Do Drugs Cause Violence?

The U.S. Sentencing Commission voted to reduce sentences for most federal drug offenders retroactively, potentially allowing 46,000 inmates to obtain slightly shorter sentences by the end of this year.  Given that there are over 6 million Americans under supervision in state and federal prisons and jails, this is a positive step, but it certainly is not going to be the end of U.S. mass incarceration. And yet, even this small step forward has received opposition.  The National Association of Assistant U.S. Attorneys opposes this change, calling it a “grave danger to public safety.”   And current pending legislation like the Smarter Sentencing Act, which aims to reduce draconian drug sentences by half, face serious opposition.  In recent testimony before Congress, the DEA asserted that drug trafficking poses serious threats due to the violence that accompanies it, and another commentator testified that simply releasing 1% of federal prisoners would lead to over 32,000 more murders, rapes, and other violent crimes.  The problems with these arguments are that they are flat out wrong.  The evidence simply does not support that drug defendants are violent people. 

The argument that drug defendants are violent conflicts with studies, like my work with economist Frank McIntyre, that shows that drug defendants are the safest defendants to release before trial.  Our study of over 100,000 felony defendants over fifteen years showed that of all of the felons released before trial, those charged with selling or possessing drugs were the least likely to commit a violent crime.  In fact, they were as safe to release as those brought in on driving related crimes.

Our study is not the only one that shows that most drug defendants are not violent. There is no proof that illegal drugs pharmacologically cause violence. Though certainly drug addicts commit more crimes than nondrug users, they commit them at low rates, and the connection between drugs and violent crime is complex and inconclusive.  In fact, no researchers have been able to prove that drugs have a direct influence on violence, and one study actually shows that drug users are more likely to reduce violent behavior after using drugs. Indeed, studies have pointed out that forces of violence are not caused by drugs but may come from economic hardship, poor intellectual capacity, an aggressive temperament, or other personality disorders. Interestingly, a link between alcohol and violence has much more support in data than a link between drugs and violence. And tobacco is even more significantly linked to crime than alcohol or drugs. A 1997 survey of prisoners also indicated only 12% of federal drug offenders were ever convicted of a violent crime. And against common perception, prisoners incarcerated for violent offences do not generally commit violent crimes for drug money. In 2002, only 5% of violent and public order offenders claimed to have committed their crimes for drug money. Even without protection of the state, illegal drug markets generally run without violence. For instance, Mexico has trafficked drugs for a century but has only seen an extreme rise in violence within the last decade.

So if there is not much evidence that drugs create violence, why do we all believe it?  Simply blame it on the War on Drugs.  In 1986, drug use was viewed as the most important problem facing the nation by only 3% of the population, but that number climbed to 64% in 1989. And during this same period drug use actually declined in America.  What happened though is that U.S. Presidents “got tough” and blamed drug use for America’s problems. With this rhetoric and legislative backing, prison rates climbed quickly and between 1981 and 1990, drug defendants went from 6% to nearly 25% of the state prison population, and from 25% to 60% of the overall federal inmate population.

  Though the drug-violence link lacks proper support, it is rarely challenged and forms the backbone of U.S. drug policy.  Countless cases and statutes continue to rely on this link to justify trumped up sentences. Courts have asserted, without support, that drug addicts need to commit crimes of violence to satisfy their demand for drugs; that drug use and trade inevitably involves violence, and individuals involved in drugs are more likely to be involved with violence, even if the defendant has never exhibited any violent behavior. What is more, the current drug laws make no difference between violent and nonviolent offenses, and an addict with a record of drug convictions often faces a longer sentence than a murderer. Instead of actually focusing on violent crime, drug crime penalty schemes (state and federal), include sentencing enhancements based upon the quantity of drug you have, assuming that the more drugs you possess, the more violent you are, even though there is little evidence to back this claim.

The overwhelming result of connecting drugs to violence is mass incarceration. Strict drug laws have punished individuals harshly for small roles in drug operations due to the fear of violence. The drug confiscation “success rate” of state and federal drug enforcement agencies has consistently hovered around 10% since the 1960s regardless of how many people are incarcerated and how much additional funding is allocated. By 2011, more than half of federal prisoners were serving time for a drug offense, while only 11% had committed a violent offense.

Recent U.S. Sentencing Commission changes—while positive—are not enough to make a dent in prison growth from the War on Drugs. Even with this change, a defendant convicted with just 10 grams of LSD, with one prior felony drug offense, receives at least 20 years in prison. But rather, these changes demonstrate that the time may be ripe to reconsider this flawed link between drugs and violence. Indeed, the entire framework of federal and state drug statutes and cases must abandon the myth that drugs cause violence.