The group Families Against Mandatory Minimums (FAMM) said that a recent decision to ease federal penalties for crack cocaine offenses should be retroactively applied to offenders already in prison, the Austin American-Statesman reported Nov. 3.

Congress went along with the U.S. Sentencing Commission's recommendation that crack penalties should be reduced by about 10 percent to bring them into closer alignment with penalties for powder-cocaine offenses. But FAMM President Julie Stewart said that the policy shift doesn't go far enough because it was not retroactively applied.

"Hundreds of our members have written letters to Congress telling them why this amendment should be made retroactive," Stewart said. "There is a huge racial disparity in sentencing for crack cocaine in our legal system and it needs to be corrected."