Drug abuse and Crime

Kimster

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Of course drug use leads to crime. Its a crime just to have and do drugs. But I don't think the drug in its self makes a person comment crimes. As much as it just opens the door to something that was all ready dark inside that person.
 
my opinion is that coorelation doesn't mean causation. Most pot smokers aren't the ones to commit the violent crimes. It usually is people doing something like blow, smack, meth etc. But I think that itself doesn't cause it. I think it is the low IQ and impulsivity to also do drugs that causes it.
 
I exclude pot smokers from this answer. Drug users want to numb something they want to keep suppressed. Before drugs there was alcohol, the trouble with alcohol was that a person could only drink so much alcohol before they threw-up or passed out or both. Drugs were better because they could numb their brain and stay "concious" (in a manner of speaking). Their addiction is expensive and crime is the only answer. The drug trafficking is deadly, the drug dependency is deadly the drug world is deadly.
One only has to look at the dreadful toll it took on Whitney Houston. She was beautiful and talented, look what happened to her.
Drug addiction also makes a lot of people go insane and dangerous also, that type of crime is violent and deadly. Other drugs are so expensive that addicts resort to financial crime in desperation. All in all disfunctional people were better off drinking themselves unconcious. (Drugs weren't the answer)! :cat:
 
From observations of patterns from researching sexual predators & psychopathic serial killers from the 1980's CA speed freak killers to the present.
There seems to be the common denominator of methamphetamine use/abuse. From Pastors to Politicians, seems that no one is excluded. Meth appears to be the primary catalyst for psychopaths to act out their fantasies, which create new psychopathic tendencies in otherwise normal personalities..imo

Just my opinion and observations..
Wished some of our more studied members would contribute their thoughts on the probable meth connection.. In the Holly Bobo abduction/murder that Kimster mentioned. TBI Director Mark Gwyn, while addressing the TN Legislature, compared her case to a meth induced horrific murder case from a decade prior.. Imo, it should have been obvious as to the motive and traits of the likely perp/s responsible for her kidnapping on day one...TN was the number one state in the nation for illegal meth lab busts in 2010, and Decatur County was the number one county in TN.. The Holly Bobo searchers discovered another 100 illegal meth labs within the first two weeks of the volunteer search.

Blame the brain: Psychopaths are wired differently

http://www.smartplanet.com/blog/scie...ifferently/632

The same reward system in the brain that hooks people to drugs might also explain why some people act like psychopaths.

We know that cold-blooded criminals lack empathy and fear — and are, by societal standards, a bit odd. But new research shows that it is not the traits that psychopaths lack that make them behave badly, it’s the traits that they do have. Not only are psychopaths impulsive, they like to take risks and seek out rewards.

So-called psychopathic traits have been linked to a disruption in the dopamine reward circuitry in the brain. And it is this disruption that drives psychopaths to want money, sex, or fame, in extreme ways.

First, we got a sample of these community volunteers. Then we measured their psychopathic inventory by giving them a personality test to measure psychopathic traits [ranging from manipulativeness, egocentricity, aggression and risk taking].

We gave them speed. And used positron emission tomography, or PET, to measure dopamine levels in the brain.

The people who scored higher on the measure of psychopathic traits, showed higher dopamine levels in brain reward regions after we gave them the drug.


_From the comment section__of this Study -says it best:

RE: Blame the brain: Psychopaths are wired differently;

There's a lot more to it than that. Psycopaths (now often coyly
labelled sociopaths) are the only real persons, places, things, in
their world. The rest of us are figments of their imagination, in
effect, to be manipulated and used in anyway appropriate and
convenient to their needs.

If they believe it to be ultimately useful
to their purposes to be kind and generous and considerate towards
someone, they will -- without limit, if helpful to their ends -- or
if they believe it to be more convenient to destroy someone, they
will. There is no such thing as truth or lies external to them --
which explains why such persons can readily pass lie detector tests,
for example.

A quasi-religious psychiatrist I knew said they were born without
souls. A philosopher long ago came to literally believe that there
are people in this world who are actually not really human beings,
but who absolutely emulate the real thing and are basically
impossible to recognize as non-human. I think he was trying to
explain the psychopath.
 
I've never heard of a study that found a correlation between low IQs and drug use. Has anyone else?

Yes, some drugs (particularly alcohol) lower one's inhibitions and may make one more likely to commit a crime.

