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Research Summary: Two perceptions drive interest in finding ways of diverting more 911 calls from police to civilian first responders: (1) police responses can result in inadvertent harm to citizens and (2) many calls to which police respond require services that police often cannot provide. Thus, using other personnel may improve police–citizen relations and strengthen crime fighting by reducing extraneous police burden. Using a case study design, we conducted formative evaluations of programs that have developed beyond pilots in three large U.S. cities: Albuquerque, Atlanta, and Houston. In each city, we interviewed officials, program operators, and other stakeholders and reviewed program documents and statistics. We detail the events and forces that led to the establishment of each program, the way in which the programs have been institutionalized, and the way they interact with the police department. We then discuss key lessons learned for these jurisdictions. Policy Implications: Many U.S. cities are considering diverting some emergency calls for service from police to civilian first responders. This analysis provides evidence to aid policy makers, researchers, and other stakeholders in the development and evaluation of community responder programs. In all respects, we find that cities' unique experiences inform program design. For example, in Albuquerque, a City Hall‐driven initiative established a new city agency parallel to the police department. In Atlanta, decarceration activists drove the initiative; the program is a city/county‐funded nonprofit, more fragile in its funding. Risk aversion among call takers and dispatchers has led to low call diversion rates across all sites, but training and collaboration have shown promise to resolve this problem. Public safety officials external to the diversion programs commonly expressed concerns about first responder safety and perceptions that police are expected when 911 is called. This risk aversion has led to slower‐than‐expected expansion of the program within each city. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reforms to deploy civilian responders to non-criminal emergency calls may reduce demands on police departments and reduce negative interactions between police and civilians, but there is presently little empirical evidence on the feasibility of these proposals. We develop a model to evaluate which calls could be transitioned to civilian responders based on their crime risk. We use a rich dataset of community-initiated emergency calls to Baltimore Police Department to evaluate the effect of re-tasking based on three call diversion design scenarios. We find that 22 to 57% of 911 calls could be assigned to civilians. We then apply Monte Carlo methods to estimate the financial and time use implications of transferring low risk calls to civilians. Under the most conservative scenario, re-tasking frees police officer time equivalent to 59 additional full-time officers (95% CI: 43 – 75 officers), about nine percent of the Department's current patrol personnel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

24/7 Sobriety programs largely focus on reducing alcohol consumption among justice-involved individuals whose alcohol use has led them to repeatedly threaten public safety. Participants are ordered to abstain from alcohol use and subject to frequent alcohol testing (e.g., twice daily breathalyzers, remote alcohol monitoring); those testing positive face an immediate sanction, typically a night or two in jail. Unlike drug courts and other forms of coerced substance use disorder treatment, 24/7 does not require participants to enter a treatment program or attend self-help group meetings; however, these approaches are not necessarily mutually exclusive. The empirical evidence suggests that participants largely abstain from heavy drinking while in the program and that 24/7 participation is associated with lower probability of criminal legal involvement and mortality. This evidence is largely based on research in the Great Plains states with large rural populations. Several questions remain about these programs (e.g., optimal program length, possible benefits of incorporating positive incentives, efficacy of different alcohol testing technologies), many of which can best be answered in an experimental setting. In addition to reviewing the existing research on 24/7, this paper highlights additional research questions and ideas for conducting randomized controlled trials with the program, especially in more urban areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Aims: The US state of South Dakota's 24/7 Sobriety Program (24/7) requires individuals charged or convicted of alcohol‐involved offenses to avoid alcohol and submit to twice‐daily or continuous alcohol testing. We evaluated the impact of the 24/7 program in the US state of Montana. Methods: Using data from everyone in Montana who was convicted of their second driving under the influence (DUI) offense from 2009 to August 2013, we described program violations among 24/7 participants and then estimated the effect of 24/7 participation on the probability of DUI re‐arrest. To address potential selection issues related to individual‐level 24/7 participation, we used an instrumental variables approach that exploits county‐level variation in program adoption. Results: Among 2768 people convicted of a second DUI in our analytical sample, 356 participated in 24/7 and were monitored for an average of 173 days (median = 112 days). Among the 332 participants monitored by breath test, 95.5% of scheduled alcohol breath tests were completed and did not lead to a program violation. After