6 - Drug control policy and street crime

Summary

In the United States the social world of street criminality is also a major arena for the use of alcohol and almost all illicit drugs. It is beyond dispute that drug use and crime overlap and interact in a multiplicity of ways. Moreover, the connection between drug use and predatory crime, along with the possible corruption of the young, constitute the major source of public fear and apprehension regarding drugs.

We shall not attempt in this chapter to survey the whole range of relationships between drug use and criminal behavior, which run the gamut from significant questions such as what should constitute a crime all the way to staff and visitor searches in the prison system. Instead, we shall focus on one group of criminal offenses - predatory street crime and burglary - and on the linkage between changes in drug control policy and levels and patterns of that category of criminal activity.

We shall restrict the category of crime that we consider here in this way because it reflects what appears to be at the center of public alarm and concern in relation to drug use. By concentrating on the potential impact of changes in drug control policy on the nature and extent of these crimes, we can direct our attention to the practical significance that should be attached to this topic. It is only by analyzing the effects of those changes that we can discover what is possible for government to accomplish in this field.