Release Date
Geography
Language of Resource
Full Text Available
Open Access / OK to Reproduce
Peer Reviewed
Objective
The unregulated drug toxicity crisis in British Columbia (BC) is shaped by prohibitionist policies that has led to the contamination of the unregulated drug supply, resulting in a surge of fatal and non-fatal overdose events. The criminalization of people who use drugs exacerbates this situation. This commentary examines the involvement of policing in the development, and throughout the first 15 months of its implementation, of BC's decriminalization framework.
Findings/Key points
Serious concerns are raised about police discretion and the broadening of the formal scope of policing in this decriminalization framework. Included in this discussion are the processes through which ostensibly progressive health and drug policy initiatives are subjected to carceral logics and political agendas that sustain, rather than restrict, the targeting and criminalization of people who use drugs. Concepts of "mission creep" and "net widening" are explored, as they pertain to the slow expansion of policing authority into sectors where it traditionally doesn’t belong (healthcare, social work, and now, decriminalization.)
