Drug offenders sdmitted to prison Essay Example for Free

medicine offenders sdmitted to prison house house EssayThe single greatest force behind the growth of the U. S. prison system since the mid-1980s has been the national war on doses. 45 Spearheaded by major federal official do doses indemnity initiatives that significantly increased penalties for dose offenses and labelly increased federal funds for invoke anti-drug efforts, federal and area measures to combat drugs have concent sayd on criminal law enforcement rather than prevention and treatment.46 An estimated 400,000 quite a little roughly oneness-quarter of the total incarcerated universe in the U. S. are confined in local jails and show and federal prisons on drug charges. 47 Citing the extraordinary enumerate of drug offenders in U. S. prisons, General Barry McCaffrey, has decried the creation of what he termed a drug gulag. 48 Policies adopted to battle the use and sale of drugs have led to marked increases in arrest evaluate, in the likelihood of going t o prison, and in the length of sentences for drug offenders. Between 1980 and 1997, the number of annual drug arrests tripled to a graduate(prenominal) of 1,584,000. 49 The rate of drug arrests per 100,000 residents rose from 288 to 661.50 The rate of commitment to state prison per drug arrest quintupled amid 1980 and 1990, rising from 19 prison commitments per 1,000 arrests to 103 per 1,000. 51 The estimated time served by drug offenders in state prisons increased a full year between 1987 and 1996 federal drug sentences doubled. 52 As of 1997, there were an estimated 285,009 men and women in state and federal prisons on drug charges, a twelvefold increase since 1980. 53 Relative to the adult population, the rate of imprisonment of drug offenders hasincreased almost tenfold, rising from less than 15 inmates per 100,000 adults to 148 per 100,000.54 In 1980, drug offenders comprised only six part of state prison populations. By 1998, they constituted 21 percent. In federal prisons , drug offenders now comprise 59 percent of in all inmates, whereas they represented only a quarter of federal inmates in 1980. 55 do drugs Offenders Admitted to Prison Between 1980 and 1998, the number of new admissions of drug offenders to state and federal prison soared, exceeding 1. 5 million in total (Figure 5). In recent years, about one hundred thousand drug offenders have been admitted to prison annually. Nationwide, 31 percent of all admissions to state prison in 1996 were drug offenders.Among the states, the correspondence of drug offenders varied between a utter of 10 percent in Maine to a high of 46. 6 percent in upstart Jersey and 44. 7 percent in New York (Figure 6). In three quarters of the states, more than one in five persons sent to prison was convicted of a drug offense. In contrast, violent offenders accounted nationwide for only 26. 8 percent of new state prison admissions. site of Admission of Drug Offenders There is a remarkable range in the extent to whi ch states subject their populations to incarceration on drug charges (Table 8).The range of admission of drug offenders to prison per 100,000 adult residents vary from a low of 6 per 100,000 in Maine to a high of 91 in California. The ten states that have the highest evaluate of drug offender admissions relative to population are California, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Washington. Nationwide, drug offenders are sent to prison at a rate, relative to population, that is 13 percent high than the rate for violent offenders (Table 9).In one half of the states reporting to NCRP, the admission rates for drug offenders exceed those for persons convicted of violent crimes. Six states Arkansas, California, Illinois, New Jersey, New York, and Virginia send drug offenders to prison at rates that range from 50 to 100 percent higher than the rates for violent offenders. Drug Offending and Prison Admissions The broad range in admissio n rates for drug offenders a grade the country cannot be ascribed simply to variations in drug use and sales in different states.Table 10, covering twenty six states, presents federal estimates of the percentage of the population over 12 in those states who were current illicit drug users in 1991-1993. 56 Although some drug users may cross state lines to purchase drugs, we assume that relative rates of drug use in each state also roughly reflect relative amounts of drug sale activity. Comparing drug use rates with calculations of the rate relative to population at which drug offenders in those states were sent to prison reveals the lack of a consistent correlation between drug offending and the imprisonment of drug offenders.First, the percentage of the population that utilize drugs varied among states from 4. 1 to 8. 2 percent, compared to a range in drug offender admission rates that extended from 8 to 91. Second, the states with higher rates of drug use were not necessarily the states with higher drug offender admission rates. Oregon, for example, had the third highest percentage of drug use, yet it had one of the lowest rates of drug admissions. In contrast, California had both the highest rate of drug use and the highest rate of drug offender admissions.Third, lower drug use did not necessarily correlate with low drug offender admissions rates. The percentage of Illinois population that used drugs was quite low, yet the statehad the second highest rate of drug offender admissions. Similarly, Louisiana had a relatively low rate of drug use yet it had one of the highest rates of drug admissions. Obviously, no important conclusions can be drawn from a comparison of these two rather crude sets of figures.Nevertheless, the data paint a picture the explanation for the different rates at which people are sent to prison for drug offenses mustiness lie in different penal policies and priorities among the states, including different law enforcement resources a nd strategies, prosecutorial charging preferences, and sentencing laws, as well as geomorphologic and demographic factors, e. g. , degrees of urbanization, rather than rates of drug offending. Drugs Involved In Offense The NCRP data does not allow reliable calculations about the extent to which different hard drugs (e. g. , cocaine, amphetamines, heroin) were involved in drug offenses.The data is close to better with regard to the identification of marijuana offenses, which were identified as the drug involved in 4. 3 percent of all drug admissions. 57 In nine states marijuana offenses accounted for more than ten percent of drug admissions Alabama (16. 09), Iowa (17. 22), Kentucky (12. 4), Mississippi (14. 50), New Hampshire (28. 83), North Dakota (43. 02), South Carolina (11. 25), South Dakota (18. 3), and West Virginia (20. 63) (Table 11). Type of Drug Conduct People are sent to prison for both drug possession and sales-related conduct.In 1996, the unanalyzable possession of dr ugs (excluding possession with intent to sell) was the most serious conviction offense for 28 percent of all drug offenders admitted to state prison (Table 12). Fifty-six percent of drug offender admissions were for drug sales, and the rest for former(a) drug-related offenses (e. g. , fraudulent prescriptions and unlawful possession of syringes). In nine states (Alabama, Colorado, Georgia, Minnesota, Mississippi, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, and Virginia) more than 50 percent of drug offenders sent to prison were convicted of simple possession.