NCJ Number
131372
Journal
Hofstra Law Review Volume: 18 Issue: 3 Dated: (Spring 1990) Pages: 795-830
Date Published
1990
Length
36 pages
Annotation
This article assesses the effectiveness of New York City's urban drug war under the Bennett Plan (the Bush administration's national drug control strategy).
Abstract
The article first argues that the two largest anti-drug efforts, Operation Pressure Point I and the Tactical Narcotics Teams, have failed to stem the crisis. The discussion then puts this failure in the context of the interaction between drug prohibition and oppressive social conditions in New York's inner-city, particularly in the African-American communities. The article concludes that the criminalization of drug use has had little, if any, deterrent effect on crack abuse or trafficking. Moreover, the combination of prohibition and oppressive inner-city conditions, rather than crack itself, is responsible for increased crime, violence, and disease. Prohibition intensifies the harm already inflicted on these communities by the criminal justice system. The article concludes that drug legalization would effectively address most of the manifestations of the current crack crisis. Distribution of drugs at their actual production cost would eliminate the majority of drug-related crime and undercut the current explosion of inner-city AIDS, syphilis, and other diseases. An end to drug prohibition would help "demilitarize" inner-city neighborhoods that are currently under siege not only by drug dealers but also by the criminal justice system. 175 footnotes