What the relationship between drugs and crime

In the modern society,the news about “crime” and “drugs” apear in the media in the high frequency.We need to have definitions of crime in order to find out the causes of it and manage to get the solution.”Crime” is defined as an action or an instance of negligence that is deemed injurious to the public welfare or morals or to the interests of the state and that is legally prohibited.”Drugs” is defined as chemical substances that affect the central nervous system, such as opioids or hallucinogens. They may be used for perceived beneficial effects on perception, consciousness, personality, and behavior.Some drugs can cause addiction and/or habituation.This essay will discuss what is the relationship between drugs and crime.

As globalization today,the economic relationship between countries are much closer than the old time.In the meanwhile,it also cause the rampant drug trade all over the world.The worldwide trading provide a plenty of chances to smuggle the illegal drugs or chemicals for drug dealers.These are the people who recognize the commercial profit of illicit drug product and most likely do no use the product they deal in, concerning the personal harms that it can cause.Their offending is seen by the government as serious criminal behaviour and they are currently dealt with in the criminal courts.

For the reason of high profit,many poor people begin to join this area and the increasing number of poppy are planted.Then apear countries such as Columbia whose main economic support is drug business.

According to the statistics,the drug does not cause much crime as alcohol,approximately 5% crime related to drugs,but why drug is defined as a danger factor to society?The most crucial reason is that the Illicit drug use has unfavorable effects on individuals, their families and the broader community including the crime, fear of crime and injury.Not all drug users commit crime, however the linkage between illicit drug use and crime is well accepted.The Drug Use Monitoring in Australia Project (DUMA) provides a reasonable and independent indicator of drug related crime based on information obtained from police detainees about their offending and drug use.

The program currently operates in Queensland, New South Wales and Western Australia and has recently commenced in South Australia.

Recent DUMA data from the other States identified that of the detainees who were interviewed:

35% of females and 30 % of males tested positive to amphetamines

57% of both males and females tested positive to cannabis

38% of females and 17% of males tested positive to opiates (Makkai, 2002).

Drug dealing and property crime were the most common crimes that were reported by the sample of intravenous drug users.Drug use leading to dependency and hard to get off the habit,which can in turn lead to crime, can result in alienation from the wider community.The person who addicted in drugs would pay for the drugs continuously,so the poor people would easily run out of money and have to find other ways to get the drug money.Generally,the solution is crime such as robbery.In a recent Australian study of drugs users, 44% reported an act of violence after use, 39% had been involved in violence previously, but 33% of violence first occurred after such use (Loxley and Bevan, 1998).

Then they would get caught by police and be put in jail or drug rehabilitation center for years.It is obvious that the prison life is boring,so the drugs are the most popular things for prisoner in order to kill time.Research shows high rates of drug use in prison.For instance,a NSW study of prisoners found that 58.2 per cent reported drug use (excluding tobacco and their own prescription medications, but including alcohol) on at least one occasion during their current term of imprisonment.When the criminal released,they are still drugster with no living skills,so they have to restart their business.That is a vicious circle.

On the other hand,drugs associate with the crime.Most criminal are well organized,individual criminal are willing to join gangs.The financing money to run gangs are always linked with drugs,so the drugs are an unavoidable issue to criminal.A majority of criminal will take cocaine and heroin,or they will be asked to take it so the gang could easy to control them.the low-grade gangsters always take the job of smuggle the drugs and sell the drugs to others.For the sake of better life,they sometimes cheat to young people or use money to entice the poor people to be the member of their organization.Then the new member will do the same things as them,it become a loop and it is extremely harmful for society.

As in any organized criminal activity, illegal profits need to be “laundered” and drug money need to be made clean.National and international observations on money laundering generally observe that it is a threat to legal economies, provides chances to legal the rotten property and give criminals the opportunity to carry on and expand their illegal activities.

The relationship between illicit drugs and crime is very complex.Many different data sources establish that there is a ‘raw correlation’ between illicit drug use and crime (MacCoun et al 2001, p2). Thus, studies often find that a majority of offenders have used illicit drugs at some time of their lives, and a lower but still quite large proportion have used illicit drugs in a shorter before the offence (or at least their detention, or interview by the researcher). However, this correlation does not necessarily amount to causation in itself (MacCoun et al 2001, p2). Those studies which attempt to identify where drugs are causally involved in crime finda somewhat lower although still not aeriform balance again. Overall, it is probably preferable to use the terms ‘association’, ‘link’ or ‘relationship’ in describing the drugs/crime nexus rather than ‘causation’.