Bills calling for more judicial discretion when it comes to mandatory minimum sentences for drug crimes are gaining traction in the Florida Legislature.

State lawmakers hope the resulting legislation — along with a proposal to increase funding for substance abuse treatment by more than $50 million — will help bridge glaring racial disparities in Florida’s war on drugs.

But a measure aimed to improve equality in sentencing through the collection and analysis of data continues to face backlash.

The mixed reaction in Tallahassee shows a statehouse split on criminal justice reform.

More lawmakers now agree that data is an important accountability check on the system and are open to bills addressing mandatory minimums. But judges and prosecutors, who have blamed each other for the disparities, are not eager to be measured in public. And problems with accurate records and consistency among circuit courts make the data proposal a tough sell.

“Florida and all other states desperately need to monitor data in the criminal justice system,” said Deborrah Brodsky, director of Florida State University’s Project on Accountable Justice. “We will continue to have this finger pointing back and forth until everyone is in agreement we are looking at the same thing.

“Constant attention to data is going to change how people look at this.”

Stakeholders say the increased exposure from the Herald-Tribune’s “One War. Two Races” investigation should help accelerate criminal justice reforms.

“The Herald-Tribune really started something that could change criminal defense work and prosecution forever,” said A. Wellington Barlow, a retired criminal defense attorney in Jacksonville. “This type of work can change criminal justice across the nation.”

 

‘Right sentence to the right person’

The Herald-Tribune’s “One War. Two Races” series showed how blacks convicted on a mandatory minimum drug charges spend 39 percent more time in lockup than whites who score similar points at sentencing, according to a review of data from the Florida Department Corrections.

Blacks also average nearly double the time in lockup when convicted of drug crimes in drug-free zones like churches, parks and public housing, which blanket minority communities.

Lawmakers say that reporting will help garner support for a bill this year that would restore discretion to judges on low-level drug offenses that carry a mandatory minimum, diverting many of these offenders into drug treatment instead of prison.

Other legislation filed this year would allow the courts to depart below the 3-year mandatory minimum term of imprisonment for drug trafficking, excluding opioids.

“One gram (of drugs) can mean the difference between three years, five years or 15 years,” said Sen. Jeff Brandes, R-St. Petersburg, who sponsored the low-level offender bill. “We are trying to get the right sentence to the right person, and make sure the sentence fits the crime. If an offender needs treatment, we should be able to give it to them. Often times, with lower-level offenders, the line between addict and dealer is pretty blurry.”

Supporters of these bills hope they will enhance access to drug treatment and ease Florida’s overcrowded prisons, which cost more than $2 billion each year to operate.

“Both Republicans and Democrats understand the issue in a way they did not several years ago,” said Greg Newburn, state policy director for Families Against Mandatory Minimums. “It’s important for stories like (One War. Two Races) to bring it to light. The tone has shifted away from increasing penalties all of the time as the silver bullet answer.”

 

‘There’s still pushback from judges’

Other legislation inspired by the Herald-Tribune’s reporting on racial disparities in sentencing appears to be dead.

A bill proposed during the 2017 session — requiring the state to compile sentencing data for each judge and measure racial disparities in sentencing — likely will fail to move forward this year after the senator who drafted the measure could not secure support from a co-sponsor in the House.

That legislation was proposed in response to the newspaper’s “Bias on the bench” series, which was published in December 2016. But the bill fell short of passage because of complaints from judges in the Sarasota’s 12th Judicial Circuit.

It now appears judges from other parts of the state are not keen on the bill’s revival.

That is in spite of efforts by Barlow, the retired Jacksonville attorney, who spent much of last year traveling the state, meeting with judges — including 12th Circuit Chief Judge Charles Williams.

Barlow said he explained how improvements in the way the state collects and analyzes data could help judges, prosecutors and lawyers do their jobs. It would allow them to quickly see average sentences doled out to defendants who committed the same crime and scored the same number of points under Florida’s sentencing guidelines.

“The prospective of judges is that the more data we have at our disposal to make the right decision, the better,” Barlow said.

Even Judge Williams, who sent retired judge Lee Haworth to Tallahassee to lobby against the bill last year, expressed support for the concept in two letters to Rep. Jim Boyd, R-Bradenton.

In August, Williams wrote that “there are a number of factors not reliably captured in existing databases that should be considered in crafting a new law. Consequently, we would like to offer our judges and trial court administrator as resources for any legislation you may see developing in this area.”

Two months later, Williams reiterated his “desire to cooperate with the legislature in any way possible to see that accurate data involving the criminal justice (system) can be captured and studied.”

Vocal support from Williams, however, was not enough to combat skepticism from other judges around the state.

“There’s still pushback from the judges, to be honest,” said Sen. Audrey Gibson, D-Jacksonville, who sponsored the data collection reform. “There just isn’t much of an appetite for it.”