0 thoughts on “San Marcos man gets 50 years for drug conviction”

1. Wonderful, we’ll be paying for his living conditions + room and board for fifty years. A personal issue with drugs posing no danger to society, only himself and we’re paying for his living for 50 years. Wonderful, let’s not focus on violent offenders for our prison sentences, lets fill’em up real overcrowded like with non-violent offenders too. That way when they come out, they’ll really be criminals with a violent streak that’ll target news homes and innocent people. What a system…

2. Don, you’re an idiot. If you read without your liberal glasses on……it wasn’t just personal use crack cocaine he had….he had a lot of it and was a dealer. Probably selling to anybody who would pay for it, including kids. Keep thinking in your own little world that it’s a victimless crime. When a crack head comes into your home to steal your belonging or mugs you on the street so they can get a quick fix from this dealer….please do us taxpayers a favor and don’t call the police, be a man and handle the situation yourself by counseling the person and wishing him the best in his future endevears as you hug him. Oh, and do your research before you type anything on these sites…just because he got 50 years doesn’t mean he will do the whole time. If you read the article he had just come out of prison after 3 years of a 17 year sentence. It’s fine to have your own opinion of things, although misguided and stupid, you still have to look at the big picture…..drugs, all drugs and those who use, sell, or manufacture the drug, hurt the community…how do you argue with that…idiot.

3. Ha !!

4. DON… Let him sell it to your family members and see how you feel afterwards because common sence would tell you that his intentions were to sell the poison with that amount in his possession.

5. TOM said it all… They give these criminals too many chances and they always screw up again one way or another creating MORE INNOCENT VICTIMS !

6. Tom, drugs don’t hurt the community, drug addiction, drug misuse, and drug prohibition laws that are destructive to human dignity and empower criminals — that create environments where criminals can flourish — hurt the community. A drug addict breaking into a home to steal money is no reason to outlaw the possession and sale of whatever drug that person happens to be addicted to. To say it does is to assume human beings either will not or cannot make responsible decisions, and therefore need to be prevented by the government from having the opportunity to make poor choices. I, for one, will accept a little more danger to live in a free society where most people are not cowards and willing slaves, and to live in a society where personal responsibility is given a chance to be utilized rather than in one where a paternalistic state treats people like subjects and children. When the government takes on that role — when people assign the government that paternalistic role — our society will indeed have more people who lack the inclination or ability to avoid making very bad decisions. We need to set the bar a little higher, don’t you think? I’m not sure this is a liberal stance. It’s definitely libertarian. I will take steps to protect myself from robbers and muggers, because that is my responsibility, so you as a taxpayer may have nothing more to do than foot the bill for the autopsy after I kill the offender with the weapon I use for personal defense. Of course, people with your view of the proper role of government will say that we need to outlaw guns and prevent people from having the opportunity of choosing whether to use guns properly or misuse them.

   Don, are you prepared to send a seller of another kind of poison–tobacco cigarettes–to jail? It seems you should be willing to do that to remain consistent in your views.

   If my family members take crack cocaine, I will think a little less of them, but I will not attempt to deprive them of their human dignity by preventing them from having an opportunity to make poor choices in life. If a friend of mine or family member becomes a drug addict, I will definitely think less of them, but in a sense once they are addicted I will regard them as sick, as victims of their own foolishness. I may physically assault any drug dealer that comes within five feet of them, but I’m still not going to protect them from themselves forever, and I won’t demand that the state outlaw whatever drug it is, because that creates more problems than it solves. Go live in Saudi Arabia if you want to live in the kind of place where thieves and drug dealers are practically non-existent.

   Parents, take responsibility for your kids. People, counsel your friends and family. Don’t give the state the authority to take life, liberty, and property from people who have not initiated violence against anyone, and don’t support laws that 1) diminish respect for human dignity 2) result in massive and wasteful government spending 3) target low socio-economic status folks and make them and their dependents even more subject to problems associated with being low SOS, 4) empower corrupt foreign governments, and 5) create environments for criminals to thrive in.

