LEGALISING or "decriminalising" illegal drugs will never solve a society's drug problem, an international conference on crime was told in Dublin yesterday.
Mr Carlo Boccia, special agent in charge at the US Drug Enforcement Administration's New York division, said legalisation has not worked before and will not work in the future, and those who argue for it do so out of "frustration" with other efforts to cope with the drug problem.
He said a number of prominent personalities, including some "misinformed" police chiefs in the United States, had proposed legalisation. They said it would reduce crime. However, they did not realise that while it might bring a short term reduction in crime, it would also lead to "an explosive and in many cases permanent rise in use and addiction". This had happened wherever he had seen legalisation, implemented, he said.
Mr Boccia was addressing the conference, entitled "International Perspectives on Crime, Justice and Public Order", being held at Dublin Castle this week. The conference, organised by the Garda, the Department of Justice and New York's John Jay College of Criminal Justice, is being attended by more than 200 law enforcement officials, senior police officers and academics from 27 countries.
Mr Boccia told delegates that law enforcement could only fight a "holding battle" against drug trafficking. Neither law enforcement nor drug treatment could solve the problem. Only a commitment to education and prevention programmes could limit the numbers of people taking drugs. Recognising this, the DEA was now spending between 15 and 20 per cent of its budget on demand reduction programmes.
The agency had also divided its activities between trying to disrupt the upper levels of the drug business and sending teams of agents to "clean up" areas where the drug problem had got out of hand. These teams gave communities a chance to "grab hold of their neighbourhoods", he said.
The Chief Constable of Northumbria, Mr John Stevens, addressed the conference on involving communities and local authorities in crime prevention programmes. Best known in Ireland for his investigation into allegations of collusion between the security forces and loyalist paramilitaries, Mr Stevens said it was "unfortunate" that the British government had not fully implemented the Morgan Report, which outlined how local government should have statutory responsibility for community safety programmes.
However, its recommendations had been put into practice in Northumbria. This involved setting up a board, chaired by the police authority, on which statutory, private sector and other agencies were represented.
"The final blend is often a potent combination of diverse expertise working in harmony towards a common goal for the good of the community," he said. "When brought to bear on even the toughest of problems, this coordination of effort virtually guarantees results."
There was little doubt that the strategy played a significant role in reducing the crime rate in Northumbria, he said. Crime had fallen by 18 per cent between 1991 and 1995, while detection rates had risen from 18 per cent to 23 per cent last year.