CRIST TO REFORM DRUG LAWS?
Governor Crist (center), mid '70's (thanks to Bob Norman)
"Pain sufferer wins pardon, set free"
by Marc Caputo and Phil Long
Copyright 2007 The Miami Herald Media Company (9/20/07)
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/breaking_news/story/244303.html
DAYTONA BEACH --
''I feel pretty good. I feel pretty good,'' he said, squinting in the sunshine from his wheelchair. ``Today was the day for miracles. I didn't think this day would come.''
That's because the 49-year-old felt the system has been stacked against him and his family ever since he was convicted, after three trials, on drug trafficking charges in a 1997 arrest for filling out fake prescriptions for about 700 oxycodone and 400 hydrocodone narcotic painkillers and 320 Valium pills.
Freed at 2:51 p.m., he was to be imprisoned for almost 22 more years.
The catch: Everyone, including judges, acknowledged the traffic accident victim was using the pills for debilitating pain. And since his incarceration, prison doctors have hooked him up to a morphine drip, which delivers more narcotics in about two days than he was convicted of trafficking.
The state's parole commission recommended denying clemency for Paey, who was only seeking to have his prison sentence commuted. But after his lawyer, wife and four children wept and pleaded for Paey's release, Crist and the Cabinet went further than Paey expected by unanimously agreeing to grant him a full pardon -- meaning he'll have the right to vote and carry firearms.
They also acknowledged that the state's drug laws might be unfair.
''This is not a pleasant case,'' said Attorney General Bill McCollum, who noted that he supported mandatory-minimum sentences when he was in Congress. ``Our laws are very much to blame.''
But so are the prosecutors in Pasco County, said Paey's wife, Linda Paey, who said she couldn't understand why they zealously pursued her husband through three trials despite the widespread acknowledgement that he was a pain victim and not a drug dealer.
''I've changed. I no longer trust the police. I don't trust the justice system,'' she said. ``Only the media got our case right.''
Crist, too, took a swipe at the prosecutors, saying the war on drugs itself isn't just to blame in cases such as this. ''If they're prosecuted appropriately, then justice will be done,'' he said. ``Obviously, this case cries out for a review of that process.''
In an interesting twist, the state that went to such great lengths to separate him from his family -- in one case moving him from the prison in Zephyrhills to one across the state after he gave an interview to the New York Times -- will get a ride to his home in Hudson, courtesy of the Department of Corrections.
this guy crist is a republican, yet he's really a democrat. Zatz is a democrat, yet he's really a republican.
it's a mixed up mother of a shook up world!
Geez, the Pasco guys make the Broward SAO look like they're the good guys
They may be gung-ho in Pasco, but even they would never set $100k bonds for 1st Degree Misdemeanors.
What a travesty. Just another example of a system that has become effective in swallowing up its citizens in a sea of bureaucratic ineptitude. Where great government or institutions exist, error is also great. Less than one hundred years ago we had penal colonies.
well as new cases come up they will get it right. it's not about -- how many can we put away so we look good in the press, u can't depend on the press to investigate and see the truth
they are afraid of losing their sources and licenses if they tell it like it really is
That seems to have been the case. The media seems to as big a part of the problem as the perpetrators. Why don't they just do what's right and report the events as they occur?
Crist IS a Republican. He is a traditional libertarian Republican (less govermnet/intrusion, less tax). He is not a neo-con or right-winger.
Its a shame that some have such a fixed mold for each party.
The picture tells a real story all by itself!
I'm having nightmares looking at that picture. (Banjos playing --- da da da dum, dah dum, dah dum, dah.......)
Squeal like a pig.
Tallahassee Democrat
http://www.tallahassee.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070921/OPINION01/709210324/1021
Righteous
Crist, Cabinet display uncommon humanity
Government in general is not known for compassion. Nor is wisdom a word that people necessarily associate with the political process.
But on Thursday, Gov. Charlie Crist and members of the Florida Cabinet - Attorney General Bill McCollum, Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink and Agriculture Commissioner Charles Bronson - displayed compassion and wisdom so extraordinary it was breathtaking.
In their capacity as the state clemency board, they granted a full pardon to an imprisoned Pasco County man with chronic and severe pain, and for whom the law simply failed.
By extending a pardon to 48-year-old disabled former attorney Richard Paey, the governor and Cabinet went above and beyond what Mr. Paey's family had sought - and ordered the inmate's
immediate release.
It would have been enough had they commuted Mr. Paey's misguided drug-trafficking conviction and 25-year sentence to the nearly four years he had served, and rejected the advice of the Florida Parole Commission. It had recommended against even commuting Mr. Paey's sentence to time served.
Instead, Mssrs. Crist, McCollum and Bronson and Ms. Sink stunned everyone in the Cabinet meeting room by demonstrating that politicians, often vilified, are fully capable of simply doing what's right, the system be damned.
Mr. Paey, whose case has received national attention, has lived with chronic pain since a 1985 car wreck. His supporters say he needed prescription drugs to cope with pain. He also suffers from multiple sclerosis and uses a wheelchair.
He was first arrested in 1997 and convicted on prosecutors' third try in 2004 on drug charges in Pasco County after they alleged that he must have been selling painkillers, despite a lack of evidence, because he illegally possessed so many that he couldn't possibly use them all himself.
"We aim to right a wrong and exercise compassion and to do it with grace," Mr. Crist said.
Mr. Paey's supporters said the case illustrates a flaw in the law - how chronic-pain patients can be snared in a war on drugs that never was intended to target people who need prescription narcotics just to live lives approaching some semblance of normalcy.
Mr. McCollum agreed.
''I think our laws fundamentally are very much to blame for this,'' the attorney general said. ''Justice would truly have to have a blind eye not to grant a pardon.''
The dictionary defines "righteous" as acting in a just, upright manner. Mr. Crist and the Cabinet certainly did that Thursday. In so doing they defied the stereotype and sent the message that cynicism about politics and politicians is not always justified.
dude, where's my car???
I wonder if young Charlie ever partied with young GWB?
I just cant stop laughing...By the way, is that Jay Hurley next to Charlie?
And this CLEARLY shows that the Governor has spent considerable time tanning.
Don't they look chummy?