1 Drugs , Crime and Crime Reduction

The use of illicit drugs and high rates of crime are strongly associated. Under drug prohibition, drug-consumption and drug trafficking are inevitably defined as offences. Drug-related offences — especially incomegenerating property crime — are also common although psychopharmacological offences and violence between drug traffickers are less prevalent. Drugs and crime are also linked by many common causal factors such as poverty and unemployment although these associations are often more difficult to unravel. As a result of the many associations between drug use and crime, most drug users around the world spend large proportions of their drug using careers behind bars. This is true in most countries, but especially in countries relying predominantly on law enforcement responses to illicit drugs. Despite vigorous efforts to detect and prevent the entry of illicit drugs to correctional centres, and the imposition of extremely severe penalties for those caught and convicted of bringing drugs into prisons, the use of illicit drugs is a major problem in prisons worldwide. Although prison inmates are only a small proportion of the total population at any time, large numbers of individuals circulate in and out of prison over a period. In addition, much of the harm associated with illicit drugs in the community is linked to drug use during episodes of incarceration.