act.
Establishes federally funded programs for prevention and treatment
1973

Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA)
Changes Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs into the DEA
1974 and 1978

Drug Abuse Treatment and Control Amendments. Extends 1972 act
1988

Anti-Drug Abuse Act.
Establishes oversight office: National Office of Drug Control Policy and the Drug Czar
1992

ADAMHA Reorganization.
Transfers NIDA, NIMH, and NIAAA to NIH and incorporates ADAMHA’s programs into the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) Many people assume that marijuana was made illegal through some kind of process involving scientific, medical, and government hearings; that it was to protect the citizens from what was determined to be a dangerous drug.

The actual story shows a much different picture. Those who voted on the legal fate of this plant never had the facts, but were dependent on information supplied by those who had a specific agenda to deceive lawmakers. You’ll see below that the very first federal vote to prohibit marijuana was based entirely on a documented lie on the floor of the Senate.

You’ll also see that the history of marijuana’s criminalization is filled with:

Racism
Fear
Protection of Corporate Profits
Yellow Journalism
Ignorant, Incompetent, and/or Corrupt Legislators
Personal Career Advancement and Greed
These are the actual reasons marijuana is illegal.


Background

For most of human history, marijuana has been completely legal. It’s not a recently discovered plant, nor is it a long-standing law. Marijuana has been illegal for less than 1% of the time that it’s been in use. Its known uses go back further than 7,000 B.C. and it was legal as recently as when Ronald Reagan was a boy.

The marijuana (hemp) plant, of course, has an incredible number of uses. The earliest known woven fabric was apparently of hemp, and over the centuries the plant was used for food, incense, cloth, rope, and much more. This adds to some of the confusion over its introduction in the United States, as the plant was well known from the early 1600’s, but did not reach public awareness as a recreational drug until the early 1900’s.

America’s first marijuana law was enacted at Jamestown Colony, Virginia in 1619. It was a law “ordering” all farmers to grow Indian hempseed. There were several other “must grow” laws over the next 200 years (you could be jailed for not growing hemp during times of shortage in Virginia between 1763 and 1767), and during most of that time, hemp was legal tender (you could even pay your taxes with hemp — try that today!) Hemp was such a critical crop for a number of purposes (including essential war requirements – rope, etc.) that the government went out of its way to encourage growth.

The United States Census of 1850 counted 8,327 hemp “plantations” (minimum 2,000-acre farm) growing cannabis hemp for cloth, canvas and even the cordage used for baling cotton.

The Mexican Connection

In the early 1900s, the western states developed significant tensions regarding the influx of Mexican-Americans. The revolution in Mexico in 1910 spilled over the border, with General Pershing’s army clashing with bandit Pancho Villa. Later in that decade, bad feelings developed between the small farmer and the large farms that used cheaper Mexican labor. Then, the depression came and increased tensions, as jobs and welfare resources became scarce.

One of the “differences” seized upon during this time was the fact that many Mexicans smoked marijuana and had brought the plant with them, and it was through this that California apparently passed the first state marijuana law, outlawing “preparations of hemp, or loco weed.”

However, one of the first state laws outlawing marijuana may have been influenced, not just by Mexicans using the drug, but, oddly enough, because of Mormons using it. Mormons who traveled to Mexico in 1910 came back to Salt Lake City with marijuana. The church’s reaction to this may have contributed to the state’s marijuana law. (Note: the source for this speculation is from articles by Charles Whitebread, Professor of Law at USC Law School in a paper for the Virginia Law Review, and a speech to the California Judges Association (sourced below). Mormon blogger Ardis Parshall disputes this.)

Other states quickly followed suit with marijuana prohibition laws, including Wyoming (1915), Texas (1919), Iowa (1923), Nevada (1923), Oregon (1923), Washington (1923), Arkansas (1923), and Nebraska (1927). These laws tended to be specifically targeted against the Mexican-American population.

