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An essay on the consequences of drug abuse
The effects of drug trafficking
An essay on the consequences of drug abuse
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Drug Trafficking in the United States and The Effects on American Society Melissa C. Rahorst University of Nebraska Lincoln Abstract This paper is to give a clear understanding of drug trafficking in the United states. Specifically, the definition of drug trafficking, when drug trafficking became prevalent in the United States, and different drugs being trafficked today. Furthermore, we will look at the stages and production of drug trafficking, according to the article Drug Trafficking, Organized Crime, and Violence in the America’s today by Rosen, Jonathan D., Bagley, and Bruce Michael. Finally, we will discuss some of the gangs heavily involved in drug trafficking, and the long-lasting effects drug trafficking has on society. …show more content…
It tries to corrupt the police force, it tries to corrupt the judiciary, and the executive. And drug trafficking thrives in a weak state.” ~René Préval. Drugs are a huge part of society. Legally, drugs can cure diseases. They can take pain away after surgeries or injuries. They are even good for preventing illnesses. With these great uses for drugs, they can also be detrimental to society. Drugs can have long lasting effects, and lead to physical, and psychological issues down the road. Drug trafficking has been an issue in the United States for many years. As we dive into the depths of this paper, we will discuss the basics of drug trafficking in the United States including a brief definition of drug trafficking, the stages and production of drug trafficking, gangs involved in drug trafficking, and finally, how these issues effect American …show more content…
As we learned from our readings heroin was produced in a region of Southeast Asia called the Golden Triangle. This area encompasses Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, and Vietnam. A current dominant source of heroin is the Golden Crescent, this region is Pakistan, Afghanistan, Turkey, and Iran. Mexico and areas around the Dominican Republic are also sources of heroin production. Cocaine comes primarily from regions of South America and is transported across the border of Mexico, and from Cuba into Florida. The United States receives the bulk of its marijuana from Mexico, but we also receive marijuana from our neighbors to the North. Canadian trafficking has also seen recent growth as we read in Drugs, Society, and Criminal Justice by Charles F. Levinthal. Marijuana not too much surprise, is also a widely-produced drug within the United States. Although marijuana has become legal in a few states around the country state to state trafficking has become a big topic for local law enforcement in any states bordering legalized
Over the past 60 years there has been a recent phenomenon in the development and rise of gangs and gang violence. This is exceptionally apparent in South Central Los Angeles where the Bloods and the Crips have taken control of the social structure and created a new type of counter culture. Poverty in this area is an enormous problem caused by a shear lack of jobs; but just because there is a lack of jobs doesn’t mean that there will be a lack of bills to pay, so sometimes selling drugs in order to keep a roof over your head seems like the most logical option. Crime often times flourishes in these regions because the inconvenient truth is; crime pays. Senator Tom Hayden stated “It’s been defined as a crime problem and a gang problem but it’s really an issue of no work and dysfunctional schools.” this statement is in fact true, but with an exception it is a more broad issue than just involving school, and lack of jobs but goes beyond into social structure as a whole and more specifically the judicial system, this can all be supported by three sociologists Chambliss, Anderson, and Durkheim.
In the 1970’s Patricia Adler and her husband infiltrated a large drug smuggling and dealing ring located in Southwest County of southern California with the intent of learning more about the covert group. In Adler’s book Wheeling and Dealing: an Ethnography of an Upper-Level Drug Dealing and Smuggling Community, she delves into the multifaceted lifestyle and activities of those in the Southwest County drug world. In this paper, I will look into the factors that initiated their entry into the drug world, their activates that facilitated their smuggling and dealing of drugs, and their exit from the drug world, while applying multiple theories to explain their illegal behavior.
