Turning gold into lead: The troubling fate of the police drug diversion initiative

Introduction This paper explores the fate of South Australia's highly regarded Police Drug Diversion Initiative over the past 10 years. Methods The paper uses historical and legal analysis, including publicly available data as to rates of drug use, arrests and diversions, media reports, legisla...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Drug and alcohol review 2024-02, Vol.43 (2), p.512-518
Main Author: Manderson, Desmond
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Amphetamines
Child
Controlled Substances (Drug Offence Diversion) Amendment Act 2000
Drug abuse
Drug dealing
Drug diversion
Efficacy
Fate
harm reduction
Humans
Law Enforcement
Legislation
Leniency
Offenders
Police
Prescription Drug Diversion
Social justice
South Australia
Statutes Amendment (Drug Offences) Act 2018 (SA)
Stimulants
Substance-Related Disorders - epidemiology
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Summary:Introduction This paper explores the fate of South Australia's highly regarded Police Drug Diversion Initiative over the past 10 years. Methods The paper uses historical and legal analysis, including publicly available data as to rates of drug use, arrests and diversions, media reports, legislation and Hansard debates. Results In the mid‐2010s, amidst growing anxiety about levels of amphetamine‐type stimulants use in Adelaide, a coroner's report became the poster child for what was seen by the Liberal opposition as the excessive leniency and ‘waste of resources’ of the Police Drug Diversion Initiative. Despite being universally praised for its efficacy, the Liberal government, when elected, passed amendments to the legislation which ‘capped’ diversions at two. This ended the period in which diversions from criminal to social justice systems was mandatory for all persons charged with simple drug possession. But since then, the diversion rate in South Australia has plummeted in ways that cannot be explained merely because of these amendments. Discussion and Conclusions The most highly regarded scheme for diversion of minor drug offenders to treatment is no longer effective. Indeed, the best scheme in the country may now be the worst. The essay draws attention to a catastrophe whose extent is not yet fully appreciated and suggests ways in which we can begin to explain why such a small change has had such dramatic and unforeseen consequences. Like some sort of perverse alchemy, Australia's gold standard for drug diversion has been turned into lead.
ISSN:0959-5236
1465-3362
DOI:10.1111/dar.13755