Ex-officer Favors Limited Legalization to Fight Drugs

Ten years ago, as a lieutenant in charge of special investigations for the Syracuse police, David Owens kept trying to push crack dealers off Syracuse street corners.

A decade later, Owens, 48, argues he's still after the same goal. But his philosophy has changed. He is now an associate professor of criminal justice at Onondaga Community College, and he has become one of the most intriguing members of Reconsider-a group dedicated to rethinking drug enforcement policy.

"We don't need a criminal justice approach to this problem," Owens said. "What we need is a public health approach. "

He maintains the all-out assault on illegal drugs is futile. "A dangerous waste of time," Owens said. He still respects and admires his former police companions. He remains impressed by the smarts and the courage they show each day on the street.

"These are good people," Owens said. "I used to do that job. But there is a has to be a pivot point where others with different opinions aren't laughed off as kooks or drug users. "

When he speaks about illegal drugs, he is careful separate himself from OCC. Despite the support of such figures as William F. Buckley and federal Judge John Curtin-who oversaw Love Canal cleanup - Owens said advocates of legalization still face a stigma.

For years, as a cop, Owens believed any softening or shift would invite social disaster. But his students at OCC, he said, challenged him with rational questions. He began to think that maybe he was plain and simply wrong.

His position touches off fiery reactions. "That's absolutely the wrong message to be sending to kids right now," said Tim Foody, Syracuse police chief. "We all know that one drug leads to another. It's like the guy who starts with one cigarette, and pretty soon is smoking the whole carton. "

Owens disagrees. For years, he said, he supervised savvy cops who cleared street corners of crack addicts and dealers. "There were always replaced," Owen said of the suspects they arrested.

The problem was economic, he said, rather than criminal. Poor people sell crack to other poor people, he said. That leads to addiction, Owens said. It leads to police sweeps against poor neighborhoods, and that leads to friction and charges that the cops are racist.

He does not endorse overnight change. What he wants is a shift to a neutral state of mind, where the problem could be officially studied by medical experts. The result, he expects, would be some sort of limited experiment-which he assumes would be legalizing marijuana.

Overall, Owens said, his position hasn't changed. He still hates drug barons who get rich off poor, young addicts. He still wants to eliminate drug parasites who prey on misery.

The best way to do that, he argues, is to legalize some drugs. "That would dry 'em right up. ," Owens says of the cartels.

He is 48 years old, a retired police officer. He does not use illegal drugs himself, and he hopes his own children would never make that choice. But if it happened, Owens said, he can make this guarantee: "If my child had a drug problem, the last thing I would do is call the police. "

Sean Kirst is a columnist for The Post-Standard.

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