But in general and IMO, the so-called "War on Drugs" has caused the greatest increase in crime since our last war on drugs (i.e., "Prohibition"). Why we didn't learn our less the first time, I don't know. A large percentage of human beings, for whatever reason (and myself included), feel a need to alter their consciousness from time to time. It would be lovely if everyone would meditate, but so far that doesn't seem to be happening.

So legalize drugs for adults, but hold people strictly accountable for what they DO while under the influence. The hardened criminals will still end up in prison, but we won't have to make prison cells for somebody caught with a little cocaine at a party.

Personally and though I religiously respond to jury summons, I refuse to serve on juries for drug-related crimes. I think our entire system is not only ineffective, but corrupt and fundamentally racist. So I ask for a side bar with the judge and counsels and declare my refusal to find any defendant guilty for holding or selling drugs. It doesn't make defense counsels happy (I'm the perfect juror for them), but thus far, no judge has sent me to jail for contempt.
 
I exclude pot smokers from this answer. Drug users want to numb something they want to keep suppressed. Before drugs there was alcohol, the trouble with alcohol was that a person could only drink so much alcohol before they threw-up or passed out or both. Drugs were better because they could numb their brain and stay "concious" (in a manner of speaking). Their addiction is expensive and crime is the only answer. The drug trafficking is deadly, the drug dependency is deadly the drug world is deadly.
One only has to look at the dreadful toll it took on Whitney Houston. She was beautiful and talented, look what happened to her.
Drug addiction also makes a lot of people go insane and dangerous also, that type of crime is violent and deadly. Other drugs are so expensive that addicts resort to financial crime in desperation. All in all disfunctional people were better off drinking themselves unconcious. (Drugs weren't the answer)! :cat:

Above, BBM (I think that last line was facetious but...) agree to a point. I think any addiction makes one more inclined to commit a crime, alcohol included. I think most addictive substances, alcohol included, reduce inhibitions, which are what generally stop, or at least slow down, people from committing crimes.
 
But, nosys, part of the reason addiction is so expensive is because (a) drugs are illegal and therefore expensive to import and acquire; and (b) our governments (federal, state, local) love to levy "sin taxes" on consciousness-altering substances.

We can treat drug addiction as a health problem far more cheaply and while doing less damage to families than we do treating it as a criminal problem.

People love to look back to the 19th and early 20th centuries as some sort of Golden Age for the United States. I wonder if they realize that marijuana was legal and Coca-Cola actually contained cocaine. Even heroin was legal in most places until the 1920s. Yet somehow we weren't plagued by mass epidemics of opioid addiction.
 
Nova, I wholly agree that drug addiction is a health problem and am all for treatment programs. But, there is also personal accountability. If someone kills someone I love, because they are drugged up, or drinking, I don't care if their drug of choice is legal or illegal. But, I will want them to be legally responsible for their actions. I would not feel going to a rehab center would be an appropriate consequence. Especially knowing the recidivism rate (or at least knowing that it is high- I don't actually know the rate :blush:). I have no problem legalizing marijuana, or even cocaine, etc. It then becomes a choice. Anything that happens after that choice, whether a person loses the ability to control it, much still be subject to legal responsibility. IMO.
 
Nova, I wholly agree that drug addiction is a health problem and am all for treatment programs. But, there is also personal accountability. If someone kills someone I love, because they are drugged up, or drinking, I don't care if their drug of choice is legal or illegal. But, I will want them to be legally responsible for their actions. I would not feel going to a rehab center would be an appropriate consequence. Especially knowing the recidivism rate (or at least knowing that it is high- I don't actually know the rate :blush:). I have no problem legalizing marijuana, or even cocaine, etc. It then becomes a choice. Anything that happens after that choice, whether a person loses the ability to control it, much still be subject to legal responsibility. IMO.

First, I misspelled your hat, nosysw, and I apologize. Of course I know who you are, my friend.

Secondly, I wholeheartedly agree with your post I quoted above. To me, the most bizarre aspect of our legal system is that in some jurisdictions a defendant's charge is reduced if he can show he was high at the time of the crime. To me, this is lunacy. I think drugs should be legal,* but I think anyone who takes a drug (including alcohol) should be completely responsible for whatever he does under the influence.

