Sentencing Commission defends crack rules

WASHINGTON, Feb. 22 (UPI) -- Most of the 1,500 inmates eligible for immediate release under new crack cocaine sentencing rules are non-violent, the U.S. Sentencing Commission reports.

The Bush administration has been lobbying against the commission's new sentencing guidelines for crack cocaine and especially against making them retroactive, the Washington Post reported Friday. U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey told the House Judiciary Committee recently that many crack offenders are "among the most serious and violent offenders in the federal system."

The commission report contradicts Mukasey. Its staff says that 41 percent of those convicted of crack crimes did not have any added factors that would enhance their sentences.

The report characterizes most of those doing time for crack offenses as street dealers or addicts. Even those who received enhancements for weapons in many cases were not actually carrying one themselves but had a co-defendant who was armed.

A 1986 law imposes far stiffer punishment for dealing in crack than for powdered cocaine. The law has been criticized as racist because crack dealers are more likely to be black or Hispanic.