The Users of Narcotics Easily Engage in Criminal Activities - Essay Example

Drugs, Mental Health and Crime The users of narcotics easily engage in criminal activities. They most likely also become mentally challenged. From the statistics of criminals over the past three decades, most of them got involved in drug-related crimes. In addition to drug abuse, their mental health has been affected. Closely following up the cases of the criminals, poverty has been the root initiator of crime. Due to the financial status of families, many youths have got involved in drugs and its trafficking. In the process of trading drugs or trafficking, most of them get forced into continuing with the illegal activities (Monahan et al. 178-190). Forced trading of illegal drugs among kids from poor backgrounds in the long-run psychologically affects them. The negative pressure exerted on the young boys in the poor communities force them to grow up stressed. In the long-run, they get into a state of depression or even end up psychologically disturbed. The topic of drugs is delicate but also unmentioned. As a result, there are more young people getting lured into the drugs trade. When more individuals get into the trade, its distribution gets broader (Petrila 5-11). Drug abuse with time has become a menace that needs close attention. The main users being innocent teenagers who got lured by peers suffer the consequences of engaging with the wrong peers. The law enforcement agencies in the past have punished these young criminals carelessly. Hence, the resulting outcome becomes recurrent crime and drug abuse. The young boys, mainly have had to engage in further criminal activities because their reputation has become questionable, and no one is willing to employ them. The drug cartels operating in poor neighborhoods have taken the advantage of the confused youths to lure them further into illegal forms of trade. In the past decades, the biggest percentage of the criminals engaging in illegal trade of drugs were male, but in recent years the percentage of girls or females have kept increasing (Stojkovic 163-179). Drug abuse among teenage girls has increased considerably. It has become the case because more girls have started consuming drugs. Most of the girls who consume narcotics come from poor backgrounds, and they also engage in prostitution. The consumption of narcotics also has caused an increase in crime. When an individual gets to consume narcotics, he or she becomes uncontrollable and may end up committing a crime unaware. Most of the time, the drugs mess up the mental status of an individual causing them to act abnormally in their intoxicated state. As a result, many courts have come up with ways and courts that deal with cases of criminal defendants who involve in illegal narcotics or have mental health issues or both. In some cases, defendants claim to commit in order for them to obtain money to buy drugs (Versey 22). Drug abuse, a cause of addiction, should get viewed as a form of illness. Its victims needed attention other than conviction. This particular result would reduce the repeated conviction of drug abusers. If the addicts can get rehabilitated and monitored, the rate of crime would come down. The mental health problems that result from excessive depression and drug abuse can also get contained. Most offenders in violence related crimes use alcohol or drugs as discovered by research done by various research groups in the United States. Men mostly have the tendency of being more likely to take alcohol and drugs and behave violently (Monahan et al. 182-190). Illegal drug use appears to increase criminal behavior in offenders. Majority of such drug users fall into criminal activities to support their habits while others do so to support their values and criminal lifestyles. The availability of some treatment opportunities in jails and prisons enables a few to reform and once released coexist peacefully with other citizens. Jails crowd with offenders who committed crimes under the influence of drugs. As a result, the judges have become unwilling to convict such offenders. Therefore, the judges sentence them for two to five years only for them to serve less than a third of the sentence and get released to get rearrested over a similar crime. The judges have opted to form other courts that can address such cases effectively (Steadman 121). The treatment-based court engages all the court team to achieve a collective goal. An offender gets arraigned, convicted, rehabilitated and later goes back into the society reformed and recovered drug addict. Even though the percentage of reformed addicts relapse, there are many more who get reformed completely and become productive members of the society. The court is nonadversarial and only aims at restoring a defendant into a non-criminal member of the society. Later on, after releasing the defendant, the court gets to monitor the defendant to ensure that he or she does not relapse and still progresses with treatment (Stojkovic 163-179). Offenders who have mental health problems should not get prosecuted in a similar way as other criminals. The act would get referred as criminalization of individuals with mental illness. This group of offenders should get treated and rehabilitated. The rehabilitation and their close monitoring are paramount since they might relapse into crime and drug abuse if not. Before an offender gets pronounced mentally ill, he or she gets to pass the psychiatric test that suits the results of mentally ill individuals. Such an individual cannot get convicted but has to go through deviation and probation or parole programs. Through the programs, the mentally ill offenders either serve shorter jail terms or go through a rehabilitation program that improves their mental status (Steadman 124). The family members of the offender need to get involved in the recovering process. The psychiatrists involved in the process of improving the mental status of the offenders highly recommend it because it improves the chances of a faster recovery. Therefore, the mentally ill offenders get considered as sick not criminal. When the correctional facility admits a mentally ailing offender, it ensures that it undertakes all the correct measures. The measures that ensure that the offender does not go back to crime at the end of the rehabilitation (Welsh 87-96). Most of the offenders who involve in narcotics and those who have a mental disorder resist treatment for fear of victimization. Mostly in jails and prisons such individuals get openly referred to. As a result, they refuse to accept their mental status. The resistance gets intensive most especially when the individuals get jailed. When the offenders and their family members partner with the criminal justice systems to ensure that offenders rehabilitate and never go back to crime (Petrila 5-11). The programs are applicable in all states, including mine. All drug addicts and mentally ill persons need a similar treatment to get back to good health. The problems of addiction and mental illness compare everywhere. The rehabilitation of addicts and mentally unfit individuals follow a similar process, but in a way acceptable by the communities and age groups involved. Since addiction gets considered a sickness that can get healed by administering rehabilitative measures just as mental ailments, it needs to get treated as other forms of illnesses. Therefore, the large numbers of criminal defendants who get involved with illegal narcotics or have mental health issues, or both should get treated other than convicted. Works Cited Monahan, J., Steadman, H. J., Sliver, E., Appelbaum, P. S., Robbins, P. C., Mulvey, E. P., Roth, L. H., Grisso, T., & Banks, S. Rethinking Risk Assessment: the MacArthur study of mental disorder. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001. Print. Petrila, J. An Introduction to Special Jurisdiction Courts. International Journal of Law and Psychiatry, 2003. Steadman, H. J., Barbera, S., & Dennis, D. L. A National Survey of Jail Diversion Programs for Mentally Ill Detainees. Hospital and Community Psychiatry, 1994. Stojkovic, S., Kalinich, D. & Klofas, J., Criminal Justice Organizations: Administration and Management, 5th Edition, 2012, Wadsworth. Versey, B. M. Specific Needs of Women Diagnosed with Mental Illnesses in US jails. New York: National GAINS Center. 1997. Welsh, W. & Harris, P. Criminal Justice Policy and Planning, 4th Edition, 2013, Anderson Read More