Bring Drug Penalties Into Line

Gov. M. Jodi Rell, whose office said she is studying the bill, should have no reservations about signing it into law.

Legal experts, including Chief State's Attorney Christopher Morano, have for years advocated equalizing the sentencing rules. Opponents of the bill are mostly Republicans. They have argued over the amount of crack as opposed to powdered cocaine that should be set as the level for similar penalties.

That's no reason to veto the bill as a number of Republican lawmakers have urged.

Current law specifies that a person arrested for selling or possessing a half gram of crack, a refined form of cocaine, faces the same mandatory minimum sentence of five to 20 years in jail as someone who sells or possesses an ounce of pure cocaine.

Under the approved bill, a person would have to possess an ounce of crack to trigger the same penalty. The Republican alternative that failed to win approval would have set the amount of crack or powdered cocaine that would prompt that sentence at half an ounce (14 grams).

Few defendants are convicted under the current crack statute. But prosecutors use its tough penalties to intimidate scores of street addicts - people who really should be in treatment centers and mental hospitals - to plead to reduced charges that carry a mandatory minimum sentence of three years jail time. The practice contributes appreciably to prison crowding and to the state's costly corrections budget.

Mrs. Rell should sign the bill.