Drug Trafficking Essay Research Paper Drug TraffickingThe

Drug Trafficking Essay, Research Paper

Drug Trafficking

The dealing of illegal drugs has existed for a very long time in Canada. People have been smuggling drugs in many different ways and there have been many popular drug busts that occurred as a result. Some of the most common illegal drugs being dealt are marijuana, cocaine, opium, crack, and so on. Some of these drugs damage your body while others act as medicine and help people to overcome certain types of illnesses and diseases. The big debate these days is whether to legalize some of these illegal drugs which provide benefits to people. Also since many people are using them these days this causes problems as these people are arrested and thrown in jail causing them to be overcrowded. Also a drug such as marijuana, which is illegal, is more safer than legalized drugs such as tobacco and alcohol. Therefore should marijuana not be made legal also. Issues like this surround the whole drug scene and cause many debates. The purpose of this paper is to examine how easy it is to buy and sell drugs in Canada and also whether it is possible to do it over the internet. An examination will also be made on the amount of money made off drug trafficking to see if there are profits made in this industry. The actors, types of drugs, trends, and obstacles must be examined before the different ways dealing takes place, whether it can be done over the internet, and the profits that are involved in trafficking in order to understand how easy it is to buy and sell drugs.

The actors that are involved in the drug trafficking scenario within Canada vary from big organizations to individual dealers. There are many transnational groups which smuggle drugs into Canada through an organized system of people and businesses forming different organizations. The main transnational groups come from places all around the world. According to C.S.I.S. “There are approximately 18 active transnational criminal organizations represented in Canada, including Asian triads, Colombian cartels, Japanese yakuza, Jamaican posses, Mafia groups from the USA, Calabria and Sicily, Russian/Eastern European mafiyas, Nigerian crime groups and major outlaw motorcycle gangs.” Some of these groups can be broken down into even smaller groups, such as “The Chinese triads, the Big Circle Boys and the Japanese yakuza [which] are the most prominent types of groups involved in Asian-based transnational crime.” As mentioned earlier these groups can be from a small group to very large ones. For example,” The largest triad in Hong Kong, the principal center for the triads, is the Sun Yee On (also known as The Yee On Commercial and Industrial Guild), with anywhere from 47,000 to 60,000 members carrying out activities worldwide.” With all of these groups around, the connections to importing drugs into Canada is really unstoppable, especially if they make all the transactions very sophisticated, as they usually do. On the other side of the scale there are the individuals who grow or manufacture drugs in basements or garages, where these activities are hidden well enough so that the police does not know about them. Some other ways in which drugs might be smuggled are through pharmacies which operate over the internet. ” The FDA is trying to crack down. It has launched investigations of 134 sites, including 54 for selling prescription drugs and another 80 for selling illegal or unapproved drugs, such as the date rape drug.” Trafficking is even going on through special organizations such as the CIA. “goes far beyond the criminal acts of CIA drug trafficking and its coverups.” These are the main actors that are mainly involved in drug trafficking in Canada.

The different types of illegal drugs that are smuggled into Canada include cocaine, heroin, hashish, liquid hashish, marijuana, and chemical drugs such as ecstasy, methamphetamine, GHB, Rohypnol, and LSD. The amounts of these drugs vary from a large amount to not such a large amount. For example,

“Approximately 15 to 24 tonnes of cocaine enter Canada each year,…. The

potential annual demand for heroin in Canada ranges between one and two tonnes.

This is based on an estimated addict population of 25,000 to 50,000, with an

average daily consumption of 0.2 grams of 50 % pure heroin, or 36.5 grams of pure

heroin per addict each year…. Based on the preceding factors and intelligence on multi-tonne hashish shipments seized in Canada and abroad and those known to have entered the Canadian market, analysts estimate that at least 100 tonnes of this

drug enter Canada every year…. Although liquid hashish (which is in fact processed marijuana) is manufactured in Canada, an estimated six to eight tonnes are

imported yearly from Jamaica…. The RCMP estimates the annual production of marijuana in Canada to be at least in the 800 tonne range,… …one Ecstasy tablet, which is sold on the black market for $35 to $40, costs about $1.70 to $2.35

to produce. Laboratories produce from one to five kilograms at a time, with a yield of

approximately 10,000 tablets per kilogram…. In January 1999, 3,500 units of Rohypnol

were seized in North Vancouver…. ”

Looking at these numbers it reveals the amount of money that could be made off these shipments per year. This might also have an effect on the GNP. However these are only some of the few