controlling for individual‐ and community‐level covariates as well as year and county fixed effects, our instrumental variable models suggested that participation in 24/7 reduced the 1‐year DUI re‐arrest probability by at least 80% (preferred model: 86% decrease; 8.9 percentage points) compared with a counterfactual group of people convicted of a second DUI over the same period but not assigned to the program. Conclusions: South Dakota USA's 24/7 Sobriety Program appears to work in Montana as well. Certain delivery of immediate but modest sanctions for repeat driving under the influence (DUI) arrestees who violate alcohol abstinence orders appears to be able to reduce future DUI arrests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: To invoke behavioral economics theories of ambiguity in the context of offender decision-making, and to test the impact of ambiguity in punishment certainty on offender decisions. Methods: We leverage a quasi-experimental condition among a sample of drunk driving arrestees that are tested for alcohol use and subject to mandatory brief incarceration for a violation. The treatment condition relaxes a zero-tolerance alcohol rule, thereby introducing design-based ambiguity surrounding the certainty of punishment. We use Mahalanobis matching and propensity score weighting methods to estimate the impact of ambiguity on violations. We then interrogate this finding with complementary sensitivity analyses. Results: When facing the ambiguity condition participants are 27–28 percentage points (84–93 percent) more likely to violate program conditions after 30 days of supervision. We demonstrate that a statistical difference in violations due to ambiguity is still detectible at 90 and 180 days of supervision. These results are robust to alternative specifications and falsification tests. Conclusions: This study is the first to examine the impact of ambiguity on criminal justice program compliance using a quasi-experiment from the field. We further demonstrate the unintended costs to persons under supervision and jurisdictions of laxity in program design, which are applicable across criminal justice domains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: Evaluate the deterrent effect of a program that increases the certainty and celerity of sanction for arrestees ordered to abstain from alcohol and other drugs on substance-impaired driving arrests. Methods: We examine participant compliance with orders to abstain from alcohol and other drug use via breathalyzer, body-worn continuous alcohol monitoring devices, transdermal drug patches, and urinalyses. We then evaluate the impact of the 24/7 Sobriety program on substance-impaired driving arrests. Using variation across counties in the timing of program implementation in North Dakota as a natural experiment, we use difference-in-differences fixed effects Poisson regressions to measure the program's effect on county-level arrests for substance-impaired driving. Results: Over half of participants ordered to abstain from substance use complete 24/7 Sobriety without a detected substance use event. At the county level, the program is associated with a 9% reduction in substance-impaired driving arrests after accounting for the impact of oil exploration in the Bakken region, law enforcement intensity, alcohol availability, whether the state's large universities were in session, and socio-demographic characteristics. We find that the Bakken oil boom is associated with a 22% increase in substance-impaired driving arrests. Conclusions: The results suggest frequent monitoring combined with increased sanction celerity deters substance use-involved crime. While the results are generally consistent with an earlier study of 24/7 Sobriety in another state, differences in the study outcome measures implementation choices across states make direct comparisons difficult. More can be learned by conducting randomized controlled trials that vary time on program, testing technology, and/or level of sanction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research Summary: We investigated whether higher rates of random drug testing lower substance use among people who are incarcerated and improve prison safety. To answer this question, we estimated linear panel two‐way fixed effects models using naturally varying monthly rates of random drug testing across all Pennsylvania state prisons over a 45‐month period during 2016–2019. Overall, we find that the testing rate is not related to any of the variables we consider, including our key measure of interest, positive drug tests. Policy Implications: Our analyses of historical monthly data find that higher levels of randomized testing did not yield more positive drug tests among incarcerated persons. Further and importantly, we did not find that lower testing rates was associated with negative consequences on other outcomes, suggesting that marginal increases in testing rates do not generate commensurate benefits. In this sense, our findings provide preliminary evidence that "a little testing goes a long way." Replication and expansion of our study is required for stronger conclusions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research Summary: Criminal justice practitioners increasingly seek out efficient means of community supervision supplanting face‐to‐face interactions with practices that are less onerous to administrators and clients. We examined the differential impact of remote supervision for low‐risk probationers by race. Remote reporting greatly reduces or eliminates in‐person meetings where race would be salient; however, it also creates conditions where an officer may rely more heavily on heuristics. We found the program drastically