Crack Cocaine

Adam "DJ AM" Goldstein's death last month was an accident caused by "acute intoxication" from a combination of cocaine and prescription drugs, the New York medical examiner said Tuesday. Goldstein's body was found August 28 in his New York apartment with a crack pipe nearby and a half bag of crack cocaine and prescription drugs in the home, a police source told People.com. His death came almost a year after he survived a plane crash in South Carolina that killed four other people.

For the first time since the war on drugs became a national law enforcement obsession in the mid-1980s, the number of African-Americans in state prisons for drug offenses has declined, a criminal justice reform organization said. A study released Tuesday by the Sentencing Project found a 21.6 percent drop in the number of blacks incarcerated for drug offenses, a decline of 31,000 people, from 1999 to 2005. The corresponding number of whites in state prisons for drug offenses rose 42.6 percent, or by more than 21,000 people, while the number of Hispanics was virtually unchanged, according to "The Changing Racial Dynamics of the War on Drugs."

In 1990, the FBI busted Washington, D.C., Mayor Marion Barry for crack cocaine. Today, the 68-year-old self-proclaimed "mayor for life" is back in politics, serving on the D.C. City Council. "I've been knocked down," Barry told CNN. "Some people would say you fell down or knocked yourself down, but I got up!" Barry has a long history of political comebacks, and his steely political sense was born out of a series of civil rights battles that energized him. Barry was born in 1936, deep in cotton country, in Itta Bena, Mississippi.

Chris Shurn walked out of San Quentin Prison in June after serving four years of hard time for possession of crack cocaine and a weapon charge. He joined at least 3,000 men paroled each year in Oakland, California, where the recidivism rate is more than 50 percent. When our documentary team first met Shurn inside San Quentin in 2008, he considered himself one of the lucky ones. At 21, he entered prison with a fourth-grade education, but left with a GED certificate and was only a few semesters short of earning an associate degree.

CIA Director John Deutch confronts allegations that the CIA dealt crack cocaine in L.A. in the 1980s.CNNs Jennifer Auther reports live from Los Angeles 8pm EST ; Reload the Vivo movie Watch this video using the VivoActive player from Vivo;To download a player go tohttpwww.vivo.comvivoactiveplayer_form.html.For technical questions, look at Vivos technical FAQ athttpwww.vivo.comvivoactivetechfaq.html.;

"Get yourself together." Mary Williams repeated those three words often to her 28-year-old daughter, who served three years in a Kansas prison for a 1988 armed robbery. Williams never judged her daughter, Wanda Taylor, for the crime or the crack cocaine addiction that fueled it. There was no need to pick at the past. Instead, Williams looked to the future. The future was her granddaughter, Donnie Belcher, a shy 4-year-old girl with curly hair who cried inconsolably from behind the glass the first time she visited her mother in jail.

LOS ANGELES CNN Newlyfiled federal classaction lawsuits allege that the CIA knew of dozens of people smuggling drugs into the United States but did not report that information to law enforcement agencies.; The suits allege that an epidemic of crack and other narcotics trading harmed African Americans and others, and placed enormous burdens on the social service system. ; Filed Monday in California, the suits allege that the CIA and the Department of Justice had an agreement that allowed the CIA to keep information about drug traffickers to itself instead of turning it over to law enforcement officials.

Babyshambles singer Pete Doherty was fined £770 ($1,523) for possession of drugs, including crack cocaine, heroin and cannabis Monday. The rock frontman, 27, was also disqualified from driving for four months at a sentencing at Thames Magistrates' Court in east London, the UK's Press Association reported. Doherty is the on-off boyfriend of supermodel Kate Moss. He had previously pleaded guilty to counts of possessing heroin, cocaine and crack cocaine, and to two counts of possessing cannabis in April and August this year.

DEA spokewoman Pam Brown said that North Miami Beach Middle School Assistant Principal Willie Young, 52, worked as a broker for drug distributors. The DEA accuses Young of planning to distribute the cocaine in the Miami and Fort Lauderdale areas, where it would be turned into crack cocaine and other forms worth millions of dollars. ; Investigators said Young was videotaped arranging the drug deal as he was busted. ; Young allegedly conducted some meetings in his school office, with students nearby, the DEA said.

