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Drug Dealing

Drug dealing is the illegal commerce of drugs.

Real life Case

My husband has been charged for carrying ten kilos of cocaine and illegal gun possession. His lawyer is a criminal attorney designated by court, and we would like to hire a private lawyer that is specialized with these cases. My husband is in preventive prison since January and has been denied freedom. Could you solicit it again?

I would love an estimate, thank you.

Drug dealing is produced in a global scale, from the cultivation in undeveloped countries till its consumption, principally in western countries, in which the end product reaches great value in the black market. Drug addiction has generated important social consequences: Crime, violence, corruption, marginalization... This is why the majority of the countries around the world prohibit the production, distribution and sale of these substances. In consequence an illegal market of psychotropic and stupefying substances has formed producing enormous benefits.

Production

The greater part of these substances produced in the world are cultivated in third world countries ( many countries of south America, southeast Asia and the Middle East ), and later smuggled to consumer countries. Traditionally USA, Mexico and Europe have had to impose restrictive actions of "zero tolerance" to producing countries. However, in many of these countries cultivating cocaine, poppy or cannabis find in these practices an important source of subsistence that they do not plan to give up.

On the other hand, psychotropic substances like Lysergic Acid ( LSD )which its consumption is decreasing, amphetamines, and other designer psycho tropical substances and synthetic composition or semi synthetic like “ecstasy” (MDMA) are produced in developed countries.

Origins

In jurisdictions where the legislation restricts or prohibits the sale of certain popular drugs, it is common that an illegal market is created. For example, the United States congress has identified various substances controlled by the corresponding drug occupancy.

The majority of these nations consider drug trafficking a serious problem. In 1989, USA intervened in Panama with the goal of breaking drug commerce. The government of India has done secret operations in the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent to continue tracking several drug lords.

Some estimates of global commerce have measured the total value of the drug market in around four hundred thousand million dollars in the year 2000; that valued at the same time with the value of global commerce from legal drugs it corresponds to a superior amount of money spent in food in the same time period. In 2005, the “United Nations World Drug Report” informed that the value of the market of illicit drugs globally in the year 2003 was estimated at thirteen thousand million dollars in production levels, ninety four thousand million in wholesale price, and at a billion of three-hundred and twenty-two in retail price and chosen by sizes and other losses by account. The top consuming countries include the USA and the European nations, even though consumption is global.

The top producing countries include Afghanistan (opium), Peru and Colombia (cocaine mostly, which has diminished in recent years).

The History

The First Opium War was an effort to force China to allow British merchants to deal opium in China’s general population. Though it was illegal by order of the emperor, smoking opium was common in the 19th century and it was believed that it cured many illnesses.

Illegal Commerce of Legal Drugs

Legal Drugs such as tobacco or alcohol can be turned into merchandise of smuggling and illegal commerce if the difference of price between its origin and its destiny is sufficiently enough for it to become lucrative. With taxes in tobacco ( much higher in the United Kingdom than in the rest of Europe ), this is a great problem in the United Kingdom. Also, it is usually illegal to sell or promote tobacco or alcohol to people who are under age, which is considered smuggling in several countries.

Prescription Drugs

Some drugs may be acquired legally with a medical prescription. But they are also available illegally eliminating the need to produce and process the drugs. For example: opioids prescribed sometimes are a lot stronger than the heroin found on the street. The group of the Fentanyl analogs come from stolen or divided prescriptions occasionally sold on the internet. However, it is much easier to control the traffic of prescription drugs than illegal drugs because the makers are normally a company supposed to be legal so the problem may be found soon and dealt with. There also may be a reduced risk of pollution or poverty of the product with the cases of fabrication of the drug in illegal laboratories.

Internet and controlled substances

There are internet web pages that offer controlled substances without a valid prescription. Such sites were recognized first in the American Justice Section in 1999, indicating that such sites had been operating for at least since the last years of the decade of the nineties. These sites allow users and distributors to complete transactions without establishing direct contact. While many of these sites accept credit card payments others take cash to reduce the evidence of the existence of such transactions.

Many of these sites are organized in countries where specific categories of controlled substances are locally legal (for example, opioids prescribed in Mexico), but thanks to the internet’s global nature , they can negotiate (in an illegal way principally), with customers around the world. Besides opioids, stimulants, and sedatives are often distributed along with steroids. Even today, there is no found site that sells illegal drugs such as heroin or illegal derivates of amphetamines.

Police has discovered though, several cases of circuits of distribution that use personal adds to solicit drug deals, using passwords or formulated phrases.

Violent Resolutions

Since the disputes cannot be resolved by legal means, participants of each level of the drug industry have leaned towards competing between themselves employing violent methods. In the end of the nineties decade in the USA the FBI estimated that five percent of the murders were related with consumption or distribution of drugs. Many have argued that the arbitrariness of the laws that prohibit drug from the medical point of view, above all the theory of reduction of damages worsens the problems surrounding these substances.

Commerce of specific drugs

The price of a heroin gram is typically eight to ten times greater than a gram of cocaine in the USA. Generally in Europe (except in transit countries such as Portugal, and the Netherlands), a gram of street heroin that is normally between .7 and .8 grams, lights up a dust of dark brown that consists in 5 to 10 percent, less commonly at 20 %, heroin based, which is between 30 and 70 Euros that make the effective price of pure heroin per gram about 300 to 2,000 euros. The purity of street cocaine in Europe normally is in the same range as heroin, the price being around 50 to 100 euros between .7 and 1.0 grams. This adds cocaine’s range up to 500 to 2,000 euros.