When Montana outlawed marijuana in 1927, the Butte Montana Standard reported a legislator’s comment: “When some beet field peon takes a few traces of this stuff… he thinks he has just been elected president of Mexico, so he starts out to execute all his political enemies.” In Texas, a senator said on the floor of the Senate: “All Mexicans are crazy, and this stuff [marijuana] is what makes them crazy.”

Jazz and Assassins

In the eastern states, the “problem” was attributed to a combination of Latin Americans and black jazz musicians. Marijuana and jazz traveled from New Orleans to Chicago, and then to Harlem, where marijuana became an indispensable part of the music scene, even entering the language of the black hits of the time (Louis Armstrong’s “Muggles”, Cab Calloway’s “That Funny Reefer Man”, Fats Waller’s “Viper’s Drag”).

Again, racism was part of the charge against marijuana, as newspapers in 1934 editorialized: “Marihuana influences Negroes to look at white people in the eye, step on white men’s shadows and look at a white woman twice.”

Two other fear-tactic rumors started to spread: one, that Mexicans, Blacks and other foreigners were snaring white children with marijuana; and two, the story of the “assassins.” Early stories of Marco Polo had told of “hasheesh-eaters” or hashashin, from which derived the term “assassin.” In the original stories, these professional killers were given large doses of hashish and brought to the ruler’s garden (to give them a glimpse of the paradise that awaited them upon successful completion of their mission). Then, after the effects of the drug disappeared, the assassin would fulfill his ruler’s wishes with cool, calculating loyalty.

By the 1930s, the story had changed. Dr. A. E. Fossier wrote in the 1931 New Orleans Medical and Surgical Journal: “Under the influence of hashish those fanatics would madly rush at their enemies, and ruthlessly massacre every one within their grasp.” Within a very short time, marijuana started being linked to violent behavior.

Alcohol Prohibition and Federal Approaches to Drug Prohibition

During this time, the United States was also dealing with alcohol prohibition, which lasted from 1919 to 1933. Alcohol prohibition was extremely visible and debated at all levels, while drug laws were passed without the general public’s knowledge. National alcohol prohibition happened through the mechanism of an amendment to the constitution.

Earlier (1914), the Harrison Act was passed, which provided federal tax penalties for opiates and cocaine.

The federal approach is important. It was considered at the time that the federal government did not have the constitutional power to outlaw alcohol or drugs. It is because of this that alcohol prohibition required a constitutional amendment.

At that time in our country’s history, the judiciary regularly placed the tenth amendment in the path of congressional regulation of “local” affairs, and direct regulation of medical practice was considered beyond congressional power under the commerce clause (since then, both provisions have been weakened so far as to have almost no meaning).

Since drugs could not be outlawed at the federal level, the decision was made to use federal taxes as a way around the restriction. In the Harrison Act, legal uses of opiates and cocaine were taxed (supposedly as a revenue need by the federal government, which is the only way it would hold up in the courts), and those who didn’t follow the law found themselves in trouble with the treasury department.

In 1930, a new division in the Treasury Department was established — the Federal Bureau of Narcotics — and Harry J. Anslinger was named director. This, if anything, marked the beginning of the all-out war against marijuana.

Anslinger was an extremely ambitious man, and he recognized the Bureau of Narcotics as an amazing career opportunity — a new government agency with the opportunity to define both the problem and the solution. He immediately realized that opiates and cocaine wouldn’t be enough to help build his agency, so he latched on to marijuana and started to work on making it illegal at the federal level.

Anslinger immediately drew upon the themes of racism and violence to draw national attention to the problem he wanted to create. He also promoted and frequently read from “Gore Files” — wild reefer-madness-style exploitation tales of ax murderers on marijuana and sex and… Negroes. Here are some quotes that have been widely attributed to Anslinger and his Gore Files:

“There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos, and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz, and swing, result from marijuana use. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers, and any others.”

“…the primary reason to outlaw marijuana is its effect on the degenerate races.”

“Marijuana is an addictive drug which produces in its users insanity, criminality, and death.”

