Drug Use and Crime among Two Cohorts of Women Narcotics Users: An Empirical Assessment

The relationship between drug use and crime among women has been given minimal research attention, and the few studies that have been undertaken have relied on arrests to indicate crimes, or have interviewed only institutionalized women or very small street samples. This report describes the drug use and crime of 286 active women narcotics users interviewed on the streets of Miami, Florida in a two-stage project. The first cohort, studied during 1977–78, were heavily involved with a wide variety of drugs and were extremely active in property crimes, vice offenses and drug sales. The second cohort, interviewed during 1983–84, displayed substantially different patterns of both drug use and crime. These differences are analyzed in relationship to changes in drug availability, drug use fads, legislation, law enforcement practices, and historical circumstance.