reduced violations, but also exacerbated the racial discrepancy in reporting high discretion violations. Policy Implication: The study illustrates how integrating an empirical test of racial discrepancies into program evaluation can illuminate conditions that amplify implicit bias. Our findings illustrate how a program with unequivocally positive outcomes for low‐risk probationers overall can further amplify racial disparities, particularly when the probation officer has more discretion. By creating a statistically equivalent group of clients who receive probation‐as‐usual, our evaluation strategy measures this bias by comparing consequences for which an agent has high discretion against those for which they have low or no discretion for program participants. This approach is replicable across many criminal justice practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As US states move toward various forms of adult access to cannabis, there has been a great interest in measuring the impact of such changes on adolescent cannabis use. Two recent prominent analyses have used Monitoring the Future (MTF), a nationally representative survey of students, to examine the effects. We compared MTF data for California and for Washington State with other survey data on use by adolescents in those states. In both studies, findings based on MTF were different from those using other larger, state-representative surveys. The discrepancy reflects the high within-state variation in prevalence rates and the small number of schools in MTF state samples. Using the Washington Health Youth Survey, we estimate that after recreational cannabis legalization past 30-day cannabis use prevalence in grade 8 decreased by 22.0%, in grade 10 prevalence decreased by 12.7%, and no effect in grade 12. These trends are consistent with those in states without recreational cannabis laws, suggesting that legalization did not impact adolescent use prevalence. Long-term trends in MTF are consistent with other data, but year-to-year volatility in state-level series undermines the survey's suitability for evaluation of state cannabis policy changes. Survey-based analyses at the state level need to be cross-validated with findings from other data sources. When findings are disparate and methodological rigor is equivalent, analyses of data sources specifically designed to describe state-level phenomena are more credible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Globally, heroin and other opioids account for more than half of deaths and years‐of‐life‐lost due to drug use and comprise one of the four major markets for illegal drugs. Having sound estimates of the number of problematic heroin users is fundamental to formulating sound health and criminal justice policies. Researchers and policymakers rely heavily upon general population surveys (GPS), such as the US National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), to estimate heroin use, without confronting their limitations. GPS‐based estimates are also ubiquitous for cocaine and methamphetamine, so insights pertaining to GPS for estimating heroin use are also relevant for those drug markets. Analysis Four sources of potential errors in NSDUH are assessed: selective non‐response, small sample size, sampling frame omissions and under‐reporting. An alternative estimate drawing on a variety of sources including a survey of adult male arrestees is presented and explained. Other approaches to prevalence estimation are discussed. Findings Under‐reporting and selective non‐response in NSDUH are likely to lead to substantial underestimation. Small sample size leads to imprecise estimates and erratic year‐to‐year fluctuations. The alternative estimate provides credible evidence that NSDUH underestimates the number of frequent heroin users by at least three‐quarters and perhaps much more. Implications: GPS, even those as strong as NSDUH, are doomed by their nature to estimate poorly a rare and stigmatized behavior concentrated in a hard‐to‐track population. Although many European nations avoid reliance upon these surveys, many others follow the US model. Better estimation requires models that draw upon a variety of data sources, including GPS, to provide credible estimates. Recent methodological developments in selected countries can provide guidance. Journals should require researchers to critically assess the soundness of GPS estimates for any stigmatized drug‐related behaviors with low prevalence rates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article applies analytical approaches to map illegal psychostimulant (cocaine and methamphetamine) trafficking networks in the US using purity-adjusted price data from the System to Retrieve Information from Drug Evidence. We use two assumptions to build the network: (i) the purity-adjusted price is lower at the origin than at the destination and (ii) price perturbations are transmitted from origin to destination. We then adopt a two-step analytical approach: we formulate the data aggregation problem as an optimization problem, then construct an inferred network of connected states and examine its properties. We find, first, that the inferred cocaine network created from the optimally aggregated dataset explains 46% of the anecdotal evidence, compared with 28.4% for an over-aggregated and 14.5% for an under-aggregated dataset. Second, our network reveals a number of phenomena, some aligning with what is known and some previously unobserved. To demonstrate the applicability of our method, we compare our cocaine data analysis results with parallel analysis of methamphetamine data. These results likewise align with prior knowledge, but also present new insights. Our findings show