The qualification ‘drug user’ or ‘drug addict’ is often not very accurate in police statistics. However, some sources give a rough indication of the group of criminal ‘drug users’. Due to a possible underreporting, the data are most meaningful in describing a profile of the
‘criminal drug user’ rather than drawing conclusions about absolute figures.18
The registration system HKS (see 4.2.1) of the police includes a classification ‘drug user’. This notification is made when the suspect may constitute a danger to others due to his or her drug use.
• In 2001, the HKS recorded 8,730 suspected (hard) drug users, which probably is an
underestimation.
• 9% were females and the average age was 36 years. These figures deviate from those
pertaining to the total population of suspects (14% females; average age 32 years).
• Most drug users were suspected of a property crime without violence (see table 4.5). • Almost half of them lived in one of the four big cities (47%).
• Some 37% committed his or her first crime before the age of 17.
• The rate of recidivism is high: three-quarters of the registered drug users had 11 or more
records of an offence in his or her total criminal career.
18 Just for illustration, in 2000, some 6% of the suspects of criminal offences was registered as a problem drug (or drug + alcohol) user. This is quite certainly a minimum estimate.
0 2000 4000 6000 8000 10000 12000 14000 Total 8735 10330 11930 11770 11760 11870 11760 12410 Opium Act 1355 1590 1805 1980 1990 1965 1965 2320 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001
Table 4.5: Offences among suspects registered by the police as a drug user in 2001
Type of offence Percentage*
Sexual offence 1%
Violence (against other persons) 19%
Property crimes with violence 11%
Property crimes without violence 63%
Vandalism, disturbance public order 19%
Traffic offence 10%
Opium Act offences 17%
Other 19%
* Total number of cases is 8,730. Source: HKS (Meijer et al., 2002).
4.3
Social and economic costs of drug consumption
There are no recent estimates of the social and economic costs of drug use. In 1995, the total annual social costs of drug addiction have been estimated at some 3 billion guilders (€1.4 billion), covering judicial costs, property crimes, specialised and general health costs, productivity loss, traffic accidents, social welfare expenditures, debts and devaluation of immovable property (Ernste & Bouwmeester, 1996). For comparison, the total costs for alcoholism were estimated at some 6 billion guilder (€ 2.7 billion). A more recent estimate has been made for costs related to alcohol use but not to drug use.
More details are given in chapter 1 and 14.
5
Drug markets
5.1
Availability
In the Netherlands, cannabis and hallucinogenic mushrooms are available through a system of ‘tolerated distribution’ (Abraham, 1999). That is, cannabis can be bought in coffee shops while mushrooms and other eco- and smart drugs can be obtained in some 150-200 smart shops. In 2001 the National Prevalence Survey included questions about the places of purchase of cannabis, mushrooms, and hard drugs (table 4.6). A distinction is made between drug users between 12 and 17 years and drug users older than 18 years. The former group is not allowed to buy cannabis in coffee shops (see 1), and smart shops usually also do not allow entrance of people below 18 years (Abraham, 1999). Because the number of young users (12-17 years) of hard drugs was very low, only places of purchase of cannabis were included for this age group.
Table 4.6: Places where last-year users (12-17 years, ≥18 years) purchased their drugs in 2001* relatives, friends % coffee- shops % café, pub % home dealer% smart- shops % Total answers (n) Last year users (n) 12-17 years Cannabis 46 37 2 3 2 390 253 ≥ 18 years Cannabis 37 47 2 2 2 1,517 1,028 Cocaine 55 2 5 17 0 284 217 Amphetamine 57 2 3 12 4 130 95 Ecstasy 65 2 3 10 1 355 274 Mushrooms 26 6 0 0 64 124 109
* More than one answer (location) per drug was possible. Source: National Drug Use Survey (Abraham et al., 1999).
• These results show that relatives and friends play a major role in obtaining drugs.
• Coffee shops are the most important place of purchasing cannabis for people of 18 years
and older while relatives and friends are more important for younger people.
5.2
Sources of supply and drug seizures
The Netherlands takes up an important position as a market and transit country of cocaine and heroin. This may be in part related to the great volume and concentration of maritime and land trade in the Netherlands, which are the most trafficking modus operandi for traffickers (Farrell, 1998). The Netherlands is also an important production country of synthetic drugs, like ecstasy, and cannabis. One way to gain insight into the size of the supply is from drug seizures.
• There is no central registration of drug confiscations in the Netherlands. Each year, some
data are collected from 26 regional police departments, including the National Police Agency (KLPD), Customs, the Royal Netherlands Military Constabulary (Dutch police with military status) and the Synthetic Drugs Unit (Bijkerk and Van der Werf, 2002).
• Table A10 (annex 2) shows that the quantities of registered seized drugs fluctuated
strong over the years. In 2001, the total number of seizures was 14,353 and the number of recorded investigations was 4,701. But these figures must be interpreted with great caution.
• Caution is warranted in interpreting trends since the data are neither complete nor
comparable from year to year. Although the response from the data sources was fairly good (86% in 1998, 97% in 2000, and 100% in 2001), not all police regions appeared to deliver adequate data. Therefore, the figures in table A10 are almost certainly lower bound estimates of the total amount of drugs seized.
• Further, trends may be due to changes in efforts of investigation services, variations in
the drugs markets as well as registration artefacts and new investigation methods. The Synthetic Drugs Unit (USD) provides some more detailed information on seizures of synthetic drugs (Witteveen & Reijnders, 2002; see table 5.1).
• In 2001, the USD has recorded a total of 678 seizures of synthetic drugs (20% in the
• From the Dutch-related tablets seized abroad, most MDMA tablets were seized in the
United Kingdom (over 6 million), followed by Germany (4.3 million) and the United States (4 million).
• The amount of seized amphetamine was higher in 2001 compared with 2000, which is
consistent with an increase in amphetamine production locations and seizures of the precursor BMK.
Table 5.1: Amount of confiscated ecstasy tablets, attributed to the Netherlands
1998 1999 2000 2001
Amphetamines
Seized abroad* 1,569 kg 990 kg 1,251 kg 530 tablets, 731 kg Seized in the Netherlands 1,450 kg
242,000 tablets 853 kg 450,000 tablets 293 kg 20,592 tablets 514 kg Ecstasy
Seized abroad* 2.4 million tablets 9.7 million tablets 16.2 million tablets 9 kg
22.1 million tablets 16 kg Seized in the Netherlands 1.1 million tablets
54 kg 3.6 million tablets 405 kg 5.5 million tablets 632 kg 3.6 million tablets 113 kg Number of tablets and kilograms of powder. Only registered if seizure exceeded 500 tablets and/or 500 kg of
powder. * Related to the Netherlands. Source: USD.
Investigational efforts at Schiphol Airport have been intensified in the past years, especially to combat cocaine smuggling. Between January and September 2002, a total of 1,311 drug couriers have been arrested, including 503 ‘pellet swallowers’ (body packers). From January - July 2002, over 3,600 kg cocaine had been seized. In 2000 and 2001, the number of arrests was 800 and 1,223, respectively.
5.3
Price/purity
The Drugs Information Monitoring System (DIMS) provides detailed information on the quality of ‘ecstasy’ pills on the Dutch market and since 1999 also on the THC content and prices of cannabis samples sold in coffee shops (THC-monitor). Information on prices of synthetic drugs are obtained from the Synthetic Drugs Unit (USD). Note that methods to collect these data are different.