The future of a reality show that Adam "DJ AM" Goldstein was working on for MTV remains undecided after his death Friday night, his publicist said Monday. "It is too soon to have made any decisions at this time regarding the status of the show," Jenni Weinman said in an e-mail regarding "Gone Too Far," a show about drug addiction that was set to debut in October. It was a subject close to his heart. The successful deejay and entrepreneur was a self-described crack cocaine addict who had 11 years of sobriety and wanted the show to help others.

For thousands of prison inmates convicted of crack cocaine charges, the prison doors will be opening early, thanks to sentencing changes easing the disparity between the penalties for possessing or distributing crack vs. powder cocaine. Congress passed the Fair Sentencing Act in August 2010, changing the 100-to-1 disparity between minimum sentences for crack and powder cocaine to 18 to 1. The U.S. Sentencing Commission voted this summer to make the reduced crack penalties retroactive, which means more than 12,000 current inmates are eligible to request reduced sentences.

A Tacoma, Washington man who allegedly asked neighbors for permission to dump a dead body in their trash can appeared in court Friday. The man is accused of committing murder with a firearm, according to a court document. CNN is not identifying the man because neither he nor his attorney could be reached for immediate comment. Witnesses told police that they heard what sounded like fireworks about an hour before the man appeared at their house, asking them to help him sell crack cocaine, the document said.

Adam "DJ AM" Goldstein's death last month was an accident caused by "acute intoxication" from a combination of cocaine and prescription drugs, the New York medical examiner said Tuesday. Goldstein's body was found August 28 in his New York apartment with a crack pipe nearby and a half bag of crack cocaine and prescription drugs in the home, a police source told People.com. His death came almost a year after he survived a plane crash in South Carolina that killed four other people.

The future of a reality show that Adam "DJ AM" Goldstein was working on for MTV remains undecided after his death Friday night, his publicist said Monday. "It is too soon to have made any decisions at this time regarding the status of the show," Jenni Weinman said in an e-mail regarding "Gone Too Far," a show about drug addiction that was set to debut in October. It was a subject close to his heart. The successful deejay and entrepreneur was a self-described crack cocaine addict who had 11 years of sobriety and wanted the show to help others.

Chris Shurn walked out of San Quentin Prison last June after serving nearly four years of hard time for possession of crack cocaine and a weapon charge. He joined the many men paroled each year in Oakland, California, where the recidivism rate is more than 50 percent. When our documentary team first met Shurn inside San Quentin in 2008, he considered himself one of the lucky ones. At 21, he entered prison with a fourth-grade education, but left with a GED certificate and was only a few semesters short of earning an associate degree.

"Get yourself together." Mary Williams repeated those three words often to her 28-year-old daughter, who served three years in a Kansas prison for a 1988 armed robbery. Williams never judged her daughter, Wanda Taylor, for the crime or the crack cocaine addiction that fueled it. There was no need to pick at the past. Instead, Williams looked to the future. The future was her granddaughter, Donnie Belcher, a shy 4-year-old girl with curly hair who cried inconsolably from behind the glass the first time she visited her mother in jail.

For the first time since the war on drugs became a national law enforcement obsession in the mid-1980s, the number of African-Americans in state prisons for drug offenses has declined, a criminal justice reform organization said. A study released Tuesday by the Sentencing Project found a 21.6 percent drop in the number of blacks incarcerated for drug offenses, a decline of 31,000 people, from 1999 to 2005. The corresponding number of whites in state prisons for drug offenses rose 42.6 percent, or by more than 21,000 people, while the number of Hispanics was virtually unchanged, according to "The Changing Racial Dynamics of the War on Drugs."

Academy Award-winning actress Tatum O'Neal was arrested Sunday allegedly after buying crack cocaine in New York, police said. The 44-year-old actress, who penned a 2004 memoir about her long road to sobriety, was arrested after being seen making a purchase from a drug dealer, police said. Investigators charged her with criminal possession of a controlled substance, a misdemeanor. In 2004, O'Neal appeared on CNN's "Larry King Live" to talk about her book, "A Paper Life.

Academy Award-winning actress Tatum O'Neal was released after an arraignment at a Manhattan courtroom Monday after her weekend arrest for buying crack cocaine. No bail was set, and none was requested by the prosecutor. The 44-year-old actress, who penned a 2004 memoir about her long road to sobriety, was arrested around 7:30 p.m. Sunday on the Lower East Side of Manhattan after she was seen making a purchase from a drug dealer, police said. Investigators charged her with criminal possession of a controlled substance, a misdemeanor that carries a maximum one-year sentence.