7. Well said Ken.

8. Ken, I’m not sure you are any less of an idiot than Don. I suppose under your “libertarian” stance, you feel if everything illegal would be made legal, than everyone would live in harmony and no harm would come to anyone? That makes all the sense in the world????????NOT. It sounds like you would be a much better citizen in Californina instead of Texas. SEE YA.

   This guy is a leach to society, nothing more than a tick, and I would much rather pay for him to be incarcerated than to have to foot the bills from all the mess he causes in the free world.

9. This guy wasn’t leaching off of society, he had a job selling a product in very high demand. Selling it, I might add, to thousands of people right here in San Marcos TX and Hays County. No part of his crime was against any person or property. And what’s this mess in the free world are you talking about? It’s not like he’s selling alcohol.

10. Not that I care, but do you suppose he sold crack, because he was passionate about sales and about crack, or because he was a criminal? If crack were legal, would he have opened Bradley’s World O’ Crack, on the square? Would he have taken a position with some big pharmaceutical company? Or, would he have turned to stealing cars or some similar career?

    I’m pro legalization, in general, although I’m not sure about crack. Regardless of the product, it seems unlikely that legalization would have kept this guy on the straight and narrow.

11. Common Sense, I would rather foot the occasional bill for indigent defense of a thieving junkie than the massive costs of drug prohibition. I fail to see the logic of trying to reduce a relatively insignificant amount of drug-related violent and property crime by stealing tens of billions of dollars a year from taxpayers and flushing it down the toilet. Drug prohibition causes more evil than any drug dealer or drug cartel ever could, because it gives violent folks the environment in which they can thrive, an environment highly dangerous without any opportunity for peaceful resolution of disputes, and black market-inflated, tax-free profits that allow the thugs to do even more evil. Most people who use cocaine, alcohol, tobacco, opiates, and illegal drugs in general do so without destroying their lives and others’. And whether some destroy their own lives or not is irrelevant, unless it is assumed that the state has a larger claim on their lives than they do. The stupid or criminal acts of a few do not justify collective punishment and do not justify violating the ‘reasonable person standard,’ a standard that must be a generally-held principle before we can even talk about holding people responsible for their actions. If we are going to assume that people are generally unwilling or unable to make responsible choices, how can we hold them accountable for anything at all? It is insane to assume someone voluntarily taking a mind-altering drug — like alcohol, cannabis, LSD, opiates, for example — is going to commit a violent or property crime. Anyone who says otherwise has never read the scientific literature, has never had any experience with any of the drugs, or has been fed lies. If we are to assume that people must be prevented from being put in the position of having to think and to act responsibly, we are left with a perfect justification for excessive government paternalism that leads often, perhaps inexorably, to tyranny. If I have to move to California, Common Sense, then you have to move to Iran.

12. Ken, I have to disagree with the idea that it is insane to think that someone using alcohol is going to commit a violent crime. It happens all the time.

13. Never mind. I think I get your point, now that I re-read it.

14. Any assertion that drug abuse is a victimless crime, or that drug abuse is not a factor in violent crime rates is blatantly false. It doesn’t even take a very specific google search to establish a clear correlation between drug use and criminal activity.

    -More than half of all the people arrested in the United States test positive for illegal drugs. Drug addiction can lead to increased property crime and robberies. Drug and alcohol abuse contribute to higher rates of domestic violence, child abuse and sexual violence. (National Institute of Justice, U.S. Department of Justice, 2007).

    -Drug use is more closely linked to robberty and property crime than to violent crime. Many addicts commit crimes to get money to buy drugs. In state prisons, those convicted of violent crimes are less likely to have used drugs than those convicted of property crimes. Yet at least a quarter of men who commit acts of domestic violence also have drug abuse problems. Woman who are drug addicts are more likely to be victims of abuse. (Ibid.)

