NCJ Number
115200
Date Published
1986
Length
43 pages
Annotation
Based on a series of studies conducted by the author in New York and Miami, this paper presents findings on the connection between drugs and crime among both male and female offenders.
Abstract
Although a number of the research subjects were contacted in treatment and detention settings, the majority of interviews were conducted with active drug users in the street community. Both heroin and nonnarcotic drug using criminal offenders were interviewed. More than 3,000 active drug users were interviewed face-to-face from 1977 through 1985. During 1983 through 1985, the research focused on 980 face-to-face interviews with women. The analysis targeted a subsample of 397 women who were using drugs and had engaged in prostitution during the 6 months prior to interview. Over the years, the 'enslavement theory of addiction' has held that the economics of heroin addiction forces women into careers in prostitution and men into careers of street crime. The data from these reported studies, however, suggest a more complex interaction between drug use and crime. Data do not support the theory that the use of heroin and other narcotics precedes and is the cause of criminal careers. Findings indicate, however, that although drug use may not spawn criminal careers, it tends to intensify and perpetuate them. Narcotics use thus freezes its users into criminality that is more acute, dynamic, violent, unremitting, and enduring than that of nonopiate users. 11 tables, 18 notes.