“Reefer makes darkies think they’re as good as white men.”

“Marihuana leads to pacifism and communist brainwashing”

“You smoke a joint and you’re likely to kill your brother.”

“Marijuana is the most violence-causing drug in the history of mankind.”
And he loved to pull out his own version of the “assassin” definition:

“In the year 1090, there was founded in Persia the religious and military order of the Assassins, whose history is one of cruelty, barbarity, and murder, and for good reason: the members were confirmed users of hashish, or marihuana, and it is from the Arabs’ ‘hashashin’ that we have the English word ‘assassin.’”

Yellow Journalism

Harry Anslinger got some additional help from William Randolf Hearst, owner of a huge chain of newspapers. Hearst had lots of reasons to help. First, he hated Mexicans. Second, he had invested heavily in the timber industry to support his newspaper chain and didn’t want to see the development of hemp paper in competition. Third, he had lost 800,000 acres of timberland to Pancho Villa, so he hated Mexicans. Fourth, telling lurid lies about Mexicans (and the devil marijuana weed causing violence) sold newspapers, making him rich.

Some samples from the San Francisco Examiner:

“Marihuana makes fiends of boys in thirty days — Hashish goads users to bloodlust.”

“By the tons it is coming into this country — the deadly, dreadful poison that racks and tears not only the body, but the very heart and soul of every human being who once becomes a slave to it in any of its cruel and devastating forms…. Marihuana is a short cut to the insane asylum. Smoke marihuana cigarettes for a month and what was once your brain will be nothing but a storehouse of horrid specters. Hasheesh makes a murderer who kills for the love of killing out of the mildest mannered man who ever laughed at the idea that any habit could ever get him….”
And other nationwide columns…

“Users of marijuana become STIMULATED as they inhale the drug and are LIKELY TO DO ANYTHING. Most crimes of violence in this section, especially in country districts are laid to users of that drug.”

“Was it marijuana, the new Mexican drug, that nerved the murderous arm of Clara Phillips when she hammered out her victim’s life in Los Angeles?… THREE-FOURTHS OF THE CRIMES of violence in this country today are committed by DOPE SLAVES — that is a matter of cold record.”
Hearst and Anslinger were then supported by Dupont chemical company and various pharmaceutical companies in the effort to outlaw cannabis. Dupont had patented nylon, and wanted hemp removed as competition. The pharmaceutical companies could neither identify nor standardize cannabis dosages, and besides, with cannabis, folks could grow their own medicine and not have to purchase it from large companies.

This all set the stage for…

The Marijuana Tax Act of 1937.

After two years of secret planning, Anslinger brought his plan to Congress — complete with a scrapbook full of sensational Hearst editorials, stories of ax murderers who had supposedly smoked marijuana, and racial slurs.

It was a remarkably short set of hearings.

The one fly in Anslinger’s ointment was the appearance by Dr. William C. Woodward, Legislative Council of the American Medical Association.

Woodward started by slamming Harry Anslinger and the Bureau of Narcotics for distorting earlier AMA statements that had nothing to do with marijuana and making them appear to be AMA endorsement for Anslinger’s view.

He also reproached the legislature and the Bureau for using the term marijuana in the legislation and not publicizing it as a bill about cannabis or hemp. At this point, marijuana (or marihuana) was a sensationalist word used to refer to Mexicans smoking a drug and had not been connected in most people’s minds to the existing cannabis/hemp plant. Thus, many who had legitimate reasons to oppose the bill weren’t even aware of it.

Woodward went on to state that the AMA was opposed to the legislation and further questioned the approach of the hearings, coming close to outright accusation of misconduct by Anslinger and the committee:

“That there is a certain amount of narcotic addiction of an objectionable character no one will deny. The newspapers have called attention to it so prominently that there must be some grounds for [their] statements [even Woodward was partially taken in by Hearst's propaganda]. It has surprised me, however, that the facts on which these statements have been based have not been brought before this committee by competent primary evidence. We are referred to newspaper publications concerning the prevalence of marihuana addiction. We are told that the use of marihuana causes crime.