    -In the 2004 Survey of Inmates in State and Federal Correction Facilities, 32% of State prisoners and 26% of Federal prisoners said they had committed their current offense while under the influence of drugs. Among State prisoners, property offenders (39%) reported the highest incidence of drug use at the time of the offense. Among Federal prisoners, violent offenders (24%) were the most likely to report drug use at the time of their crimes. (Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, 2006).

    -In 2004, 17% of State prisoners and 18% of Federal inmates said they committed their current offense to obtain money for drugs. (Ibid.)

    Education is not the enemy.

15. I have also seen different studies showing more than half of people arrested test positive for illegal drugs, but one can’t reasonably conclude from that that those drugs should be illegal. Most arrestees who test positive in the studies I’ve seen tested positive for cannabis, which stays in the body for at least 30 days — and you can’t tell me with a straight face that cannabis use is likely to cause someone to commit a violent or property crime. None of the cannabis smokers I know commit violent acts or property offenses. Cannabis use has been wrongly illegitimated and somewhat driven into the subculture, which is enough to explain why it might be used at a higher rate among social deviants than the general population. Jeffrey A. Miron, a professor of economics at Boston University, writes that although there are more than 1.2 million possession arrests each year, there are more than 28 million drug users. This is in accord with my own experience, which tells me most people who use drugs do not wind up committing property and violent crimes. Even the statistics you cite indicate that a minority of prisoners reported to have been under the influence of drugs when they committed their crime, and a very small minority of prisoners reported committing their current offense to buy drugs. I am opposed to collective punishment and using the government to preempt the opportunity to choose good or evil, which denies human dignity and lowers the bar for human beings. Dano, drug abuse is not a victimless crime — because it is not a crime at all. A crime is an offense against another’s right to be secure in their life, liberty, and property. Whether the crime is committed after a person has ingested some substance is irrelevant; a crime committed by an intoxicated person was not caused by the drug, the availability of the drug, or the legal status of the drug, but by that person.The problem of drug addiction and misuse is a medical problem exacerbated by poverty, lack of education, and a culture of irresponsibility (facilitated by the aforementioned “lowering of the bar”), which are all exacerbated by drug prohibition. Active enforcement of drug laws is more likely to take place in poor neighborhoods, and paying fines, doing jail time, and acquiring a criminal record exacerbates the problem of poverty. I’m certainly not saying ending drug prohibition will eradicate poverty. But assigning the state regulatory power over our bloodstreams and denying human dignity is an ineffective and illegitimate tool against poverty and crime.
    “It is, of course, true that some people ruin their lives with drugs. The right question for policy analysis, however, is not whether drugs are sometimes misused but whether policy reduces that misuse, and at what cost. The best available evidence shows that prohibition reduces drug use only modestly, and most of this reduction is for casual users rather than ‘addicts.’ It is hard to see, therefore, how any benefits from prohibition could possibly outweigh its incredible costs.” Jeffrey A. Miron
    “Under legalization, there would still be problems related to drugs. Specifically, a small fraction of users would harm themselves and occasionally others, as occurs now for a range of legal goods. Most users, however, would obtain benefits that exceeded any costs, and the enormous externalities imposed by prohibition would disappear.” Jeffrey A. Miron

16. Ken, after your last post, it is clear to see that you are a DOPER and your posts must be written in doper langauge, that is the reason it is not easily understood by normal folks.

    If you do not like the laws of the great State of Texas. LEAVE. See ya.

17. What studies were those, Ken? The ones in last months’ issue of “High Times”?

    You have to love the pseudo-intellectual arguments put forth by the “legalize it” crowd. Between calling pot “cannabis” (as if a fancy name changes what it is) and the claims that smoking dope – or any drug abuse, really – isn’t really a crime at all (no matter what the law of the land might say), I have officially had my fill of bull hockey for the week.

    If one in six inmates report commiting their crimes to purchase drugs, it stands to follow that drugs are directly responsible for one in six crimes committed. That’s certainly not a “very small minority” as you assert, and moreover it’s a significant problem…..no matter how much “smoked out logic” you try to apply to it.