Anabolic Steroids

Anabolic Steroids are used as a method to increase the anabolism. Its primary effect is growth of the skeletal muscle , as well as the development of sexual masculine characteristics. Steroids also have serious secondary effects if used for a long period of time.

These substances are regulated legally for its employment in medical purposes in many countries, and in many others are totally legal. In competitive sports steroid consumption is considered a type of doping which is totally illegal. Steroid production requires complex chemical procedures and sophisticated equipment, which is why steroids are fabricated by the pharmaceutical industry which is legal (with medicinal and veterinary purposes) and in clandestine laboratories. Mexico and Thailand are steroid exporters because in those countries substances are completely legal.

Cannabis

Cannabis is a stupefying substance obtained from the cannabis plant sativa, mostly consumed in leaves (marihuana), or resin (hashish). Its effects are less damaging that of other drugs, and in some medical cases cannabis is recommended as it can be beneficial.

Cannabis was prohibited in almost every part of the world in the beginning of the twentieth century. However, nowadays it is permitted or tolerated in many countries. In many developed countries growing this plant for self consumption mixed with tobacco is permitted. In the year 2005 around the world there were 530,000 hectares destined for cannabis, which produced 42,000 tons of this substance. The principal producers in the world were USA and Mexico, although production is very distributed. The principal producer of hashish is Morocco, followed closely by Afghanistan. 70 % of hashish is consumed in western Europe.

Psilocybe mushrooms

Psilocybe mushrooms grow naturally in almost every climate, so this drug market is financially less lucrative. Even so, a commercial growth of mushrooms can be detected, semi-legally in the Netherlands and illegally in different distinct phases of maturity of the tissue in the form of a chewable mushroom. Psychonauts usually cultivate or recollect these mushrooms for themselves, since they are common all over the world.

Alcohol

In some areas of the world, particularly in and around the Arabic peninsula, alcohol commerce is strictly prohibited. For example, Pakistan prohibits commerce due to a large Muslim population. Similarly, Saudi Arabia prohibits the importation of alcohol to the kingdom, though it is smuggled in large quantities. In other areas of the world it is considered like any other drink, and it is legal. And in more other areas, there is an age limit for consumers, and an alcohol license to sell liquor is necessary. Other restrictions may exist that affect alcohol commerce via publicity, sale hours, places, etc.

Tobacco

Tobacco commerce, legal, is taxed in the majority of countries with high taxes, that seek the reduction of consumption and on the other hand to cover the sanitary expenses provoked by illnesses caused by tobacco consumption. In the European Nations, taxes represent at least 70 % of the price in tobacco sales and up to 80 % in the United Kingdom. This is why smuggling offers a high margin of benefits. In the United States tobacco taxes vary enormously between states, which favor internal smuggling between borders. On the other hand, these taxes are lower than in Canada, which has generated an illegal flux of merchandise in that border.

In the kingdom of Bhutan tobacco sale was prohibited in 2004, which provoked the appearance of a lucrative black market. It is estimated that a third of the global tobacco production ends up on the black market. In many cases the tobacco corporations are the ones benefited from this and have been participants of the smugglings to such countries.

Opium

Illicit international commerce of opium is relatively rare. The principal organizations of smugglers prefer refining the opium in heroin before shipping it to consumer countries because a certain quantity of heroin the value is much higher than of opium. Heroin is more lucrative, and much stronger because it metabolizes directly in the substance of the principal psychoactive that occurs naturally in the morphine of opium.

Heroin and Morphine

Heroin enters via smuggling to USA and Europe. The levels of purity vary enormously depending on the region with the greater purity in northeastern cities in the USA (according to a report emitted by the DEA: Elizabeth and Newark (New Jersey) have the purest quality of drug in the country). Heroin is an easy drug to smuggle because a tiny test-tube can contain hundreds of doses. Heroin is also amply used (and normally in an illegal way) as a powerful and addictive drug that produces intense euphoria that often disappears with increased tolerance towards the drug. This "hit" comes from its high solubility caused by its two groups of acetates, while it produces a very fast penetration in the blood flow to the brain after its use. Once in the blood flow, heroin turns itself rapidly into morphine, which joins the opioid receptors in the brain and the spinal chord while causing subjective effects.

Heroine and morphine can be taken in various ways, including sniffing and injecting. These can also be taken by smoking and inhaling vapors produced when preheated (known as puffing the dragon ). The penalties for smuggling heroin and/or morphine are often harsh in the majority of the countries. Some countries will soon pass a death penalty for the illegal smuggling heroin and morphine, which both are part of the Unique Convention about Narcotics.

In many Asiatic countries, including Singapore and Malaysia, heroin and morphine are classified amongst themselves and penalties for its use, possession, and/ or traffic are more severe than any other drug, including opioids and cocaine.

Methamphetamines

In some areas of the USA, commerce of methamphetamines is uncontrolled. Due to its easy production and its degree of addiction, methamphetamines are a favorite amongst drug dealers. According to the ‘’ Community Epidemiology Work Group’’, the numbers of incident clandestine laboratories of methamphetamines informed to the ‘’ National Clandestine Laboratory Database ‘’ diminished from 1999 to 2004. In this same time frame, similar incidents increased in Illinois, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania. In 2004, more incidents in Illinois were informed (926) than in California (673). In 2003, the incidents of methamphetamine laboratories reached a new record in Georgia (250), Minnesota (309), and Texas (677). There were only seven reports of methamphetamine laboratories informed in Hawaii in 2004. Methamphetamines are sometimes used in injections, putting users in risk of HIV infections and hepatitis C.