PHILADELPHIA _ A federal judge ruled Wednesday that a Philadelphia nonprofit's proposal to open the nation's first supervised injection site does not violate federal law _ the first court decision in the country to definitively weigh in on the matter.
In a 56-page opinion, U.S. District Judge Gerald A. McHugh said a 1986 law designed to target so-called "crack houses" did not apply to an "overdose prevention facility that provides medically supervised consumption services."
His decision will shape the legal debate surrounding supervised injection sites in several U.S. cities that are also considering, and in some cases have authorized, the opening of such facilities.
"No credible argument can be made that facilities such as safe injection sites were in the contemplation of Congress either when it adopted (the crack house statute)," he wrote.
The U.S. attorney's office, which sued earlier this year in hopes of stopping the nonprofit's plans, said it would have a response to the ruling later Wednesday.
It's not clear how quickly Safehouse may open an operation in Philadelphia, or whether the Justice Department plans to appeal.
Ronda Goldfein, a lawyer who is Safehouse's vice president and the executive director of the AIDS Law Project of Pennsylvania, said she is "reading (the opinion) closely to make sure that we're acting in complete conformity with the judge's direction."
"We said to the court and the public that we won't open until we have authority to do so _ and we're still reading the opinion, and we see that the judge has denied the argument that it's illegal as a matter of law," said Goldfein, who is married to a Philadelphia Inquirer editor, David Lee Preston. "So we're now figuring the next step and hope to have some guidance from the court."
Supervised injection sites, which have been in operation for decades in Canada and Europe, allow people to use drugs such as heroin under medical supervision and be revived if they overdose. Advocates in Philadelphia say they hope to provide a crucial tool to save lives in the midst of an overdose epidemic that has killed more than 3,000 in the city alone in the last three years.
"We have maintained that the federal laws couldn't possibly be interpreted to stop people from saving other people's lives," Goldfein said. "We encourage other jurisdictions to think broadly about what that means. It's not over by any stretch. At this very first level of judicial determination, the court has agreed that that law is not intended to stop us from saving lives."
