WHO'S THE CROOK? WHAT'S THE CRIME?

I love my drugs -- from the first jolt of caffeine in the morning to the
last burnt amber drop of cognac before bed.

I sent up a cheer when Madame Justice Mary Southin got the last laugh on
the health police over the exhaust system installed in her office to
facilitate her nicotine habit.

I rejoiced at the Senate committee report urging the decriminalization of
marijuana.

Yankees pitcher David Wells might impress some by saying he was half tanked
when he threw his no hitter, but I celebrate Pittsburgh Pirate pitcher Dock
Ellis's 1970 achievement -- he threw a 2-0 perfect game win over the San
Diego Padres while tripping on acid.

So I cringe every time someone talks about the link between drugs and
crime. It is obvious that drug abuse is related to crime, but the nature of
the relationship is not cause and effect.

Many criminals take drugs for the same reason as the rest of us: "Drugs"
come in all shapes and forms, they relieve our pain, increase our fun and
can be really enjoyable. Some drugs are also very addictive.

So I don't think it's at all surprising that many drug users commit crimes.

Research, and common sense, I suggest, indicate this is likely because
addiction and crime both blossom in a similar environment of spiritual and
economic desperation. I think it's time to cleave them apart.

The uneven application of the drug laws across Canada has created an
atmosphere of disrespect towards the courts and raises fundamental issues
of fairness.

I'm not arguing that junkies don't do a lot of crime, or that drugs don't
fuel the worst demons. But I think health and crime are two different
beasts and are best kept in separate public policy pens.

Politicians, however, have created a regime that brands illegal any
behaviour that might be risky and foolhardy -- but not criminal. The
unintended effects of these laws and their capricious application are
costly and do more damage to the body politic than the problem they
putatively combat.

I honestly don't see how a reefer differs so much from a bottle of scotch
that smoking it must be outlawed rather than regulated, its users
imprisoned rather than required to toke downwind.

Drug laws for the most part have their roots in the turn of the last
century -- which is when opium addiction began to seriously rear its head
in the West.

In the 1920s, the newly formed League of Nations established an
international drug control system. Canada, for instance, criminalized
marijuana in 1923 by adding it to the schedule of the federal 1908 Opium
and Drug Act, its first prohibition law.

The Convention on Narcotic Drugs, the first international agreement with
binding force, was adopted in 1961 -- placing specific obligation on
countries to limit production of narcotic plants and prohibiting the use of
cannabis.

The only drugs prohibited until 1971 were the organics --the poppy, the
coca plant, cannabis. The advent of LSD and other happy pills led to the
expansion of the prohibition -- with the 1971 Convention on Psychotropic
Substances, which covered hallucinogens, stimulants and sedatives.

While there is a range of new pharmaceuticals from crystal meth to ecstasy
in the crosshairs of law enforcement agencies, heroin, cocaine and
marijuana remain the drug-world's axis of evil. And just as it's harder and
harder for Osama Bin Laden to find sanctuary, illicit drug producers have
become similarly hunted pariahs.

The globe is becoming a more organized place these days and international
cooperation is no longer just a pipe dream or a paranoid hallucination.

Regardless of political ideology, countries are signing deals and
cooperating with each other to spotlight black markets, whether it be in
drugs, blood, diamonds or enriched uranium.

The end of the Cold War produced a number of multi-national agreements; one
involves Egypt, Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian Authority, another
Pakistan and India.

United Nations figures show illicit cocaine production fell 20 per cent in
the last decade, illegal opium production by 15 per cent -- and both are
grown in fewer and fewer countries. The major drug-producing nations can be
counted on the fingers of one hand -- Afghanistan, Burma and Colombia being
the most high profile and problematic.

The primary reason for this decline is not enforcement, however, it's
alternative development policies coupled with crop eradication and
substitution programs.

Demand, too, has stabilized and declined.

The number of chronic cocaine users in North America peaked at about four
million in 1988 and dropped to about 3.3 million in 2000. Occasional users
dropped from six million to two million. The number of heroin addicts
appears to have stabilized at about one million. The total number of
illicit drug users is estimated to be about 180 million people, or three
per cent of the globe's population or slightly more than four per cent of
those 15 and older.

But the dampening of demand, unquestionably a product of the U.S.-led war
against illicit drugs, has come at a staggering cost -- an experience much
like a domestic Vietnam.

Building and maintaining a system to support the war on drugs has proved
extraordinarily expensive -- more than 1,600 new prison beds a week were
required in the U.S. to keep pace with new arrests and convictions.

The incarceration rate for drug offences was 15 prisoners per 100,000
adults in 1980; by 1996 it was 148 per 100,000.

For New York, Texas, Florida, California and Michigan, the U.S. National
Institute of Justice pegged their prison budgets at more than $1 billion --
about the same level as the federal prison budget. In Michigan, they were
spending as much on prisons as on colleges and universities.

On top of all that, the Bush administration's drug control efforts are
estimated at $19.2 billion for last fiscal year -- and individual states
spend an equivalent amount.

Across the U.S., cash-strapped states now are abandoning such tough-love
policies and releasing jailed drug offenders early. At least 13 states in
the last fiscal year considered closing existing prisons or curtailing
expansion plans.

In November 2000, California voters passed Proposition 36 -- a measure that
sends first and second-time drug offenders to treatment rather than jail.

In Canada, it's estimated we spend about $1 billion enforcing our own
prohibition.

Thankfully, we did not enlist in this war on drugs, but the country did and
does target drug users.

There are more than 90,000 drug incidents reported nationally by police
annually -- more than three quarters involve cannabis, more than half are
simple possession of pot.

The focus on punishment and incarceration is only now being questioned as
governments struggle to find the billions of dollars required each year to
warehouse nonviolent offenders, many with severe addictions.

The policy is especially dubious when you consider drug offenders are for
the most part recidivists.

Addicts receive little treatment in prison and often are released without
ever addressing the fundamental cause of their addictions or learning the
coping strategies to survive outside. Moreover, when they get out they have
a criminal record and it makes getting a job, an apartment or even finding
decent friends even harder.

Its a vicious circle that could easily be broken.

A 1997 Rand study concluded that spending money to reduce drug consumption
through treatment rather than incarceration would reduce serious crime 15
times more effectively.

Crime and drug abuse clearly are self-reinforcing forms of behaviour -- if
you reduce drug abuse, you generally reduce the level of crime.

But I believe the way we should be doing that is through health and social
programs, not an expensive prohibition policy that creates a whole new
class of "crook" and crime.