About the Author | Feature page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

At his 1973 graduation ceremony, President John Coleman introduced Eric Sterling as the "conscience of the college." Little in that respect has changed since the days when Sterling toiled for an underground war-resistance printing operation and was arrested after chaining himself to the door of the draft board to protest the Vietnam War.

Sterling is president of the Criminal Justice Policy Foundation (www.cjpf.org), a non-profit educational organization he founded with philanthropist Robert Linnell in 1988. The CJPF promotes innovative solutions to criminal justice problems. It assists policy makers, criminal justice professionals and the public by disseminating information about preventing crime and improving the quality of justice through education programs, publications and the news media.

An acknowledged expert on the nation's "war on drugs," Sterling lectures frequently at colleges and universities, and his opinion is regularly sought by top officials. He has been quoted on the front pages of The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune, USA Today, The Los Angeles Times, and other newspapers. He has traveled to Mexico, Peru, Bolivia, Columbia, and Jamaica, often in the company of members of congress, to examine crime and drug problems first-hand and discuss them with the countries' top officials.

Sterling, who received his J.D. from Villanova Law School in 1976, was Counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on the Judiciary from 1979 until 1989. On the staff of the Subcommittee on Crime, he was responsible for drug enforcement, gun control, money laundering, organized crime, pornography, terrorism, corrections and military assistance to law enforcement, among other issues. He was principal aide in developing the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984 and the Anti-Drug Abuse Acts of 1986 and 1988.

He lives in Chevy Chase, Maryland, with his wife, June S. Beittel, and their daughter, Maya Rebecca Sterling.