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Is the ‘War on Drugs’ Over? Arrest Statistics Say No

Despite bipartisan calls to treat drug addiction as a public health issue rather than as a crime — and despite the legalization of marijuana in more states — arrests for drugs increased again last year.

According to estimated crime statistics released by the F.B.I. in September, there were 1,654,282 arrests for drugs in 2018, a number that has increased every year since 2015, after declining over the previous decade. Meanwhile, arrests for violent crime and property crime have continued to trend downward.

Drugs have been the top reason people have been arrested in the United States for at least the past 10 years, and marijuana has been the top drug involved in those arrests.

The percentage of drug arrests that have been for possession (instead of for sale or manufacturing charges) has also risen, to 86 percent last year from around 67 percent in 1989. And the majority of drug arrests have involved small quantities.

“We’ve gotten so used to the idea that this is normal to arrest so many people for tiny amounts of drugs, but it’s not normal,” said Joseph E. Kennedy, a professor at the University of North Carolina School of Law… [Read More @ The New York Times]

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