Toni wrote:Bodofish wrote:Toni wrote:Speaking from Pierce County, it is everywhere. What they need to do is keep them in jail long enough that the drugs get out of their system. So they can make right choices then if they offend again send them for 10 years. Of course we would all have to pay $$ for it just in a different way.
A little different but we still have the tree strikes law on the books. Regardless, the prisons are over crowded and the push now is to keep victimless criminals or non-violent criminals out of jail. Even if they did get to keep them till they got the drugs out of their systems it wouldn't do any good. The pathways in the brain are what need to be changed and anyone feel free to jump in if I'm off on the time but Meth, the pathways can never change back to pre-meth use......
NEVER. For Heroin and other opiates it's a year of so. for Alcohol I want to say 6 mo to a year. Could be longer but I can't remember off the top of my head. Everyone is a special case and it really depends on whether they want to change or not and then the underlying reason for the use needs to be addressed.
I think the 3 strikes is a felony thing? Not stuff like property crimes which I think is a misdemeanor? Yes I disagree with your assessment of heroin and meth. Meth a year and heroin longer. I think you have it backwards. I agree that there has to be a desire for change. It is addiction. Some would say once an addict always even if not using. That goes for alcohol, too.
It would all take lots of money. It is taking a lot of money.
Narcotics violations are all felonies and sooner or later they're going to run into someone breaking into a house or a car and before you know it, it's a violet encounter regardless of them just trying to defend themselves or they freak and attack, the result is the same, three strikes and we pay for their hotel for the rest of their lives.
I'm pretty sure that only one or two felonies need to be violent. Patient three, below was nearly killed trying to get away from a burglary and it gave him two strikes, one being possession and netted him five years in Monroe.
You're certainly entitled to your own opinion on how long it takes to break cycles or reprogram the brain. Having witnessed the trials and tribulations of getting a couple people through addiction treatment programs, I can tell you the only ones that I've seen work, lasted the better part of a year in house treatment (Lockdown, no escape). All previous short term in-house and outpatient were successful until they were returned to the street and allowed to interface with their old friends and new ones they met with the needle. Once they were away from all temptation for a year, most of the bad influences had moved on, the patients still had to lead a very structured life. All of the cues that triggered wanting to go shoot up had been broken. Today they both go to work every day and come home to the group homes and hang out with others that want to stay clean and spend most of their free time at meetings or working at their houses, with no end in sight. Meth is the killer; no amount of time can ever reset the pathways. Patient three, meth addict goes to prison for 5 years for breaking into houses, gets clean and comes home to his extended family who gave him all the love and support he could take, he went to meetings and worked hard at his job and stayed away from all the bad influences. It all worked out great for about 3 years when he took his own life leaving a note that said he was sorry and couldn't take the constant craving any more, delivering himself a lethal dose. All I can say is he's free of his demons now. All three of them were people you would never have thought would go down that road, it's a very private thing and they keep it very private until it too late. I didn't pull the numbers out thin air. They came curtesy of the class our family took to help support the returning addict. Just because you get past the physical addiction is just the very first step, the first baby step. Prison is not a cure for addiction any more than you can treat heart disease with a prison stay. There is no simple solution and we're the only modern industrialized country that continues to treat addiction with prison stays. It doesn't work. What's that saying for insanity? Keep doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result.
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