Drug Policy and the Criminal Justice System


Book Description

This book provides a description of illicit drug use in the US, including the drugs being used, their effects, and who is using them. An historical analysis of federal laws and policies designed to stop drug use and trafficking in the US and abroad, as well as a political analysis of drug legislation, is also offered.




Drugs, Crime, and Justice


Book Description

Drugs, Crime, and Justice is an engaging, yet comprehensive, analysis of the interrelationships among drug use/abuse, crime, and justice. The first four chapters introduce readers to the interrelationships between drugs and crime, while the second later chapters provide readers with an overview of historical and contemporary policies, as well as a comprehensive review of research on policing drug markets, arresting drug offenders, and prosecution and sentencing of drug offenders in state and federal courts. Steven Belenko and Cassia Spohn also examine and assess the impact of the war on drugs and conclude with a discussion of recent policy changes such as drug courts and reform/repeal of mandatory minimum sentences and an examination of new and emerging drug policies in the 21st Century.




Drugs, Society and Criminal Justice


Book Description

For courses in Drugs and Crime, Drugs and Criminal Justice, Drugs and Society, and The Sociology of Substance Abuse Drugs, Society, and Criminal Justice is a highly readable introduction to the major facts and issues concerning criminal justice and drug-taking behavior in America today. Building on sociological theory, it explores the social problems associated with drug use and the theoretical reasons for drug use and abuse. It then delves into the complex relationship between drug-taking behavior and crime. Distinctive chapters include: Understanding the Drug Problem in America (Chapter 1), Understanding the Drug Problem in Global Perspective (Chapter 2), The History of Drug Use and Drug-Control Policy (Chapter 3), Drugs and Crime (Chapter 6), Drugs and Law Enforcement (Chapter 7), and Drugs, Courts, and Correctional Systems (Chapter 8). Discussion-starting features spotlight prominent figures, drug trafficking realities, and life-saving information as the book explores how drug use and abuse impact the criminal justice system.




Drugs, Crime, and Justice


Book Description

As the articles in this collection explore the drug-crime connection, it examines the "cause" of the strong association between drugs & crime. This collection offers a solid foundation for readers who aspire to be well-informed participants in this critical debate.




Drugs, Crime, and Their Relationships


Book Description

Surveys administered to high school students, studies carried out on jail and prison inmates, and interviews conducted with substance abusers undergoing treatment all point to the same conclusion: drugs and crime are strongly connected. Why they are connected is less well understood, however. Written for middle to upper-level undergraduate courses on drugs and crime or substance abuse and crime, this book examines the drug-crime connection in a systematic and comprehensive way. This book covers the entire drug-crime spectrum, starting with a review of drug and crime terminology, classification and theory, and ending with policy implications for prevention, harm reduction, and macro-level management of the drug-crime problem. The opening chapters discuss drugs and crime separately for the purpose of setting the stage for later discussions on drug-crime relationships. As the book proceeds, the boundaries between drugs and crime blur, thus revealing the complex and intimate relationship that links these two behaviors.




Drug Use in Prisoners


Book Description

This edited volume provides the first ever comprehensive, international and multi-disciplinary review of the evidence regarding substance use and harms in people who cycle through prisons and jails. Grounded in solid evidence and a human rights framework, the text provides a roadmap for evidence-based reform




Judging Addicts


Book Description

The number of people incarcerated in the U.S. now exceeds 2.3 million, due in part to the increasing criminalization of drug use: over 25% of people incarcerated in jails and prisons are there for drug offenses. Judging Addicts examines this increased criminalization of drugs and the medicalization of addiction in the U.S. by focusing on drug courts, where defendants are sent to drug treatment instead of prison. Rebecca Tiger explores how advocates of these courts make their case for what they call “enlightened coercion,” detailing how they use medical theories of addiction to justify increased criminal justice oversight of defendants who, through this process, are defined as both “sick” and “bad.” Tiger shows how these courts fuse punitive and therapeutic approaches to drug use in the name of a “progressive” and “enlightened” approach to addiction. She critiques the medicalization of drug users, showing how the disease designation can complement, rather than contradict, punitive approaches, demonstrating that these courts are neither unprecedented nor unique, and that they contain great potential to expand punitive control over drug users. Tiger argues that the medicalization of addiction has done little to stem the punishment of drug users because of a key conceptual overlap in the medical and punitive approaches—that habitual drug use is a problem that needs to be fixed through sobriety. Judging Addicts presses policymakers to implement humane responses to persistent substance use that remove its control entirely from the criminal justice system and ultimately explores the nature of crime and punishment in the U.S. today.




Criminal Artefacts


Book Description

Annotation Attitudes towards crime, criminals, and rehabilitation have shifted considerably, yet the idea that there is a causal link between drug adiction and crime prevails.




Policing Methamphetamine


Book Description

In its steady march across the United States, methamphetamine has become, to quote former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, OC the most dangerous drug in America.OCO As a result, there has been a concerted effort at the local level to root out the methamphetamine problem by identifying the people at its sourceOCothose known or suspected to be involved with methamphetamine. Government-sponsored anti-methamphetamine legislation has enhanced these local efforts, formally and informally encouraging rural residents to identify meth offenders in their communities. Policing Methamphetamine shows what happens in everyday lifeOCoand to everyday lifeOCowhen methamphetamine becomes an object of collective concern. Drawing on interviews with users, police officers, judges, and parents and friends of addicts in one West Virginia town, William Garriott finds that this overriding effort to confront the problem changed the character of the community as well as the role of law in creating and maintaining social order. Ultimately, this work addresses the impact of methamphetamine and, more generally, the war on drugs, on everyday life in the United States.




Against Excess


Book Description

Drug-taking and drug control are alike; both are often done to excess. Against Excess shows how we can limit the damage done by drugs and the damage done by drug policies.