Drug use among a misdemeanant population

Abstract

Over the past two decades, researchers studying drugs and crime have employed a variety of methods to produce findings in support of the drug-crime connection including criminal justice records, self-report surveys, and the evaluation of physical evidence through urinalysis. Using these techniques, they have been able, to demonstrate linkages between hard drugs and criminal behavior,1 make estimates of the prevalence of drug use among criminal populations, 2 specify drug trends in the general population and make forecasts of drug epidemics. 3 The purpose of this paper is not to review the extensive research on drugs and crime. It suffices to point out that although research on drug use, crime, and criminal justice has covered most of the spectrum of criminality, much of the concern, and a majority of the research and scholarship has focused on the connection between drugs and serious crime. Less attention has been given to the connection between drug use and what are frequently thought to be more minor criminal offenses. This paper attempts to expand our knowledge of drug use among populations involved in law breaking by examining some drug use indicators in a sample of felony and misdemeanor arrestees in one city, Omaha, Nebraska (pop. 339,671). In particular we will make comparisons on selected drug-use indicators for various misdemeanant subpopulations such as those arrested for DUI with those arrested for other offenses. Comparisons will also address felony populations in order to determine the extent to which they differ from misdemeanor populations. The aim is to see if drug use indicators vary between levels of seriousness.