that an optimally aggregated dataset can provide a more accurate picture of an illicit drug network than can suboptimally aggregated data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims To (1) assess trends and variation in the market share of product types and potency sold in a legal cannabis retail market and (2) estimate how potency and purchase quantity influence price variation for cannabis flower. Design Secondary analysis of publicly available data from Washington State's cannabis traceability system spanning 7 July 2014 to 30 September 2016. Descriptive statistics and linear regressions assessed variation and trends in cannabis product variety and potency. Hedonic regressions estimated how purchase quantity and potency influence cannabis flower price variation. Setting Washington State, USA. Participants (1) A total of 44 482 176 million cannabis purchases, including (2) 31 052 123 cannabis flower purchases after trimming price and quantity outliers. Measurements Primary outcome measures were (1) monthly expenditures on cannabis, total delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) concentration and cannabidiol (CBD) concentration by product type and (2) excise tax-inclusive price per gram of cannabis flower. Key covariates for the hedonic price regressions included quantity purchased, THC and CBD. Findings Traditional cannabis flowers still account for the majority of spending (66.6%), but the market share of extracts for inhalation increased by 145.8% between October 2014 and September 2016, now comprising 21.2% of sales. The average THC-level for cannabis extracts is more than triple that for cannabis flowers (68.7% compared to 20.6%). For flower products, there is a statistically significant relationship between price per gram and both THC [coefficient = 0.012; 95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.011-0.013] and CBD (coefficient = 0.017; CI = 0.015-0.019). The estimated discount elasticity is −0.06 (CI = −0.07 to −0.05). Conclusions In the state of Washington, USA, the legal cannabis market is currently dominated by high-THC cannabis flower, and features growing expenditures on extracts. For cannabis flower, both THC and CBD are associated with higher per-gram prices, and there are small but significant quantity discounts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims Drug policy strategies and discussions often use prevalence of drug use as a primary performance indicator. However, three other indicators are at least as relevant: the number of heavy users, total expenditures and total amount consumed. This paper stems from our efforts to develop annual estimates of these three measures for cocaine (including crack), heroin, marijuana and methamphetamine in the United States. Methods The estimates exploit complementary strengths of a general population survey ( National Survey on Drug Use and Health) and both survey and urinalysis test result data for arrestees ( Arrestee Drug Abuse Monitoring Program), supplemented by many other data sources. Results Throughout the 2000s US drug users spent in the order of $100 billion annually on these drugs, although the spending distribution and use patterns changed dramatically. From 2006 to 2010, the amount of marijuana consumed in the United States probably increased by more than 30%, while the amount of cocaine consumed in the United States fell by approximately 50%. These figures are consistent with supply-side indicators, such as seizures and production estimates. For all the drugs, total consumption and expenditures are driven by the minority of users who consume on 21 or more days each month. Conclusions Even for established drugs, consumption can change rapidly. The halving of the cocaine market in five years and the parallel (but independent) large rise in daily/near-daily marijuana use are major events that were not anticipated by the expert community and raise important theoretical, research, and policy issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives. We examined the public health impact of South Dakota's 24/7 Sobriety Project, an innovative program requiring individuals arrested for or convicted of alcohol-involved offenses to submit to breathalyzer tests twice per day or wear a continuous alcohol monitoring bracelet. Those testing positive are subject to swift, certain, and modest sanctions. Methods. We conducted differences-in-differences analyses comparing changes in arrests for driving while under the influence of alcohol (DUI), arrests for domestic violence, and traffic crashes in counties with the program to counties without the program. Results. Between 2005 and 2010, more than 17 000 residents of South Dakota--including more than 10% of men aged 18 to 40 years in some counties--had participated in the 24/7 program. At the county level, we documented a 12% reduction in repeat DUI arrests (P = .023) and a 9%reduction in domestic violence arrests (P = .035) following adoption of the program. Evidence for traffic crashes was mixed. Conclusions. In community supervision settings, frequent alcohol testing with swift, certain, and modest sanctions for violations can reduce problem drinking and improve public health outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A response is provided to articles in the same issue of the journal which address additional data sources for cannabis markets, the legalization of the cannabis industry, and changes in cannabis policies as of 2017. The economic profitability of marijuana as a commodity is examined, along with the structure, performance, and conduct of an industrial organization. Company loyalty and frequent buyer programs are assessed, along with data mining and smart vaporizer pens.