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Len Bias
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Len Bias was a basketball star from the University of Maryland who died of a cocaine overdose in 1986 that sparked anti-drug legislation that still affects current drug policy today.
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[edit] Background
Leonard Kevin Bias, known by his family, friends, and team mates as Len, is one of the greatest 'what-ifs' in basketball history. Considered to be the "next Michael Jordan," he had his entire career ahead of him. Bias was a dominant force to be reckoned with on the court. He was known for his play making abilities and his crowd pleasing antics at the University of Maryland, where he quickly became a crowd favorite, as well as an All-American.
In the 1986 NBA draft, he was the second player to be selected, picked by the Boston Celtics. In celebration of this event, Bias partied with friends and team mates back at the University of Maryland, where he ingested large quantities of cocaine. Sometime between 6:00 a.m. and 6:30 a.m., Bias collapsed into a seizure, dying of a cardiac arrythmia, due to a cocaine overdose. His death occurred within 48 hours of his selection by the Celtics.
[edit] Initial Reaction
Len Bias' death was used to fuel an anti-drug campaign. Speaker of the House of Representatives, Thomas P. O'Neill Jr., a representative from Boston, demanded anti-drug legislation from his fellow Democrats, immediately after Bias' death. The Capitol erupted with Len Bias-inspired legislation attacking America's drug problem.
A little over two months after Bias' death, the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 was passed. This act created penalties, such as mandatory minimum sentences, for drug offenders, which remains in practice today, over 20 years since the act was passed. The problem with enacting mandatory minimums was instead of focusing on large-scale traffickers, they created lengthy mandatory minimum prison terms for low-level drug quantities.
[edit] Problems Arise
The legislation caused the federal prison population to explode. Our prisons are currently filled with over 190,000 prisoners, where more than half are low-level drug offenders. These offenders are serving minimal mandatory sentences because of the legislation passed 20 years ago after Len Bias' death.
Drug policy reform activists, such as Eric Sterling, who was counsel to the U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary and was involved in the passing of mandatory minimum sentencing laws, believes the Justice Department has strayed from their initial goals. Instead of focusing on the large-scale traffickers, our government is focusing on the low-level users, and most specifically African Americans. 81.4% of crack cocaine defendants in 2002 were African American, while about two-thirds of crack cocaine users in the general population are white or hispanic (Sentencing project: The Federal Prison Population: A Statistical Analysis). Drug policy reform activists believe that statistics like this only prove that the current drug policies are in need of reform.