A bipartisan bill aims to strip mandatory minimum sentences for certain drug offenses from Idaho law — an issue the Legislature gave statutory authority back in 1992 — and return all sentencing to local judges.

The bill, co-sponsored by Rep. Ilana Rubel, D-Boise, and Rep. Christy Perry, R-Nampa, has been debated in the House Judiciary Committee, where despite some skepticism, it will be given a full public hearing.

While the idea behind the bill sounds prudent to some — local judges know the facts of individual cases, for instance — public officials like Barry McHugh, Kootenai County chief prosecutor, object strongly to both the logic and the facts involved in the bill’s central premise.

Rep. Perry is a member of the Judiciary Committee, as are Reps. Luke Malek, R-Coeur d’Alene; Paul Amador, R-Coeur d’Alene; and Don Cheatham, R-Post Falls.

“The legislature got involved with sentencing way back during the national ‘War on Drugs,’ and it has had a lot of negative effects,” Rubel argued. “There has been no noticeable deterrent; our jails and prisons are now overcrowded with non-violent offenders, and it’s costing the state about $7 million per year.

“Besides that, there is the basic separation of powers here. Sentencing for criminal acts belongs to the judicial branch, not the legislature.

“And finally, it’s just common sense that judges in the different jurisdictions would know more about these cases than a legislature that represents the entire state.”

Under the current statute, anyone caught with more than a pound of marijuana, 28 grams of cocaine or 2 grams of heroin is considered a trafficker.

Some of the minimum sentences include a year in prison for marijuana trafficking and three years for cocaine or heroin — along with hefty fines. There is no stipulation as to whether the accused is charged with a first offense, or has multiple drug convictions.

“I’m against this bill,” McHugh told The Press. “The legislature made sure to give prosecutors plenty of discretion in what charges we bring in any particular case.

“Theoretically, we can have a case where the amount of a drug meets the legislature’s definition of mandatory sentences, but we can change or amend the charge — say, in the situation of a first offender — before it ever gets in front of a judge.”

Amador, on the other hand, essentially agrees with the bill’s sponsors.

“The idea back in the 1990s was to come down as hard as possible,” Amador said, “but that was during a time when drugs were flowing into the country and there was a need to fight it.

“Now years later, it’s become obvious that we’re not serving people by using the heaviest hand possible. It’s no longer necessary. I think local discretion is the most prudent approach.”

Malek disagreed with his Coeur d’Alene colleague, insisting that the mandatory minimums were, indeed, a deterrent to drug trafficking (there are no legislative minimums involving small amounts of drugs for personal use), and that the overcrowding issue was addressed by passing the Justice Reinvestment Act in 2015.

“The JRA will go a long way toward solving our problems,” said Malek, an attorney. “We need to provide tools and training through our parole and probation departments. We need to teach life skills and get our non-violent offenders back in society.”

Malek said the state’s $30 million initial outlay in the Justice Reinvestment Act has yet to bear significant results, but noted that the program is still in the set-up phase.

“To say that handing all discretion to judges would reduce overcrowding is completely disingenuous,” Malek insisted. “It’s simply not the case, as long as we invest in rehabilitation.

“We should be proud of our trafficking statute. Look, these traffickers know our laws, and they do act as a deterrent. You can’t tell me that somebody caught with a pound of marijuana isn’t going to be selling it.

“That’s trafficking, and the legislature has made it very clear that we’re going to punish people who engage in it.”

McHugh agreed the mandatory minimum sentences act as a deterrent, and took issue with the notion that drug offenses are no longer a major problem.

“You see stories about heroin deaths every day,” McHugh said. “Depending on which survey you study, heroin use is up by huge percentages. These are scary numbers.

“The legislature was very careful to include language that really only includes drug traffickers. As prosecutors, we see people with small amounts of marijuana all the time. We’re not going to throw these people into prison. We have the option of lesser, misdemeanor charges or plea bargains.

“We want to let recreational users know they’re breaking the law and next time might be worse, but we certainly aren’t mistaking them for drug traffickers.”

With passionate arguments on both sides of the Rubel-Perry bill — especially the point about keeping all criminal sentences within the judicial branch of government — Amador indicated he couldn’t predict how the Judiciary Committee would vote on whether or not to send the bill to the House floor for a full vote.

“My gut tells me it’s going to be very, very close,” he said.