The drug crisis : report on drug abuse in Illinois to the Illinois General Assembly.

  • Illinois. General Assembly. Legislative Investigating Commission.
Date:
[1971]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The drug crisis : report on drug abuse in Illinois to the Illinois General Assembly. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    91/404 (page 69)
    this, the question arises as to whether mari- huana use is associated with other types of criminal behavior. Does the violation of mari- huana laws predispose or compel an individual to commit other illegal acts, or does this illicit behavior have no further consequences? There is no evidence to suggest that mari- huana, or any drug, has a direct causal relation- ship with criminal behavior in a sense that its use invariably compels an individual to commit criminal acts. The relationship is more com- plex as the behavioral consequences depend upon the age and sex of the user, his mental state and associates, his socioeconomic status, and the extent of his involvement in and identi- fication with drug abuse as a way of life. In the last instance, it is obviously a common thing to experiment with marihuana smoking once or twice and quite another thing to ha- bitually use the drug, actively proselytize for initiates, or sell marihuana for a substantial profit. Habitual use of marihuana is often associ- ated with other illicit acts. First, many persons who are otherwise delinquent or criminal may also smoke marihuana. This, of course, does not suggest any causal relationship. Second, marihuana use is often pursued in a hedonistic peer group setting in which laws are violated. Again there is no causal relationship suggested. Third, use of more dangerous drugs is. fre- quently preceded by the use of marihuana: the degree of causation here is also quite con- jectural. On the other hand, use of marihuana is not necessarily associated with other illicit acts. Moreover, the extent to which occasional users go on to the use of more dangerous drugs or become involved in criminal activity is unknown. A number of authorities have suggested that marihuana use in the United States is a type of behavior which is often associated with crim- inal activity. Other authorities hotly dispute this charge. Although most juvenile delinquents do not go on to become professional criminals, most professional criminals have been delin- quents. The question remains, then, as to how many marihuana smokers are involved in a transitory episode of delinquency and how many become enmeshed and committed to a drug oriented way of life. Because the acquisition of drugs and their possession are ipso facto crimes, al! drug use is in one sense “‘criminogenic.” With regard to other forms of criminal activity, however, there is no evidence that marihuana use has any crimongenic effects (with two exceptions which will be discussed below). The testimony which preceded the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937 in- cluded such lurid statements as: Under the influence of this drug [mari- huana] the will is destroyed and all power of directing and controlling thought is lost. Inhibitions are relaxed. As a result of these effects, many violent crimes have been and are being committed by persons under the influence of this drug... 1 believe in some cases that one marihuana cigarette may de- velop a homicidal maniac probably to kill his brother [sic.]. Even at that time, responsible spokesmen for the medical profession objected to such state- ments feeling that there was no basis for them. Experimentation has proved that the objections were well founded. Marihuana has, a great majority of the time, an exactly opposite effect to the violence syndrome associated with urban crime. For the most part its users are passive, inactive, and lethargic. We noted that there were exceptions to this rule. It is true that persons who need money for drugs sometimes turn to criminal activities such as burglary, purse-snatching, and prosti- tution in order to obtain enough. This is more true of hard-core narcotics and amphetamine abusers, because it does not take a great deal of money to support even a substantial mari- huana habit. And because marihuana releases inhibitions, it may cause an apparently normal person to become violent, or a person from a culture where crime is endemic to join in criminal activity. The incidence of such effects is not known. But any drug, legal or illegal, which loosens self-control is likely to trigger such responses in susceptible persons. Per- sons who use marihuana deliberately in order to loosen their inhibitions about criminal be- havior do so because it is available. Drugs such as alcohol, amphetamines and barbiturates are usually popular for this purpose. It may be that because marihuana is above all a mood intensifier, the person who expects to become violent after drug use will probably become so. The calmness and euphoria experienced by many of the current young users are a re- flection of their search for a passive, non-com- petitive way of life. Marihuana and Alcohol Proponents of legalizing marihuana frequent- ly make the claim that marihuana is less harm- ful to the individual and to society than alcohol.