But yet no one has been produced from the Bureau of Prisons to show the number of prisoners who have been found addicted to the marihuana habit. An informed inquiry shows that the Bureau of Prisons has no evidence on that point.

You have been told that school children are great users of marihuana cigarettes. No one has been summoned from the Children’s Bureau to show the nature and extent of the habit, among children.

Inquiry of the Children’s Bureau shows that they have had no occasion to investigate it and know nothing particularly of it.

Inquiry of the Office of Education— and they certainly should know something of the prevalence of the habit among the school children of the country, if there is a prevalent habit— indicates that they have had no occasion to investigate and know nothing of it.

Moreover, there is in the Treasury Department itself, the Public Health Service, with its Division of Mental Hygiene. The Division of Mental Hygiene was, in the first place, the Division of Narcotics. It was converted into the Division of Mental Hygiene, I think, about 1930. That particular Bureau has control at the present time of the narcotics farms that were created about 1929 or 1930 and came into operation a few years later. No one has been summoned from that Bureau to give evidence on that point.

Informal inquiry by me indicates that they have had no record of any marihuana of Cannabis addicts who have ever been committed to those farms.

The bureau of Public Health Service has also a division of pharmacology. If you desire evidence as to the pharmacology of Cannabis, that obviously is the place where you can get direct and primary evidence, rather than the indirect hearsay evidence.”
Committee members then proceeded to attack Dr. Woodward, questioning his motives in opposing the legislation. Even the Chairman joined in:

The Chairman: If you want to advise us on legislation, you ought to come here with some constructive proposals, rather than criticism, rather than trying to throw obstacles in the way of something that the Federal Government is trying to do. It has not only an unselfish motive in this, but they have a serious responsibility.

Dr. Woodward: We cannot understand yet, Mr. Chairman, why this bill should have been prepared in secret for 2 years without any intimation, even, to the profession, that it was being prepared.
After some further bantering…

The Chairman: I would like to read a quotation from a recent editorial in the Washington Times:

The marihuana cigarette is one of the most insidious of all forms of dope, largely because of the failure of the public to understand its fatal qualities.

The Nation is almost defenseless against it, having no Federal laws to cope with it and virtually no organized campaign for combating it.

The result is tragic.

School children are the prey of peddlers who infest school neighborhoods.

High school boys and girls buy the destructive weed without knowledge of its capacity of harm, and conscienceless dealers sell it with impunity.

This is a national problem, and it must have national attention.

The fatal marihuana cigarette must be recognized as a deadly drug, and American children must be protected against it.
That is a pretty severe indictment. They say it is a national question and that it requires effective legislation. Of course, in a general way, you have responded to all of these statements; but that indicates very clearly that it is an evil of such magnitude that it is recognized by the press of the country as such.
And that was basically it. Yellow journalism won over medical science.

The committee passed the legislation on. And on the floor of the house, the entire discussion was:

Member from upstate New York: “Mr. Speaker, what is this bill about?”

Speaker Rayburn: “I don’t know. It has something to do with a thing called marihuana. I think it’s a narcotic of some kind.”

“Mr. Speaker, does the American Medical Association support this bill?”

Member on the committee jumps up and says: “Their Doctor Wentworth[sic] came down here. They support this bill 100 percent.”
And on the basis of that lie, on August 2, 1937, marijuana became illegal at the federal level.

The entire coverage in the New York Times: “President Roosevelt signed today a bill to curb traffic in the narcotic, marihuana, through heavy taxes on transactions.”

Anslinger as precursor to the Drug Czars

Anslinger was essentially the first Drug Czar. Even though the term didn’t exist until William Bennett’s position as director of the White House Office of National Drug Policy, Anslinger acted in a similar fashion. In fact, there are some amazing parallels between Anslinger and the current Drug Czar John Walters. Both had kind of a carte blanche to go around demonizing drugs and drug users. Both had resources and a large public podium for their voice to be heard and to promote their personal agenda. Both lied constantly, often when it was unnecessary. Both were racists. Both had the ear of lawmakers, and both realized that they could persuade legislators and others based on lies, particularly if they could co-opt the media into squelching or downplaying any opposition views.

