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Drug Offenders - Treat Them Or Build Much more Prisons?

As you have probably read over once, offenders with some connection to drugs make up the greatest percentage of individuals in our prisons. Often, the criminal commits his/her crime either below the influence of drugs, or to gain money to support a drug habit.

But numerous of the prisons within the U.S., prison population has doubled or tripled over the last 20 years. Are people committing more crimes? Actually, national statistics show violent crimes on the decline by more than 30%. What, then, accounts for this huge improve?

You are able to blame a good part of it straight on our `get difficult on drugs' policy. The growing incidence of drug use, the death of youths by overdose, (and also some extremely famous persons), and the connection of drugs with other crimes, have produced this mindset of `lock `em up and throw away the key'.

This phenomenon spread across the country. Prisons had been being built in record breaking numbers. Private business was obtaining on the bandwagon, erecting prisons and bidding on housing, (or warehousing), offenders.

And the bill for this really is getting greater and higher. But what are we to do? Ignore the issue? Let uncontrolled drug trade flourish?

Drug trade wouldn't be a lucrative business without clientele. If we throw the `buyer', (user), into jail without substantial rehabilitation programs whilst he/she is there, we're just taking the customer out of the marketplace temporarily.

An additional unproductive aspect of locking the user up is the fact that the individual might possess a family members and kids he's supporting. (I'll stick towards the pronoun `he' for most of this article, as we have numerous much more men imprisoned than women-still recognizing that the drug offender may be a lady, too.) While he is incarcerated, who's supporting that family members? Too often, we, the public, are. You say, it's worth it?

It expenses $20,000.00 to $30,000.00 a year to home an inmate, depending on the state. What do you think a great drug rehabilitation system would price?

There are some drug rehabilitation programs in some prisons, with follow-up following the inmate is on parole. The program is frequently restricted to a specific number of inmates and staffing of the program is constrained by budgetary issues. Following the inmate has completed what's frequently an initial 60 day program, he's back living with `general population', not necessarily the best place for someone who's undergoing rehabilitation attempting to achieve a mindset change!

Private rehabilitation drug applications are expensive-in house programs are nicely more than $100/day. But divide that in to the $30,000.00 per year housing expenses in the prison, and you can have numerous, numerous days of intense treatment!

So, what is the answer? Do we maintain building more prisons? Do we keep taking much more breadwinners away from the family members? Do we keep creating more felons, with the monumental consequences of wearing that label? (A convicted felon almost always has serious difficulties finding decent employment as soon as he's released. These days, in healthcare- hospitals and nursing homes are prohibited by law of hiring felons. Most countries won't let a felon in to get a visit/vacation. And the list goes on.)

California took a bold and innovative step. Their Proposition 36, passed by 61% from the electorate, imposes therapy rather than imprisonment for first-and many second -time drug possession offenses. The conviction is then automatically removed from the person's record following he or she completes therapy.

California expects to divert as numerous as 36,000 offenders from prison annually, with this new law. Their legislative analyst's workplace estimates that the program could save California between $200-$250 million each year!

1 challenge facing California is that there aren't nearly sufficient drug treatment centers to handle the expected influx of diverted offenders. Drug rehabilitation centers are just as scarce in virtually each state.

Let's get off the statistical `train' to get a moment, and let me relate a specific case of which I'm personally aware.

A 31 year old man, living in 1 county, was a marijuana user. He was gainfully employed, and sadly also had an alcohol issue. Let's call him Sam, (not his real name), for ease of relating the story.

1 day, at Sam's location of employment, a diner, (which occurred to be in a various county than exactly where he lives), a consumer he had befriended, asked him if he knew where he could "...get a joint". Sam, an ever-obliging, friendly type, stated, "I've got some", and also the customer gave him $5 for 1 cigarette.

As fate would have it, that exact same consumer was caught by the police, later, smoking marijuana. At that time, (this was about 1995), the police in that region had been trying to break up a pretty big marijuana distribution `ring'. They told this man that he would not get `busted' if he would set them up using the individual who sold him the `joint'.

Shortly thereafter, the `customer' brought an undercover police to the diner. He said his `friend' wanted a joint, and asked Sam if he had some marijuana. Sam was a little leery about `selling' a joint to a stranger, but his friendly customer assured him the guy wasn't a policeman. So, the joint passed hands.

The undercover policeman then stated he would prefer to purchase much more.

Sam stated he knew exactly where to get it, and they agreed to meet at Sam's home on another day. It occurred, along with a little bag of marijuana passed hands.

Then the handcuffs came out. Sam was arrested, and offered exactly the same deal: "Tell us who your supplier is, and we'll let you go."

As is so frequently the case, the little fry won't `squeal' on the large fish, and Sam's loyalty cost him a jail term.

What sort of a penalty is associated with this crime of Sam's? Bad luck for Sam-he had sold marijuana to an undercover policeman in two counties! (Just by driving a brief distance down the road from his job to his home!)

In county exactly where he sold to the policeman, he pled guilty and was sentenced to 1 to two years. Whilst in county jail, he was taken to court within the second county, and got another sentence of as much as 7 years, suspended, if he successfully served his initial term and did not violate his parole circumstances.

The end from the story is that he spent 8 months in county jail, and 16 more months on probation.

There was completely no `treatment', rehabilitation-nothing in county jail. Occasionally, there was an AA (Alcoholics Anonymous) meeting, but sometimes the facilitator didn't show up. (I'm happy to say that Sam came out from the ordeal `clean', and has been clean and sober and an upright citizen for the final 7 years, in spite of the system!) This case was in New Hampshire.

Back to the options:

Arizona established a system 4 years ago, instigated by a citizen's initiative! In Arizona, individuals convicted of drug possession have their sentences suspended, are placed on probation and assigned to a drug treatment or education program. Those who violate probation may be ordered by the court to take part in intensified drug therapy, community service, house arrest, etc.-anything brief of prison. Their statistics showed the persons had been obtaining off drugs.

In 1998, the state saved $5 million in prison expenses while spending $2.1 million on substance abuse therapy.

In Nevada, a pilot system is releasing 150 inmates six months early on the condition that they participate in a court supervised treatment program for a minimum of a year.

Both Nebraska and Ohio are contemplating similar proposals to those of California and Nevada.

In Utah, drug offenders make up 22% of the prison population. They are looking at choices like day reporting centers, court supervised treatment programs and electronic monitoring.

Possessing marijuana is still a criminal offense in most states. Are we filling our prisons with customers who provide no real danger to society? It's time to seriously look at option options to locking up drug users. We could save lots of money, maintain households together, and with good rehabilitation programs in location, make sure that numerous users wouldn't re-offend. For more information about drug treatment programs in new hampshire, Try to visit my site.