18. Dano, I’m not sure why you want to discredit studies that support your views or discredit the study you cited. The two studies I saw were conducted for the U.S. President’s Office of National Drug Policy with data collected from the Arrestee Drug Abuse Monitoring I and II programs, which I think may have generated the same data for the source you used.

    Common Sense, if I do not like the laws of “the great State of Texas,” I don’t have to “LEAVE,” because, as it says in the U.S. Declaration of Independence, when the government becomes destructive of the ends of Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness, it is the right of the people to “alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government.” Therefore, I don’t have an obligation to leave, but a right to petition the government to alter the law, and I have a right to work with others to alter or abolish the current form of government. I have no ethical obligation to change my behavior, rather, the ethical obligation lies with those doing harm. If you can find someone willing to step up and say, “Ken harmed me,” and their case is proved, then I have an ethical obligation to change. If I am enjoying some Bach after a few cannabis brownies, and a bunch of tax-subsidized, submachine gun toting guys come crashing through my door and demand I surrender my liberty and property, they have an obligation to cease and desist, and I have a moral right to resist them with deadly force.

    Dano, I call pot “cannabis” because I oppose the very rhetorical tricks you accuse me of. It was called “cannabis” in the west long before the criminalize-it crowd started calling it “marijuana” in the 1930s to give it a sense of foreignness in an appeal to bigotry. It’s still called “cannabis” just about everywhere else in the developed West.

    Dano, to equate “smoking dope” with drug abuse is fallacious, unless you define “drug abuse” as using illegal drugs, in which case you state the obvious. There are perfectly legitimate reasons to use cannabis. You don’t own other people’s bloodstreams, so even if there were no legitimate use, it would be none of your business as long as the user was not infringing on anyone’s rights. You state that illegal drug use must always be characterized as a crime. I disagree, because there is a difference between a legal crime and a moral crime — a difference between what is legal and what is moral or ethical. Everyone has a legal obligation to obey all laws, yet no one has an ethical obligation to obey all laws. There are some who, from their arguments, seem to maintain that they calibrate their moral compasses to the actions of legislative bodies, but I doubt they would ultimately align their lives to that view.

    Dano, you state that “If one in six inmates report committing their crimes to purchase drugs, it stands to follow that drugs are directly responsible for one in six crimes committed.” And you state that one in six is not a very small minority. I disagree, and I think most people would as well. Those one in six inmates you spoke of are completely responsible for their own actions, they don’t get to say “the drug made me do it,” and we should not craft laws to punish all drug users to prevent a tiny minority from making bad choices. Of course, the term “drug users” can include those who use nicotine, prescription drugs, alcohol, etc.

    Again, most people who use illegal substances do not and will not commit acts of violence or offenses against property. On the other hand, acts of violence and offenses against property were committed against at least three friends of mine by the government, which threatened their lives and took their property for possessing cannabis and a relatively harmless psychedelic compound. My friends were the victims. They have no obligation to move away; rather, those committing the crimes — legislators, police, prosecutors, judges, and juries — have an obligation to cease them.

    The actions committed by Kevin Bradley as described above are no worse than those committed by H-E-B employees every day. H-E-B sells nicotine and alcohol products, the former of which is possibly more addictive than cocaine. Tobacco smoking and alcohol consumption are probably each associated with at least as high, if not higher, mortality rates among their users than cocaine.

    Aside from the horrible consequences of drug prohibition, some of which I mentioned earlier, the philosophical problem I have with prohibition is that it denies the reality of human responsibility and dignity. I’m interested in holding *people* responsible for their actions rather than denying them the opportunity to choose good or evil. Drug prohibition treats citizens like children, slaves, or animals. I’m confident that the world would not, at the very least, be any less of a dangerous place without drug prohibition, and would probably be safer.

19. Common Sense- Maybe you should (legally) take Ritalin to get through Ken’s post.
    Dano _ LOL ” Cannibis- a fancy name” Come on , you can do better than that.