In the case of minor property crimes, I don't mind rehab as an alternative for prison. But when it comes to violent crimes, lock 'em up for our protection and let 'em do their rehab at the state penitentiary!

* I don't know anything about crystal meth or the new bath salts. Frankly, both scare me. Perhaps these drugs are so severe they must be controlled. But we need to carefully distinguish between crime caused by the drug itself and crime caused by the fact the drug is illegal.
 
You know, I figured you just missed a letter, and no apologies are needed.

I agree with much of what you say, especially about rehab for minor property crimes...especially first time offenses. I would be a little concerned about legalizing mind altering drugs (don't even know their street names nowadays but we called them acid, LSD, etc, and I'm not even sure meth is in that category) as there is too much potential for harm to the user, and someone they might come across. But anything that gives someone a buzz, relaxes them, or makes them feel more alert and awake, etc. I'm okay with, as you said, as long as it is understood that they will be solely responsible for their actions while under the influence. I think we're both on the same page (and the same thread, again, which is always nice, my friend).
 
Nice to see you, too.

I'm no expert, but it seems that MAKING crystal meth may be even more dangerous than using it! Maybe the answer isn't making it legal to sell crystal OTC, but we could do no worse by simply throwing the book at those who commit crimes while under the influence.
 
It's definitely a cause, (the harder drugs) but also there is often a deep seated emotional reason for a person's drug use in the first place….and then there are the means - crimes- that a person addicted to drugs would go to to get their drugs.

But alcohol is so often involved when it comes to violent behavior in general.. I don't think we should revisit prohibition of course but it can be such a contributor to violent crimes!! Much more so than marijuana… but I don't know hard statistics on any of them.
 
Thanks and welcome to the thread and Websleuths, in general. :wagon:

Agree about alcohol. While I definitely enjoy a few cocktails now and again, generally, I tend to get a silly buzz after imbibing. Have seen way too many who get angry, belligerent and even violent. My older son calls it "beer muscles" mostly relating to guys, but I've seen females this way, too.
 
So much crime is directly related to ADDICTION. I think we should stop locking up people we are "mad at" and lock up people we are" afraid of."

Sent from my LG-MS770 using Tapatalk
 
From my research on various illegal substances & the resultant changes that are evident on brain scans, I would state that methamphetamine shows profound & permanent brain changes. Meth is unique in that way.

Moo
 
I think we should take a lesson from prohibition. We banned liquor and what happened? Crime skyrocketed. We legalized it and yes, we still have a great deal of alcohol related crime, but not like we do with substances like heroin or meth. I'm certainly not saying let's legalize crack. I'm saying I don't know the answer but to quote Dr. Phil "How's this workin' for us?" It’s not.
 
Thanks and welcome to the thread and Websleuths, in general. :wagon:

Agree about alcohol. While I definitely enjoy a few cocktails now and again, generally, I tend to get a silly buzz after imbibing. Have seen way too many who get angry, belligerent and even violent. My older son calls it "beer muscles" mostly relating to guys, but I've seen females this way, too.
This probably is way off topic but I just watched a documentary on PCP and it seems that its always males that are walking around naked, stabbing themselves and doing all this weird stuff and it does seem that way with alcohol also. Wonder why that is. Just sayin..

Closure is b.s.
 
So sad to go through these threads and pick out the missing/murdered young people who in one way or another were associated with illegal drug use.... It's not like there isn't enough literature, ads and movies putting out the message that your life can go down a rocky and sometimes deadly path when you associate yourself or others who indulge in drug use. Yet we read how so and so was using or selling or was friendly with those who are and now their life is a mess or ended because of drugs. They leave behind people who really loved them and cared for their well being. I don't know if this was the proper place to put my thoughts but I had just spent a couple of hours going back into missing person/murdered cases and finding these young people. Just sad...
 
I think the drug abuse has raised the crime rate.People who do drugs got so high that they dont even control their own actions,loose their mind control and after getting normal feels regret.I dont know who people who do drugs survive day by day after being so mindless.Sometimes criminal lawyer who defend people have to defend people who do drugs and are innocent but lost due to misguidance.Most of the drug criminals says that they did not want to do this but its a mistake.Drug world is rising by the day and even govt has made strict rules and taken action to stop the drug crimes.But still they happen, i dont think eliminating these drug criminals will get the crime rate any better, we need to cut the roots.
 

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