Holder hails reductions in drug sentences

The rate at which federal judges have pursued mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent drug offenders is at a record low, according to Attorney General Eric Holder.
 
Holder, speaking at a National Press Club luncheon this afternoon, said federal prosecutors have not only prosecuted fewer nonviolent drug trafficking cases overall, they’ve pursued mandatory minimum sentences at a dramatically lower rate than the year prior, according to prepared remarks.
 
Between 2013 and 2014, the number of defendants charged with drug trafficking offenses declined by nearly 1,400 individuals — a reduction of more than 6 percent, he said.

Notably, he said, federal prosecutors last year pursued mandatory minimums about half of the time they could be applied under the law. In previous years, prosecutors sought the tougher sentences in roughly two-thirds of the cases. Holder has led a push toward more treatment and diversion programs — and less time behind bars — for many nonviolent drug offenders.
 
“While the U.S. population has increased by about a third since 1980, the federal prison population has grown by almost 800 percent over the same period,” he said in prepared remarks. “And on the day I took office, as a result of well-intentioned policies designated to be “tough” on drugs, nearly half of all federal inmates were serving time for drug-related offenses.”
 
The country’s first black attorney general and longest member of President Obama’s cabinet announced his resignation in September but said he would stay in office until his successor is named.
 
President Obama has nominated federal prosecutor Loretta Lynch to succeed Holder, though Republican objections have caused her confirmation vote to be pushed back by two weeks. GOP lawmakers have expressed concerns about Lynch’s stance on immigration, among other issues.
 
Holder resisted calls for his resignation during a rocky tenure marked by controversies, including the agency’s botched “Fast and Furious” arms trafficking initiative, in which the administration lost track of hundreds of guns, some of which ended up in the hands of Mexican drug cartels.