For years, research reports have documented the injustice, ineffectiveness, and waste of the Rockefeller Drug Laws and mandatory minimum prison sentences. Below are reports that provide researchers and drug policy reform advocates valuable information regarding the Rockefeller Drug Laws’ disproportionate impact on communities of color; the impact of long, harsh mandatory minimum sentences that neither deter drug use nor recidivism; and the hundreds of millions of scarce New York tax dollars wasted every year because judges cannot sentence those convicted of drug offenses to community-based alternatives to incarceration programs -- which are far cheaper and more effective than prison.

Barred from Treatment: Punishment of Drug Users in New York State Prisons
Human Rights Watch, (March 2009)

The report found that New York prison officials sentenced inmates to a collective total of 2,516 years in disciplinary segregation from 2005 to 2007 for drug-related charges. At the same time, inmates seeking drug treatment face major delays because treatment programs are filled to capacity. When sentenced to segregation, known as "the box," inmates are not allowed to get or continue to receive treatment. Conditions in the box are harsh, with prisoners locked down 23 hours a day and contact with the outside through visitors, packages, and telephone calls severely restricted.

The Rockefeller Drug Laws: Unjust, Irrational, Ineffective
New York Civil Liberties Union, (2009)

There has emerged over the last decade a broad consensus among policy experts, criminal justice scholars and lawmakers that the War on Drugs, with its singular emphasis on incarceration, has failed. This report presents and marshals the empirical evidence, informed by demographic maps of urban centers throughout the state that depict in bold relief the racial and ethnic bias, that demonstrates New York's mandatory-minimum drug sentencing scheme has failed, utterly, to accomplish its stated objectives. It has not reduced the availability of drugs or deterred their use; it has not made us safer.
The report concludes by proposing a paradigm shift toward a public health approach to drug policy. In this new model, prison is a last resort, reserved for the truly violent. The public health approach seeks to reinvest dollars, otherwise spent on prisons, to promote safe and stable communities. In practice, this approach diverts individuals with substance abuse problems from prison to programs that promote and facilitate life success. Legislators might conceive of this paradigm shift as justice reinvestment.

Reform Criminal Justice Policies, Cut Government Costs
The Correctional Association of New York, (December 2008)

The Correctional Association released a brief position paper recommending policy reforms which would improve New York State’s criminal justice system and save the fiscally strapped state over $450 million annually. Recommendations include: closing underutilized prisons, repealing the Rockefeller Drug Laws, increasing work release eligibility and participation, and diverting technical parole violators from prison. The paper proposes that these and other measures can make the criminal justice system more fair and efficient, while increasing public safety and reducing exorbitant costs.

Drug Law Reform 2008 – Dramatic Cost Savings for New York State
Legal Action Center, (May 2008)

Despite the fact that an astonishing 70-80% of individuals involved in New York's criminal justice system have a drug or alcohol problem, drug sentencing reform efforts to-date have not enabled even one additional addicted individual to be sent to community-based treatment instead of prison. These reforms have provided relief from some of the harshest provisions of the Rockefeller Drug laws by changing the length of sentences individuals must serve for drug convictions and, as a result, as of October 2008, have saved New York approximately $99.22 million. However, the reforms did not give any sentencing discretion back to judges to divert addicted individuals from prison to treatment or provide any other mechanism to expand the use of mandated community-based treatment for addicted individuals. The report provides a conservative estimate of New York State's fiscal savings were it to enact the reforms the Legal Action Center proposes.

Five Year Comprehensive Plan for Chemical Dependence and Gambling Services 2006-2010
New York State Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services, (January 2006 )

The Statewide Comprehensive Plan for Chemical Dependence Services for 2006-2010, developed in accordance with Section 5.07 of the Mental Hygiene Law, charts an ambitious agenda for the New York State Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services (OASAS), counties, and providers to pursue over the next five years. The Plan focuses on improving the performance of the service delivery system and reinforces the Agency's commitment to quality prevention, treatment, recovery, and support services.

Methamphetamine Use and Manufacture
Commission of Investigation of the State of New York, (2005)

Recent developments in New York State and New York City provide serious evidence that the proliferation of methamphetamine use and manufacture has clearly come to New York. The patterns of methamphetamine use, addiction and production seen in other states, along with the crime and violence associated with the drug, raise the specter for potentially far more serious problems in New York in the near future. It is clear that our current statutory scheme is inadequate to deal with the growing methamphetamine problem. Unless state officials act immediately to address this growing problem, New York could soon become a haven for methamphetamine users, addicts and manufacturers. The Commission concludes that the use and manufacture of methamphetamine is a severe and urgent threat to New York State and the safety and welfare of its law enforcement community and citizens.