Anslinger even had the ability to circumvent the First Amendment. He banned the Canadian movie “Drug Addict,” a 1946 documentary that realistically depicted the drug addicts and law enforcement efforts. He even tried to get Canada to ban the movie in their own country, or failing that, to prevent U.S. citizens from seeing the movie in Canada. Canada refused. (Today, Drug Czar John Walters is trying to bully Canada into keeping harsh marijuana laws.)

Anslinger had 37 years to solidify the propaganda and stifle opposition. The lies continued the entire time (although the stories would adjust — the 21 year old Florida boy who killed his family of five got younger each time he told it). In 1961, he looked back at his efforts:

“Much of the most irrational juvenile violence and that has written a new chapter of shame and tragedy is traceable directly to this hemp intoxication. A gang of boys tear the clothes from two school girls and rape the screaming girls, one boy after the other. A sixteen-year-old kills his entire family of five in Florida, a man in Minnesota puts a bullet through the head of a stranger on the road; in Colorado husband tries to shoot his wife, kills her grandmother instead and then kills himself. Every one of these crimes had been proceeded [sic] by the smoking of one or more marijuana “reefers.” As the marijuana situation grew worse, I knew action had to be taken to get the proper legislation passed. By 1937 under my direction, the Bureau launched two important steps First, a legislative plan to seek from Congress a new law that would place marijuana and its distribution directly under federal control. Second, on radio and at major forums, such that presented annually by the New York Herald Tribune, I told the story of this evil weed of the fields and river beds and roadsides. I wrote articles for magazines; our agents gave hundreds of lectures to parents, educators, social and civic leaders. In network broadcasts I reported on the growing list of crimes, including murder and rape. I described the nature of marijuana and its close kinship to hashish. I continued to hammer at the facts.

I believe we did a thorough job, for the public was alerted and the laws to protect them were passed, both nationally and at the state level. We also brought under control the wild growing marijuana in this country. Working with local authorities, we cleaned up hundreds of acres of marijuana and we uprooted plants sprouting along the roadsides.”
After Anslinger

On a break from college in the 70s, I was visiting a church in rural Illinois. There in the literature racks in the back of the church was a lurid pamphlet about the evils of marijuana — all the old reefer madness propaganda about how it caused insanity and murder. I approached the minister and said “You can’t have this in your church. It’s all lies, and the church shouldn’t be about promoting lies.” Fortunately, my dad believed me, and he had the material removed. He didn’t even know how it got there. But without me speaking up, neither he nor the other members of the church had any reason NOT to believe what the pamphlet said. The propaganda machine had been that effective.

The narrative since then has been a continual litany of:

Politicians wanting to appear tough on crime and passing tougher penalties
Constant increases in spending on law enforcement and prisons
Racist application of drug laws
Taxpayer funded propaganda
Stifling of opposition speech
Political contributions from corporations that profit from marijuana being illegal (pharmaceuticals, alcohol, etc.)
… but that’s another whole story.


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Interlude…





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This account only scratches the surface of the story. If you want to know more about the history of marijuana, Harry Anslinger, and the saga of criminalization in the United States and elsewhere, visit some of the excellent links below. (All data and quotes for this piece came from these sources as well).

• The History of the Non-Medical Use of Drugs in the United States by Charles Whitebread, Professor of Law, USC Law School. A Speech to the California Judges Association 1995 annual conference.

