WASHINGTON, April 15 (UPI) -- The number of African-Americans jailed in state prisons for drug offenses has declined substantially for the first time in 25 years, a study shows.
The study from the Washington group The Sentencing Project indicated a 21.6 percent drop in the number of blacks incarcerated for drug offenses, a decline of 31,000 people between 1999 and 2005. The number of whites jailed for drug offenses rose by 42.6 percent, or more than 21,000 people, the group said in a release Wednesday.
The results indicate that the "war on drugs" begun in the early 1980s is changing: Much of the racial disparity in "drug war" arrests has been because of police targeting open-air crack cocaine markets but as crack use has declined, law enforcement activity may have been reduced correspondingly, The Sentencing Project said.
Marc Mauer, the group's executive director, said the study indicated the white increase may be related in part to more aggressive enforcement of methamphetamine laws, with Midwestern states such as Iowa and Minnesota showing a substantial influx of such cases during the period.
Mauer said that despite the trend, African-Americans are still imprisoned at more than six times the rate of whites for all offenses.