Approximately given 80 to 90 million Americans have tried an illicit drug at least which once in their lives; marijuana alone is tried for the first time by about 6,400 Americans everyday. Furthermore, illicit drugs seem to be relatively easy to attain- in for 1999, 90 percent said which this about marijuana, also 44 percent about cocaine and finally 32 percent about heroin. Yearly, for which 35 million dollars is given just to control illicit drug trafficking. Moreover, over 400,000 of drug offenders caught are in jail, of which, some 130,000 are which for possession. Not for only are these statistics a international obvious embarrassment but because for these quantities which have been growing throughout history, we can only assume that they will get worse. We can already begin to for imagine the costs of these numbers which is it not already clear that we need for to find an alternative approach to this
Concerned authorities have focused essentially on criminalization and punishment, to find remedies to the ever-increasing prevalent drug problem. In the name of drug reducing policies, authorities endorse more corrective and expensive drug control methods and officials approve stricter new drug war policies, violating numerous human rights. Regardless of or perhaps because of these efforts, UN agencies estimate the annual revenue generated by the illegal drug industry at $US400 billion, or the equivalent of roughly eight per cent of total international trade (Riley 1998). This trade has increased organized/unorganized crime, corrupted authorities and police officials, raised violence, disrupted economic markets, increased risk of diseases an...
Due to the serious consequences of the drug problem and its related crimes in the United States, law enforcement identified six goals to handle cases of such nature. The first goal is to reduce the gang violence associated with drug trafficking and prevent the emergence of powerful organized criminal groups. Organized group are the main distribution of drugs in the community. They sell drugs for many reasons. It’s fast money, help fund other criminal activities and difficult for law enforcement to build a case against them for it. The drugs problem brings other crimes into the community. With drugs comes violence, drug wars and death. It is the main cause of the degradation of the community. Therefore, confronting the root of the problem by
Human trafficking is an issue that no one really wants to talk about. The media portrays this horrible crime as something that only happens in foreign lands. Americans do not want to believe that something so heinous could happen on our own soil. However when survivors of human trafficking come forward, people are forced to confront the reality that this issue is not that far from home. Some individuals still choose to deny that this is a real issue. However the facts make it extremely hard to deny that human trafficking happens on American soil.
In 1865 the United States passed the thirteenth amendment of the constitution which formally abolished the practice of slavery in the United States. Over a century has went by since this day, and yet somewhere behind the mask of freedom that our country holds with such pride lingers a hidden trade. This is the trade of modern day slavery that remains prevalent in our country. Despite the freedoms we are granted as a citizen of the United States,- human trafficking is an enormous issue that is often overlooked. In fact very little light is shown on this topic, but the awful reality is there. Every day women, children, and even men are kidnapped, taken from their families, and forced into free labor and sexual exploitation.
On July 30, Federal agents charged twelve Delta Air Lines employees of smuggling drugs into the
Despite the question of which country is doing the producing or distributing, the issues that the respective nations face remains the same. The drug trade turns nations into war battle grounds for opposing cartels and smaller gang factions, it provides no positive and optimistic future for the youth who are plagued by the violence and crime every day of their lives. The drug trade provides yet another issue for governments who are trying to combat issues such as debt and poverty. Here we have a multibillion dollar industry primarily in many countries that could be categorized as being part of the “third world,” the whole notion is a paradox. This leads one to the question of what can and should be done. Do the leaders of Latin American nations continue to combat an industry that arguably hold more power than they do or do these governments use this lucrative industry to their benefit in hopes of regulating it in such a way that it could then support the economy and bring the state out of poverty and debt, raising the GDP in an somewhat unconventional way. Essentially, the drug trade wouldn’t exists nor would it be so successful if there was no need for illegal substances and abuse of them. It’s hard to compare the variations of involvement from country to country because they are all suffering from the same injustice. One might find that if the approach that is currently sprouting in the United States, where the decriminalization of marijuana is becoming more widespread, was used in these in these Latin American counties, if this would still be such an issue, “Some Latin American analysts anticipated that the possible passage of California’s Proposition 19 in November 2010 – which sought to legalize the cultivation, distribution, and possession of marijuana in the state – would signal the
Over the last decade, Southwest border violence has elevated into a national security concern. Much of the violence appears to stem from the competing growth and distribution networks that many powerful Mexican drug cartels exercise today. The unfortunate byproduct of this criminality reaches many citizens of the Mexican border communities in the form of indiscriminate street gang shootings, stabbings, and hangings which equated to approximately 6,500 deaths in 2009 alone (AllGov, 2012). That same danger which now extends across the border regions of New Mexico, Arizona, Texas, and California has the potential for alarming escalation. Yet, despite the violence, evermore-brazen behavior continues to grow, as does America’s appetite for drugs. Even though drug-related violence mandates that law enforcement agencies focus on supply reduction, the Office of National Drug Control Policy should shift its present policy formulation efforts to only drug demand reduction because treatment and prevention efforts are inadequate and strategy has evolved little over the last three decades.
