Criminal Justice Responses to Crack

Abstract

The past few years have seen heightened concern about the spread of the use and sale of smokable cocaine (“crack”) and its effects on crime and public order. In particular, the criminal justice system has responded to these concerns with an unprecedented emphasis on apprehending street drug dealers and users in record numbers, overwhelming the courts and jails of many urban jurisdictions. The public perception that crack is a particularly dangerous and addictive drug, together with the growth of an unregulated street drug market, media accounts of crack-related violence, and the lack of treatment facilities, has placed pressure on the system to process crack arrests differently from other drug arrests. This study of the response of the New York City criminal justice system to the early stages of the crack “epidemic” is based on analyses of the 3,403 crack arrests that occurred between August and October 1986, including the characteristics of defendants, charges, case dispositions, and sentences. The comparison sample consisted of powdered cocaine arrests from 1983 to 1984. The results suggest that crack cases had a higher probability of pretrial detention, felony indictment, and jail sentence. Logit analyses of lower court disposition and the bail decision indicated that being charged with a crack-related offense was a relatively strong determinant of these case decisions compared to such traditional factors as prior criminal record.

Race, Crime, and Punishment in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries

“…That same year, Operation Hammer, a policing strategy employed by the Los Angeles Police Department, resulted in the arrest of more than 1,000 persons for drug offenses over the course of one weekend; all were black or Hispanic (Walker, Spohn, and DeLone 2012). A similar policing strategy in New York City-Operation Pressure Point-led to dramatic increases in arrests of street dealers, almost all of whom were nonwhite (Belenko, Fagan, and Chin 1991). Also in New York City, the implementation of quality-of-life policing resulted in both a dramatic increase in arrests for possession of marijuana in public (arrests increased from fewer than 1,000 in 1990 to 51,000 in 2000) and racial disparity in arrests; in 2000, blacks made up less than onequarter of the population of New York City but constituted 52 percent of arrests for use of marijuana in public (Golub, Johnson, and Dunlap 2007).…”

Analyzing HIV/AIDS and Alcohol and Other Drug Use as a Social Problem

“…While drug use is defined as a crime, criminals were easily found after government officials’ response to this “crime,” with strengthened policing and increased arrests (Liska & Chamlin, 1984; Belenko, Fagan, & Chin, 1991; Liska, 1992). Due to these drug-using persons being economically marginal and alienated, social conflict theorists would conclude that this specific population would be arrested for their drug use.…”

Studying Crack Abusers: Strategies for Recruiting the Right Tail of an Ill-defined Population

“…Although ROR criteria (such as those in New York City) and bail-setting policies of judges were established prior to the crack era and typically ignore drug abuse, typical crack abusers (i.e., poor, high-school dropouts, unemployed, lacking family ties, no legal income, minority male) rarely gain ROR. Rather, they are detained andreceive more severe dispositions at each stage of criminal justice processing (Belenko, Fagan & Chin 1991).…”

“…The overall effect of the arraignment process is that arrestees with employment and family connections are the most likely to gain ROR and/or make bail (if set). This process has the effect of leaving impoverished, disaffiliated crack abusers in jail and detained where they receive consistently worse dispositions at every stage of criminal justice processing (Belenko, Fagan & Chin 1991 what arrestees reported at the initial pretrial interview. The CJA comparison groups are reported in Table III and consist of (a) "Any felony," including persons arrested on any felony charge (which carries a sentence of a year or more), (b) "Any drug" charge, including both felony and misdemeanor charges involving the sale or possession of any illicit drug, (c) "TNT arrest," including all arrests made by the New York Police Tactical Narcotics Teams in Manhattan from November 1988 to February 1989 (this team specializes in buy-bust tactics designed to clean up neighborhoods and imprison street drug sellers), and (d) "Crack only," including TNT arrests where crack was the primary illegal substance involved (and excluding arrests involving cocaine powder or heroin).…”