Drug Use among Police Detainees, 2005
2006; Issue: 319 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
1836-2206
Autores Tópico(s)Crime, Illicit Activities, and Governance
ResumoThe Drug Use Monitoring in Australia (DUMA) program is a crime monitoring program that focuses on illegal drug use amongst police detainees. It involves the collection of self-report and urinalysis data from people detained in police watchhouses, and the timely output of this data to police, policy-makers, criminal justice practitioners and other professionals every three months. The scale of the program enables the collection of a large quantity of information, and its strong foundation of state-based teams (some of whom have spent over seven years working on the program) and the use of urinalysis ensures the quality of the data collected. This paper summarises the annual data and provides information about drug use and its link to crime. Trend data on those testing positive across all sites indicate that use of heroin has largely remained stable while codeine has increased; MDMA has increased while methylamphetamine has remained stable, and cannabis has declined, although it still remains the most commonly used drug. Toni Makkai Director Introduction The Drug Use Monitoring in Australia (DUMA) program is a quarterly collection of information from police detainees in seven sites across Australia. These sites are: Southport and Brisbane City watchhouses in Queensland, Bankstown and Parramatta police stations in Sydney, New South Wales, Adelaide City watchhouse and Elizabeth police station cells in South Australia and East Perth watchhouse in Western Australia. The year 2005 was the seventh year in which the DUMA program monitored drug use among police detainees across Australia. The ability of DUMA to provide both snapshots and long term trend analysis indicates its value as a policy- and decision-making tool for law enforcement. In 2005, 3,786 detainees (adults and juveniles) were interviewed in the seven sites and of these, 81 percent provided a urine sample. Long term trends are also discussed noting for example, that following the heroin shortage in 2000-01 , there was an increase in the use of methylamphetamine, but since 2003 the levels have remained relatively stable. Profile of police detainees, 2005 In 2005, a total of 3,786 detainees (adults and juveniles) were interviewed in the seven DUMA sites. The demographic profile of the detainees shows: * the majority of adults were males (85%) * around two out of five (42%) were aged 21-30 years, 14 percent were aged 18-20 years, 17 percent were aged 31-35 years and 27 percent were aged 36 years and over * almost half the adult detainees had less than 10 years of formal education (48%); 17 percent had finished a TAFE course and 11 percent were currently at TAFE or university, but only four percent had completed university * almost half (47%) reported that they had lived in their own house during the past 30 days and six percent reported that they had lived on the street during the past 30 days an increase from only one percent in 2004 * just under a third of detainees (31 %) had a full-time job in the past 30 days * most adult detainees (62%) obtained money through government benefits * females were much less likely than males to obtain an income from fulltime work (1 0% compared with 35%) and more likely to rely on government benefits (83% compared with 59%) * females were more likely than males to have lived in their own house (52% versus 46%) * family/friends represent a significant source of money - 28 percent of males and 30 percent of females reported income from this source * females were more likely than males to report income from sex work (7% versus 1 %) and shoplifting (10% versus 6%) * males were slightly more likely than females to report an income from drug dealing (10% versus 7%) and other income generating crimes (9% versus 6%). Drug use among adult detainees Of the adult detainees who agreed to be interviewed, 81 percent (2,997 detainees) also agreed to provide a urine sample. …
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