Drug offending and criminal justice responses: practitioners’ perspectives

This paper describes the perspectives of 35 senior criminal justice professionals from Melbourne, Canberra and Sydney who were interviewed in 1998/99, as part of a much larger study that examined illicit drug issues in the context of a multicultural community. Key informants worked across a range of areas within the criminal justice sector—national intelligence, inter-agency drug task forces, state and federal police, corrections, juvenile justice, judiciary, and academic—each observing illicit drug issues from different perspectives. Despite being from different areas within the criminal justice sector there were many similarities in perceptions about illicit drug use and current policy approaches to the problem. Many had private views that were at variance with the policy position adopted by their agencies. The majority of those interviewed believed that the response to drug users—many of whom also sell drugs—should primarily be one of health, and most were in favour of imaginative and liberal approaches designed to minimise the harms associated with illicit drugs.