• THE FORBIDDEN FRUIT AND THE TREE OF KNOWLEDGE: AN INQUIRY INTO THE LEGAL HISTORY OF AMERICAN MARIJUANA PROHIBITION by
Richard J. Bonnie & Charles H. Whitebread, II. VIRGINIA LAW REVIEW. VOLUME 56 OCTOBER 1970 NUMBER 6

• The Consumers Union Report – Licit and Illicit Drugs
by Edward M. Brecher and the Editors of Consumer Reports Magazine

• The History of the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937
By David F. Musto, M.D., New Haven, Conn.
Originally published in Arch. Gen. Psychiat. Volume 26, February, 1972

• The Report of the National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse
I. Control of Marihuana, Alcohol and Tobacco.
History of Marihuana Legislation

• The Marihuana Tax Act of 1937.
The history of how the Marihuana Tax Act came to be the law of the land.

• Marijuana – The First Twelve Thousand Years by Ernest L. Abel, 1980

Fort Worth Officer Blood Alcohol Alleged to be Twice the Legal Limit. Criminal Prosecution now Intoxicated Manslaughter

By ALEX BRANCH

Fort Worth Star Telegram

FORT WORTH — A Fort Worth police officer’s blood-alcohol content was more than twice the legal limit when his unmarked police vehicle collided with a PT Cruiser, killing a mother of two, police said Thursday.

Officer Jesus Cisneros’ blood-alcohol content measured 0.17 after the Dec. 11 crash that killed Sonia Baker, 27, according to a Fort Worth police statement. The legal limit in Texas is 0.08.
Detectives are now investigating the crash as an intoxication manslaughter case, police said.

"This tragedy has shocked the conscience of this department," Police Chief Jeff Halstead said in a statement. "The Police Department is deeply saddened for the Baker family. We are embarrassed by this tragic incident."

Reached by telephone, Demond Baker, Sonia Baker’s husband, said that dealing with his wife’s death left him too tired to discuss Thursday’s findings. Her funeral was Tuesday, according to an obituary in the Star-Telegram.

The Bakers have two sons, Tayshawn, 4, and Amarion, 5.

"I’m just drained right now," Demond Baker said.

Sonia Baker, a dialysis technician, was driving from her southwest Fort Worth home to a McDonald’s when the crash occurred, her husband has said. Fort Worth police said Cisneros, who was off-duty, was westbound in the 3800 block of Columbus Trail when the Toyota Highlander he was driving collided with Baker’s car about 2:30 a.m.

Baker, who had been southbound on Evening Star Drive, had turned east in front of the officer’s vehicle, police have said.

Cisneros’ blood was drawn at a hospital after the crash. He is now on restricted duty, police said.

Fort Worth traffic investigators requested an independent reconstruction of the wreck from Crash Dynamics, a private company contracted through the Tarrant County district attorney’s office, police said. It will try to determine the speed and momentum of both vehicles, which are factors in determining whether intoxication manslaughter charges are applicable, police said.

Intoxication manslaughter is a second-degree felony punishable by two to 20 years in prison and up to a $10,000 fine.
Internal affairs is investigating Cisneros’ activities before the crash. That inquiry will include what time Cisneros concluded his workday, whom he was with, why he was in an undercover police vehicle and whether he was allowed to use it after hours, police said.

In 2006, Cisneros accepted a 20-day suspension after an internal investigation determined that, while intoxicated and with a passenger in his private car, he fired a single shot through an open sunroof, civil service records show.

Mayor Mike Moncrief released a statement Thursday calling the crash a "terrible tragedy."

"If the facts are as presented, the actions by this officer are completely unacceptable," he said. "They certainly do not represent the good men and women of our Police Department who protect us every day."

This report includes information from the Star-Telegram archives:

Fort Worth police say officer in fatal wreck was very drunk
A Fort Worth police officer’s blood-alcohol level was more than twice the legal limit when his unmarked police vehicle was involved in a fatal collision that killed a 27-year-old mother of two, police announced Thursday.

Officer Jesus Cisneros had a blood-alcohol content of .17, Fort Worth police said in a statement. The legal limit is .08.