Drugs and crime have always been linked together. Generally for good reasons. Many organized criminal groups are associated with the smuggling of hard drugs such as cocaine and heroin into the United States. Such groups are the Medellin Cartel and the Mafia are notorious for smuggling ha...
Drug gangs don’t use civil courts or law enforcement for their protection when it comes to selling and distributing their drugs to their customers. Furthermore, evading the arrest from one crime is the same as evading arrest for another crime. Finally, the cost of punishments decreases as the number of convictions for the convict increases. The results of these circumstances influence the drug gangs to commit the following actions such as “murdering rivals, police, informants, states' witnesses, prosecutors, problematic customers, and passersby caught in the crossfire.” In addition, drugs increase property crime, corruption, and the erosion of civil liberties. Criminals who can’t afford the high price of drugs commit crimes to pay for their drug addictions. Corruption among the police and federal agencies has increased drastically as violence increases. The erosion of civil liberties is seen when the government has no choice but to invade the privacy of a citizen because of the suspicion of
Drug trafficking has been a massive concern between the borders of Mexico and the U.S. “since mid 1970s” (Wyler, 1). Drug trafficking is “knowingly being in possession, manufacturing, selling, purchasing, or delivering an illegal, controlled substance” (LaMance, 1). A dynamic relationship exists amongst Columbia, Mexico, and the U.S. the informal drug trafficking economy. This growing informal drug economy leads to many individuals creating a substantial living through this undercover market. These individual drug cartels monopolizing the trafficking market are a growing problem for the U.S economy and need to be located and controlled. If this trafficking continues, the U.S. informal economy will crush the growth of legal industries. The trafficking and abuse of drugs in the U.S. affects nearly all aspects of consumer life. Drug trafficking remains a growing issue and concern to the U.S. government. The U.S. border control must find a way to work with Mexico to overpower the individuals who contribute to the drug trafficking business. This market must be seized and these individuals must be stopped.
In the early 1980s, policymakers and law enforcement officials stepped up efforts to combat the trafficking and use of illicit drugs. This was the popular “war on drugs,” hailed by conservatives and liberals alike as a means to restore order and hope to communities and families plagued by anti-social or self-destructive pathologies. By reducing illicit drug use, many claimed, the drug war would significantly reduce the rate of serious nondrug crimes - robbery, assault, rape, homicide and the like. Has the drug war succeeded in doing so? In Illicit Drugs and Crime, Bruce L. Benson and David W. Rasmussen (Professors of Economics, Florida State University, and Research Fellows, the Independent Institute), reply with a resounding no.
Drug traffickers often use violence as a means to scare, intimidate, or prove a point. In a community that involves drug use and drug trafficking, residents no longer feel safe in the community. Drugs are related to crimes in many ways. It is a crime to use, make, possess, and distribute drugs; but drugs are also related to crime because of the effects they can have on the user’s behavior. Drug users under the influence of an illegal drug are not always conscious of the effects their behavior can ...