What If Geraldine Ferraro's Convicted-Felon Son Had Been Black?

It's hard to speculate--with any degree of certainty, I mean--but something tells me this 1988 scenario might have played out a little differently:

John Zaccaro Jr., son of the 1984 Democratic Vice-Presidential candidate, Geraldine A. Ferraro, is spending his four-month prison term for selling cocaine in a $1,500-a-month luxury apartment in Vermont with maid service, cable television and privileges at the Y.M.C.A. next door.

John Zaccaro Jr., son of the 1984 Democratic Vice-Presidential candidate, Geraldine A. Ferraro, is spending his four-month prison term for selling cocaine in a $1,500-a-month luxury apartment in Vermont with maid service, cable television and privileges at the Y.M.C.A. next door.

He is staying at his own expense in one of 12 units in a building designed for expense-account business people on short assignments in Burlington, Vt. ''We like to think of it as a cross between an apartment and a hotel, with the advantages of both,'' a spokeswoman for the building's owners said, according to an article yesterday in The Daily News in New York.

Mr. Zaccaro, convicted in April of selling a quarter-gram of cocaine to an undercover officer, was determined eligible for the state Correction Department's house arrest program, under which nonviolent convicts can find their own housing and live under what is said to be close supervision by correction officials.

John Quinn, who prosecuted Mr. Zaccaro, said, ''This guy is a drug felon and he's living in conditions that 99.9 percent of the people of Vermont couldn't afford.''

Also at litbrit.

Comments

[Sir Charles]

Ouch!

You say "convicted drug felon" like it's a bad thing.

[Lisa Simeone]

Thanks for bringing this up, Deborah. I confess I just can't remember all this stuff, even though I lived through it, and it's important to be reminded of it, especially since Ferraro has been shooting off her mouth in the most embarrassing fashion lately. I heard her on Talk of the Nation the other day, and before she was identified, I was asking myself, who is this person who's just bulldozing the proceedings, not answering the host's questions, rambling on and on and on?! Just cringe inducing. And then they said her name.

[rob]

A quarter gram? That'd be 10 or 15 dollars. Clearly,
a big time dealer.

In any event, Ferraro is acting like a complete idiot. I hope she wises up.

[litbrit]

A quarter gram? That'd be 10 or 15 dollars. Clearly,
a big time dealer.

rob, I don't know about the law in Vermont back then, but in Florida, selling any amount of cocaine is termed "trafficking", and did--and still would--carry a mandatory minimum prison term. Selling a single gram would net you seven years in state, at least (a friend's brother was sent away for that long for that very crime. Yes, African American.) Also, your math is off--a single G in 80's Florida ran about $125. (Another friend was a DA in Miami.) I'm assuming Ferraro's son, a well-off young man, was not dealing in El Cheapo, heavily-cut stuff.

[minstrel hussain boy]

they should have busted him for felony stupid. over a 1/4 gram? christ on a skateboard that's less than a decent line. (at least in my circles) that's not transactional level, if that's on the table it's a 'dude, knock yourself out' type of thing. to risk exposure for a quarter? stupid.

[litbrit]

It is a very small amount. But John Zaccaro's lawyers--yeah, he had a team of lawyers--refused any plea bargain out of hand. They gambled and lost.

Apparently Zaccaro had a reputation as the campus dealer, something the school was determined to put a stop to. So they set up a honey trap, and he dove right into it:

Sergeant Wemette initiated the investigation after rumors circulated that Mr. Zaccaro had earned the campus nickname "the pharmacist." Mr. Quinn said the verdict was important. "It sends a message that drug pushers will not be tolerated in Vermont," he said. "In my mind, it's been difficult dealing with the publicity in the case. I don't care who his parents are."

Mr. Zaccaro's lawyer surprised onlookers, who had expected the case to last several more days, by presenting no witnesses. He told jurors in closing arguments that they should find his client not guilty because of entrapment.

The 12-member panel began deliberations at 3:15 P.M., six days after the trial opened.

In his instructions to the jurors, Judge Francis McCaffrey said they could find Mr. Zaccaro not guilty because of entrapment if they believed he was induced to commit a crime he normally would not have committed. However, the judge said Mr. Zaccaro's attorneys must have proved entrapment.

The judge also said the entrapment defense could not be used if the jury was to consider finding Mr. Zaccaro guilty of a lesser offense of cocaine possession.

At the closing arguments, a Zaccaro attorney, Charles Tetzlaff, said the police acted improperly by sending an attractive female agent to Mr. Zaccaro's apartment to buy cocaine.

[rob]

Between 1981 and 1990, the average price of cocaine dropped 60-65% and your $125 is a very early 1980s price.

If you want to argue that a poor black Miami kid facing the same charge, wouldn't have gotten that same deal, well, no doubt that's true. On the other hand, a Miami narc might have scorned such a small fish.

[litbrit]

rob, I'm not arguing anything! The post, and my above comment with an excerpt from another NYT story discussing the lad's problematic reputation as "the pharmacist", was indeed about the disparity between the way rich white persons (persons, not kids, as Zaccaro was over 18) and poor black ones are punished in our system.

A Miami narc would undoubtedly have ignored such a small transaction per se, though if he was known as a big enough "campus pharmacist", he may well have used the gentleman in question as a way to gain entré into a particular supply line.

I stayed out of the whole legalization thread last week, but I am actually in favor of decriminalizing, and eventually legalizing, all drugs and treating the matter as the serious public health problem it is. For one thing, bed space would be freed up in all the Florida prisons that currently burst at the seams with drug offenders serving mandatory minimums. That space coul then be filled with the violent criminals--rapists, child molesters, etc.--who are currently and routinely released after serving only a fraction of their sentences, and who all too often turn around and rape/kill again.