Drug Trafficking in the United States Research Paper

Drug Trafficking in the United States - Research Paper Example This essay will briefly discuss the current problem of drug trafficking in the United States and how the government tries to solve the enduring issue. Criminal drug operations in the United States have been a crisis for decades now and display no indication of disappearing. The National Drug Threat Assessment in 2004 shows that (Swanson, 2006): In adults age eighteen to twenty-five, 15.4 percent report having used cocaine in their lifetime, 53.8 percent report having used marijuana, and 15.1 percent report having used MDMA (commonly known as ‘Ecstasy’). In 2002, there were 1,209, 938 mentions of drug use by emergency room patients (compared with 899,977 in 1995), and in 2000 alone, over 1.5 million people were admitted to substance abuse treatment programs in the United States. Americans consumed over 259 metric tons of cocaine in 2000 and over 13.3 metric tons of heroin in the same year (ibid, p. 779). The U.S. government, as a solution to the growing problem of drug tr afficking, invests more resources into law enforcement, rehabilitation, and prevention initiatives (Destefano, 2007). The United States confront major threats of drug trafficking from neighboring Western countries because they can simply satisfy or surpass the demands of the United States for prohibited drugs (Destefano, 2007). The drug control goals of the U.S. ... The agency believes that the prosecution of drug traffickers is a major element of its plan, and functions to reinforce overseas criminal justice systems to reduce their fraud by drug traffickers (Swanson, 2006). The Office of National Drug Control Policy of the Clinton administration proclaims its major priorities for national policing as â€Å"the disruption and dismantling of drug trafficking organizations, including seizure of their assets, and the investigation, arrest, and prosecution and imprisonment of drug traffickers† (Swanson, 2006, 780). The presence of an International Criminal Court with authority over illegal drug activities would promote all of these (Bartilow & Eorn, 2009). The United States, primarily, should back up this scheme because it will provide a greater assurance of punishment and conviction for drug traffickers. The judicial body would furnish another medium for prosecution, aside from the United States’ and other countries’ criminal j ustice system. More suspected drug traffickers would be convicted, sentenced, and thus pulled out from current systems of drug production and distribution (Bartilow & Eorn, 2009). The disturbance of drug traffickers and their loss of profits from drugs could aid in mitigating political corruption and fraud, and safeguard the authority of social institutions, law, and democracy from disrupting forces (Destefano, 2007). The United States would hence gain from the consequent boost in international defense. Subsequently, the Court would probably make global policing more productive and responsive. It will offer procedures for mitigating jurisdictional conflicts between countries and for transferring