Drug-abuse treatment works better than jail
Mandatory minimum prison sentences have done little other than give the land of the free the highest incarceration rate in the world. The deterrent value of tough drug laws is overrated. During the crack epidemic of the 1980s, New York City chose the zero-tolerance approach, opting to arrest and prosecute as many offenders as possible.
Meanwhile, Washington Mayor Marion Barry was smoking crack and America's capital had the highest per-capita murder rate in the country. Yet crack use declined in both cities simultaneously.
The decline was not due to a slick anti-drug advertising campaign or the passage of mandatory minimum sentencing laws. Simply put, the younger generation saw firsthand what crack was doing to older siblings and decided for themselves that crack was bad news.
This is not to say nothing can be done about hard drugs like crack or methamphetamine, the latest headline grabber. Access to substance-abuse treatment is critical. Diverting resources away from prisons and into cost-effective treatment would save both tax dollars and lives.
The following U.S. Department of Justice research brief confirms my claims regarding the spontaneous decline of crack cocaine: http://www.ncjrs.org/txtfiles1/nij/187490.txt
Robert Sharpe
Washington
The writer is policy analyst, Common Sense for Drug Policy.
Comments (1)
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If the government wanted to solve this problem that would seal the boarders. Social solutions DO NOT WORK. Neither does jail, but it keeps them from robbing every thing in sight.
Posted on December 2, 2007 8:12 PM