Sentencing Reform and Offender Re-Entry
David A. Paterson, New York State Senate Democratic Conference, (2004)

In 2004, then-Senate Minority Leader David Paterson conducted a nationwide survey of drug offense sentencing in comparison to New York's harsh Rockefeller Drug Laws. In this survey, nearly a hundred district attorneys, attorneys general and public defenders in every state in the country were contacted and asked what sentencing options were available in their states for a low-level drug seller with a prior non-violent felony conviction. Paterson found that New York State has, by far, the harshest drug sentencing option for low-level drug sellers in the entire country.

Unjust and Counterproductive: New York’s Rockefeller Drug Laws
Physicians for Human Rights and The Fortune Society, (2004)

Physicians for Human Rights and The Fortune Society recommend that the State of New York reform the Rockefeller drug laws by granting judges discretion to depart from statutory sentencing ranges, especially in cases of nonviolent drug felony offenses where people are not involved as major players in drug crimes. The groups also recommend that the State of New York work to expand, strengthen and improve alternatives for incarceration, especially for people who need drug treatment. Ending the cycle involves judicial discretion not only for departing from mandatory sentence ranges but also the discretion to divert offenders to treatment programs rather than prison.

The report concludes that there are a number of misconceptions held by proponents of the laws relating to drug crimes in New York. This research helps expose ten myths about mandatory sentences such as the Rockefeller Drug Laws:  incarceration serves as a deterrent; harsh punishments are justified because of the severity of the drug crimes; tough drug laws reduce drug-related crime; harsh punishments help people stop using drugs; drug laws are fairly applied; if a person wants to stop using drugs, they can; prisoners can get drug treatment if they want it; tough drug laws help poor communities; New York State prisons maintain the human rights of inmates; and the Rockefeller Drug Laws are just.

2003-2004 Report on the Progress of the Edward Byrne Memorial State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance Program
New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services, (2004)

New York State supported 275 projects with $29.3 million in grants from the Edward Byrne Memorial State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance Program during the July 1, 2003 to June 30, 2004 reporting period. The report outlines the projects and measurements the fiscal appropriations were allocated to.

Report on the Syracuse Police Department Activity for the year ended June 30, 2002
City of Syracuse Department of Audit, (December 2003)

The City of Syracuse’s Department of Audit conducted a study of fiscal appropriations to the city’s police department (SPD) and of the police’s impact on the city using those resources. The report found that alternatives to the City’s current policy related to the enforcement of drug-related laws should be examined. The fact that the SPD devotes such a significant percentage of resources to drug-related incidents stems from the tasks it is assigned by the Mayor and the City Council during the budget process. Alternatives may range from forms of “decriminalization” to programs that address the root causes of the drug problems. Such programs provide for treatment on demand, harm reduction, and prevention rather than absolute prohibition.

Cruel and usual: Disproportionate sentences for New York drug offenders
Human Rights Watch, (March 1997)

In this report, Human Rights Watch criticizes the human rights impact of drug sentences in New York for low-level or marginal drug offenders. Human Rights Watch does not challenge the state's decision to use criminal sanctions in its effort to curtail drug abuse and drug trafficking. To an extent far greater than other drug control policies, however, the use of the criminal law is subject to important human rights constraints. Of particular significance are the constraints on criminal sanctions. To be consistent with internationally recognized human rights standards, criminal sanctions must be both humane and proportional to the gravity of the offense. Conviction of a crime is not license for the imposition of arbitrarily severe punishment.

Report and Recommendations of the Drug Policy Task Force 
New York County Lawyers Association, (October 1996)

It has become a widely accepted fact that drug policy, as employed during the past three decades by the federal government, and in state and local jurisdictions throughout the United States, has largely failed to meet its stated objectives.

Current drug policy relies on an "enforcement" or "penal" model, emphasizing interdiction, arrest, prosecution and incarceration of both distributors and users of controlled substances as its primary "weapons" in what has often been characterized as a "war on drugs."

In making its assessment, this study has concluded that contemporary drug policy has failed by virtually every objective standard. Accordingly, we call for a dramatic shift in thinking and approach in development and implementation of future drug control efforts. At this time, although not recommending "decriminalization" or "legalization" of most substances currently designated as "controlled" under federal and state penal statutes, the Task Force does urge that certain incremental steps be taken to alleviate the more easily resolved economic and social costs associated with current drug policy.

Stupid, irrational and barbarous: New York judges speak against the Rockefeller Drug Laws 
Correctional Association of New York, (2001)

This report describes a series of New York Rockefeller Drug Law cases that highlight the severely disproportionate mandatory sentencing mandated by judges that, even though admonishing the sentences they imposed, were bound by the mandatory minimum provisions of the New York state drug laws. These cases, compiled by the Correctional Association of New York, explicate the egregious and unjust sentences for drug law violators in New York State.