X-Message-Number: 8779
Date: Thu, 13 Nov 1997 19:45:29 -0700
From: David Brandt-Erichsen <>
Subject: Oregon update

From the ASSOCIATED PRESS
(Thurs Nov 13/97; 2 p.m. EST)

          Reno: DEA Chief Should Have Waited

          WASHINGTON (AP) -- Attorney General Janet Reno said
          Thursday her chief drug-law enforcer should have waited
          for a full Justice Department review of Oregon's
          assisted suicide law before warning doctors about
          prescribing lethal medication.

          Reno said she did not get advance word of a letter by
          the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration wrote
          saying that Oregon doctors could lose their licenses to
          prescribe federally controlled drugs if they dispensed
          such medications to help assist suicides.

          Asked if DEA chief Thomas Constantine had sent the
          letter prematurely to Congress, Reno said: ``I think
          it's important on a legal issue such as this the whole
          department review it, and we are in the process of doing
          do.''

          That review would be completed ``as soon as possible,''
          Reno said at her weekly session with news reporters.

          Reno said she had not talked about the letter with
          Constantine, who had replied to Sen. Orrin Hatch,
          R-Utah, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee,
          about how the DEA would respond to the Oregon law.

          Aides to Reno did not know about the letter for several
          days after it was sent to Hatch, officials said.

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