California Proposition 36 (Prop 36) is most commonly known as the Substance Abuse and Crime Prevention Act (SACPA) of 2000, which according to the Legislative Analyst’s Office is, “an initiative statute that permanently changed state law to allow qualifying defendants convicted of non-violent drug possession offenses to receive a probationary sentence in lieu of incarceration.” According to the UCLA evaluation report of the SACPA 2008- 2010 fiscal year, the Substance Abuse and Crime Prevention Act covered a classification of 3 types of offenders, the first being those with new convictions for drug possession or being under the influence or drugs, the second being persons on parole for being under the influence drugs or for drug possession, …show more content…
36 will come from peer reviewed journal articles found through, SAGE Journals, The Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment, The Justice Policy Institute, and The Criminology Public Policy, as well as a wide range of websites such as Drugpolicy.org, Legislative Analyst’s Office, the Drug Policy Alliance. Goals of Proposition 36 Due to the increased number of individuals that were arrested and imprisoned for drug possession and or drug related crimes in the State of California, policymakers as well as the state and local governments felt as though something had to be done. The State of California as well as the local government took the initiative to uncover ways to help decrease the number of offenders that were incarcerated due to drug related crimes. According to the Drug Policy Alliance, the total number of people imprisoned in California for drug possession quadrupled between 1988 and 2000, leading to a total of 20,116 individuals that were …show more content…
In June 1971, President Nixon declared a “war on drugs.” He dramatically increased the size and presence of federal drug control agencies, and pushed through measures such as mandatory sentencing and no-knock warrants. The war on drugs was viewed as a deterrent to help eliminate the use of illegal drugs and to decrease the transport and export of illegal substance from in and out of the State of California. Yet, as it did help with clearing the streets and reducing the use of drugs, it caused a significant increase in amount of offenders that were arrested and incarcerated for non-violent offenses. Due to these increased numbers, many would argue that the war on drugs failed the State of California, as it led to a significant amount of overcrowding in California jails and a greater financial burden for California
The people sentenced under the "Three Strikes" law received their third strike for a nonviolent crime. It reported that 192 individuals were convicted of marijuana possession while only 40 were convicted of murder, 25 rape, and 24 kidnapping. At the end of 1997, California’s inmate population totaled 152,577. 23.2% of the inmates (35,411) were homeless. imprisoned for second- and third-degree convictions.
Mandatory minimums for controlled substances were first implemented in the 1980s as a countermeasure for the hysteria that surrounded drugs in the era (“A Brief History,” 2014). The common belief was that stiff penalties discouraged people from using drugs and enhanced public safety (“A Brief History,” 2014). That theory, however, was proven false and rather than less illegal drug activity, there are simply more people incarcerated. Studies show that over half of federal prisoners currently incarcerated are there on drug charges, a 116 percent percentage rise since 1970 (Miles, 2014). Mass incarceration is an ever growing issue in the United States and is the result of policies that support the large scale use of imprisonment on
Proposition 8 was a piece of legislation formally called the California Marriage Protection Act which was an amendment to the Constitution of the State of California. The amendment was voted on and passed during the state elections of November 5th, 2008. The new legislation added to the constitution reads: “Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California.” The issue was prompted in May of 2008, when the California Supreme Court ruled that same sex couples had a right to marry one another according to the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution of the United States. This overruled earlier legislation known as Proposition 22, which was in fact the same as Proposition 8, but was a part of California’s Family Code, and not written into the constitution. Because the Constitution was given precedence over the Family Code in the Supreme Court’s ruling, Proposition 22 was rendered obsolete. Many people who shared conservative views about the meaning of marriage took exception to that and took action to create Proposition 8.
...y, H. (2008). Drug use and abuse: a comprehensive introduction (7th ed.). Belmont, CA: Thomson/Wadsworth.
The National insitute on Alcohol and alcoholism. (2012, December). Retrieved November 20, 2013, from http://www.drugabuse.gov/drug-abuse
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2009). Results from the 2008 National Survey on Drug Use and Health: National Findings (Office of Applied Studies, NSDUH Series H-36,HHS.PublicationNo.SMA09-4434).Rockville,MD,p.25., http://www.oas.samhsa.gov/nsduh/2k8nsduh/2k8Results.pdf
The war on drug not only change the structure of the criminal justice system, it also change the ways that police officers, prosecutors and judges do their jobs. Even worse, the way politicians address crime. The tough stand on drugs started during the Nixon presidency, most of the resources was focus on medical treatment rather than punishment. Although it was a better strategy and alternative than the drug war policies that exist today, it was a very divisive issue between the conservatives and the liberals. The war on drug ignited during the Reagan administration, two third of the financial resources were being spent on law enforcement. In addition, the end of the cold war left the United States with weaponry and resources that needed to be repurposed. As a result, small town were given high power grade artilleries and weaponry, and means to form specialized tactical units such as SWAT teams in case of unusual event. To maintain and justify the need for these new expenditures, SWAT teams are used in any drug warran...
The war on drugs began with the presidential term of President Nixon in the 1970s. According to drugpolicy.org, “He dramatically increased the size and presence of federal drug control agencies, and pushed through measures such as mandatory sentencing and no-knock warrants. Nixon temporarily placed marijuana in Schedule One, the most restrictive category of drugs.”
Liehr, P, Marcus, M, Carroll, D, Granmayeh, K L, Cron, S, Pennebaker, J ;( Apr-Jun 2010). Substance Abuse; Vol. 31 (2); 79-85. Doi: 10.1080/08897071003641271
Drug violators are a major cause of extreme overcrowding in US prisons. In 1992, 59,000 inmates were added to make a record setting 833,600 inmates nationwide (Rosenthal 1996). A high percentage of these prisoners were serving time because of drug related incid...
Once the War on Drugs was announced under President Reagan’s administration, Congress had began to expand government by enacting new laws. For example, the newfound solution to indeterminate sentencing and most notable act to which had lead to the increase in imprisonment rates was the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984 to which had the most dramatic and wide ranging effect. The Sentencing Reform Act of 1984 alone had prevented federal judges and many state judges from utilizing their discretion in determining their response to a case and were directed to use a mandatory sentencing guideline, which set out minimum sentences for all those who took part in the same crime (Bosworth, 2010). Unable to see such circumstances, this inevitably lead to hardened punitive practice, which resulted in the ending of parole in the federal system, increasing prison sentences overall, and requiring the offenders to serve out their entire
There is a need to change the current drug policy due to inefficiency by adopting the above recommend policy that is scientific based and that has credibility by justifiable statistics and research. The policy should be evidenced-based prevention programs, rooted in scientific research on addiction, historical emphases on recovery, increased access to treatment and a complete criminal justice reform if success against drug abuse is to be attained (Carmen, 2015).
Center, N. D. (2004, April). Drug Abuse and Mental Illness. Retrieved Febrauary 9, 2011, from Justice.gov: http://www.justice.gov/ndic/pubs7/7343/7343p.pdf
... Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (2012): ERIC. Web. The Web. The Web.
Resentfully, Policymakers against expanding drug treatment programs for convicted felons rest their case on several arguments: rehabilitation programs treat criminals too leniently; the public wants more criminals punished rather than more rehabilitation programs; and rehabilitation programs cost too much and do not work (Fallen, 2016). The Policymaker’s arguments have been proven to be unfactual. It costs more money to imprison and continually re-incarcerate criminals. In Spite of their beliefs on whether these programs actually work or not, I have just given examples of such successful programs. With drug abuse crimes being the number one reason behind incarceration of any