On October 22, 2008, The Huffington Post featured Eric E. Sterling's op-ed "Take the Handcuffs Off the Economic Recovery". Sterling highlights how the economic effect of more than ten million American adults who can't buy cars, houses, furniture, appliances, or other durable goods is like 9-11, Katrina, and every other hurricane combined.

On October 17, 2008, The Buffalo News published an op-ed by CJPF President Eric E. Sterling. The op-ed, Mandatory minimums unjust - and they don't work, is based on a new report from Families Against Mandatory Minimums that analyzed the failure of the federal mandatory minimums of the 1950s, the political consensus that repealed them in 1970, the lack of any re-election problems for Members of Congress who voted for the repeal, and the need to repeal mandatory minimums today. FAMM simultaneously released a poll reporting that 6 out of 10 Americans want Congress to repeal mandatory minimum sentences.

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ESPN's Michael Weinreb reports on the death of basketball star Len Bias from cocaine on June 19, 1986, and the consequences for his family, his community and the nation. CJPF President Eric E. Sterling is quoted in this detailed report.

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The cover story the June 1, 2008 The Washington Post Magazine is about a man whose 19 year prison sentence was commuted by President Bush last winter. Michael Short got that long sentence because of the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 that Eric E. Sterling helped write. He is quoted several times in the story.

This story helps explain why CJPF has been working with people trying to reform the law since 1989. Eric E. Sterling's analysis of the larger drug enforcement problem, was used by one of the vice chairmen of the U.S. Sentencing Commission to challenge the Justice Department's defense of its outrageous misuse of this law.

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On May 18, 2008, Eric E. Sterling spoke to an adult forum at the River Road Unitarian Universalist Church, Bethesda, MD, about the crack cocaine sentencing laws. His comments followed a showing of the documentary film, A Perversion of Justice, by Rev. Melissa Mummert, which tells the story of a young single mother of three, Hamedah Hasan, who was initially sentenced to life in prison for her minor criminal role in the household of her cousin, an Omaha, Nebraska crack dealer.

Ms. Hasan has been in prison since 1993. She is scheduled to be released in 2016 notwithstanding the efforts of the U.S. District Judge who tried her case to reduce her sentence because the U.S. Justice Department repeatedly appealed the Judge's rulings.

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On May 15, 2008, Eric E. Sterling spoke in Pilgrim A.M.E. Church in Washington, DC, N.E. to the mentors of persons on under the supervision of the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency for the District of Columbia about the effectiveness of faith based programs in corrections.

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On April 5, 2008 Eric E. Sterling spoke at the First Annual Symposium of the Criminal Law Brief at the Washington College of Law of American University in Washington, DC on a panel on the crack cocaine sentencing controversy.

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