October 4, 2023
On Sep 27, Oregon Public Broadcasting published an article, “Study says drug decriminalization in Oregon did not cause more overdose deaths”
Three years after Oregon voters elected to decriminalize drugs, a new study has concluded that the first-in-the-nation law has not led to increased drug use or drug overdoses. The conclusion counters an increasingly common narrative that Oregon’s drug problem is unique in the country — and that decriminalization is to blame.
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August 13, 2023
Response to letter dated 09 Aug 2023 by Jackson County Commissioners CALL FOR THE REPEAL OF THE PROVISIONS ENACTED PURSUANT TO OREGON BALLOT MEASURE 110 (2020) order 192-23.
“Since Measure 110 was passed, there has been a dramatic increase in overdose deaths in Oregon. In 2020, there were 585 overdose deaths. In 2021, that number increased to 917.”
- It is too early to evaluate the effect of Measure 110 on overdose deaths. “It wasn’t until September of 2022 that the Oregon Health Authority announced funds had gone out to each county in the state.”
“Measure 110 has reduced the deterrent effect of drug laws, making it more likely that people would use drugs.”
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July 16, 2023
The average professional in this country wakes up in the morning, goes to work, comes home, eats dinner, and then goes to sleep, unaware that he or she has likely committed several federal crimes that day. Why? The answer lies in the very nature of modern federal criminal laws, which have exploded in number but also become impossibly broad and vague. In Three Felonies a Day, Harvey A. Silverglate reveals how federal criminal laws have become dangerously disconnected from the English common law tradition and how prosecutors can pin arguable federal crimes on any one of us, for even the most seemingly innocuous behavior. The volume of federal crimes in recent decades has increased well beyond the statute books and into the morass of the Code of Federal Regulations, handing federal prosecutors an additional trove of vague and exceedingly complex and technical prohibitions to stick on their hapless targets. The dangers spelled out in Three Felonies a Day do not apply solely to “white collar criminals,” state and local politicians, and professionals. No social class or profession is safe from this troubling form of social control by the executive branch, and nothing less than the integrity of our constitutional democracy hangs in the balance.
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