As a result, investigators will "focus the criminal investigation on intoxication manslaughter," the statement said. Detectives are reconstructing the Dec. 11 wreck that killed Sonia Baker (right) to determine the speed of Cisneros’ Toyota Highlander.

Here's what Police Chief Jeffrey Halstead had to say about the case:

“This tragedy has shocked the conscience of this department. The men and women of the Fort Worth Police Department risk their lives to protect our community from impaired drivers; to have an employee suspected of causing the death of a citizen under these circumstances is deplorable. As Chief of Police, I will ensure our investigators work closely with the District Attorney’s office and once the facts of the investigation are obtained, I will deal swiftly with Officer Cisneros. The police department is deeply saddened for the Baker family. We are embarrassed by this tragic incident.”

Mayor Mike Moncrief also commented:

"Fort Worth is deeply saddened by this terrible tragedy," he said. "If the facts are as presented, the actions by this officer are completely unacceptable. They certainly do not represent the good men and women of our Police Department who protect us every day."

Death Sentences Decreasing

According to news articles published today Texas juries are following a nationwide trend of sending fewer convicted criminals to death, but the state still leads the country in executions by a wide margin, according to a new study released today.
Both in Texas and across the country, death sentences declined for the seventh straight year, according to a report from the Death Penalty Information Center, an anti-capital-punishment group.
Both in Texas and nationwide, the number of executions carried out rose this year. Out of 52 people executed by states in 2009, 24 occurred in Texas. Last year, there were 37 executions nationwide, with 18 in Texas. There was a four-month death penalty moratorium last year while the Supreme Court addressed the constitutionality of lethal injections.
"The fact is those 24 people will never murder anyone again," said William "Rusty" Hubbarth, an Austin attorney and vice president of Justice for All, a victims’ advocacy group. "That in itself is a real good deterrent."
Nationwide, 106 people were sentenced to death this year, the lowest number since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976, according to the report.
Texas also reached its lowest point in over 30 years, with juries giving just nine death sentences, including Erick Davila, who was sentenced in February for gunning down a 5-year-old girl and her grandmother during a birthday party in southeast Fort Worth.
Texas accounts for 8 percent of the country’s death sentences, an amount in proportion with the state’s population.
California, however, is bucking that nationwide trend. The state’s death sentences more than doubled, from 14 in 2008 to 29 this year.
Reasons for the drop
There is some disagreement over why the number of death sentences has fallen so sharply in most states in recent years.
Many in the legal community point to the introduction of life without parole as an option for juries in 2005. The change in state law altered the dynamics of capital cases. Before 2005, jurors were responsible for choosing either the death penalty or a life sentence in which a convicted killer could be eligible for parole in 40 years.
Several Texas prosecutors have said they are now less likely to pursue the death penalty. Capital cases are long and expensive, and defendants are often willing to plead to life without parole to avoid the death penalty.
Others argue that jurors have become less willing to agree to the ultimate punishment as more stories emerge of convicted offenders exonerated through DNA evidence.
Nine people sentenced to Death Row were exonerated in 2009, according to the report, including two Texans: Michael Toney, who was convicted of the 1985 bombing of a Lake Worth trailer and served nine months, and Robert Springsteen, who was convicted of the 1991 slayings of four teens at an Austin yogurt shop and served eight years.
"I think there are a large number of people who are on Death Row currently in Texas who most likely would not have been sentenced to death in the current climate," said Kristin Houlé, executive director of the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty.
Economic factors?
The report suggests a third theory: The bad economy has prompted district attorneys to shy away from pursuing the death penalty because they are more expensive.
"The economics are a controlling factor on that," Hubbarth said. "It has nothing to do with public opinion."
While the death penalty is becoming more rare in Texas courtrooms, the state’s justice system is still working through the hundreds already sentenced to die.
Almost all of the offenders executed by Texas this year were sent to Death Row between 1993 and 1999, when the state gained international notoriety for its high use of the death penalty.
The Death Row facility at Huntsville will likely stay busy next year. Six executions are already scheduled through March 30.