With the spike in heroin-overdose deaths in recent years—a six-fold increasefrom 2002 to 2015—lawmakers and prosecutors are pushing for new mandatory minimums. In at least 29 states, laws have been proposed to increase penalties for heroin and fentanyl-related offenses. Pennsylvania is the latest to join the fray, with lawmakers advancing legislation to reinstate mandatory minimums the state's supreme court found to be unconstitutional in 2015.
We've seen this sequence of events play out many times before on both the state and federal level—a certain type of crime starts grabbing headlines, and lawmakers respond by proposing mandatory sentences for that crime.
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