Drug Abuse In Prison Essay

Society most of time tends to be keen on helping each other. One way we help each other is by allowing inmates, no matter the crime, to join rehab. Steve Earle the author of ‘A Death in Texas’ was in drug rehab at one-point, finished rehab, and got clean of drugs. Earle then wrote about Jonathan Wayne Nobles a man on death row for killing two people. While Nobles was on death row he took drug rehab and got clean of his drug addiction.

On April 20 of this year I attended the drug court which is located in the Erie County Courthouse. The Drug Court is intended to promote healthy and law-abiding behavior for its participants. It acts as an alternative for jail and an individual is free to live in the community as long he or she participates in all services, along with being subject to random drug testing.

Most people in the United States each year go the prison and keep there for non-violent crime, such as drug related offenses. This issue has affected many family’s life for many years and caused the prisoners to deprive from many of their rights. Lacking the appropriate policies for keeping drug related offenses in prison has been a public health crisis and created a new addiction, like penchant for locking people up in prison. The author in this article “prison addiction: why mass incarceration policies must change.” discusses about lacking the appropriate policies for incarceration for non-violent drug related offenses.

Since the 1980s the prison population has grown by 800 percent. Many of the prisoners that got convicted and sent to jail was innocent of their crime but the jury finds them felonious and gave them a sentencing. In the 1980s people started adapting to the lifestyle of drugs, alcohol and also started a lot of violence “The origin of this unseemly record is in our panic about the explosion of addiction in the early 1980s. Alcohol, heroin and marijuana had already been wrecking lives, but a tipping point was passed when crack cocaine transformed addiction into a national catastrophe.”

The idea behind these program was to help treat the offenders for their substance abuse disorders while still holding them accountable for the crime that they had committed (Lutze & Wormer, 2013). Many studies have been conducted in order to assess the effectiveness of drug court programs across the country. In a qualitative study done by Gallagher 100 participants of the drug court program were examined. This study found that of the drug court participants, seventy-nine percent were not rearrested in the follow-up period. Twenty-one percent of those participants were rearrested (Gallagher, 2014).

After analyzing 69 adult Drug Courts, every practice found there was higher recidivism reduction compared to another program (NREPP , 2017, p. 4). Through studies on individual participants, SAMHSA found that “drug courts ‘significantly reduced the incidence of incarceration from a base rate of 50% to roughly 42% for jail, 38% for prison, and 32% for overall incarceration’” (NREPP, 2017, p. 6). Drug Courts save people from getting put in jail and this study shows how it works in keeping them out after completion. Low recidivism percentages are another huge plus to the courts.

Substance Use, Incarceration and Race We need to have additional substance use treatment options instead of sending drug addicts straight to prison. Treatment costs tend to be far less than incarceration. There are higher rates of substance use within whites, but higher rates of African Americans being incarcerated for drugs. These factors have been proven to increase the rates of incarceration and substance use.

America is a nation freeing its self from the shackles of the past . This is evident during the mid 19th century with reform movements happening in the Temperance, Education, Prison, women’s rights, and anti-slavery. Temperance, also known as Prohibition, is the fight against Alcohol. Americans were extraordinary heavy drinkers. In the 1820s it was estimated that per capita, consumption was 4 gallons of two-hundred proof per year (Larkin.

Only 18.3% (337,882) were for the sale or manufacture of a drug” (p. 23). Therefore, the individuals who are likely to enter the already overcrowded prisons may be users and the actual not distributors themselves. Thus, prison space that is intended to be reserved for murders and sexual predators is instead being occupied by substance

Should Convicted Felons be Entitled to More Rights? Everyday thousands of individuals are incarcerated into the United States prison system. As soon as these jailed individuals start their term, they give up multiple rights they had prior to being convicted. Each convicted felon is treated the same regardless of the crime they committed and lose the same amount of rights. The amount of constitutional rights taken away from convicted felons should depend on the severity of their crime.

I Prison and Enforcement Prisons are being overcrowded in the U.S and if nonviolent marijuana smokers were let out it would decrease prison population by over 3%. When they get out they can go to rehab and get over their addiction. The government could save money convicting prisoners and keeping them in jail. Fewer law enforcements would be required in prisons.

Therefore, those continually exposed to drug use will begin to see this as the normative behavior, accepting and adopting it for themselves. There is a direct correlation between the amount of exposure and the prevalence of deviant behavior. The realization of this correlation is part of what is leading the push for changes in drug laws. People are beginning to realize that while confining a drug user to jail does punish the drug user, it also forces them to observe and socialize with other deviants, not just other drug users, thereby exposing them to new and perhaps worse deviant behaviors for them to assimilate.

This leads to the question of whether the justice system is doing an adequate job of dealing with drug addiction. Instead of incarcerating people for drug abuse, an alternative is treating victims by rehab and treatment. This paper will exam why treatment is the superior option for

Addiction is the reliance on a routine. There are many addictive stages. Addiction, as it comes along, becomes a way of life. The persistent use of the substance causes to the user serious physical or psychological problems and dysfunctions in major areas of his or her life. The drug user continues to use substances and the compulsive behavior despite the harmful consequences, and tries to systematically avoid responsibility and reality, while he or she tends to isolate himself/herself from others because of guilt and pain (Angres, & Bettinardi-Angres, 2008).

All of the researchers know that "prevention is better than cure". Many teenagers fail in their life because they addicted by a drug. Department of health Malaysia very focuses on this cases. The teenager's above 18 years old participated itself in drug abuse, but they might have death penalty. Their brighter future will become dark.