Defining and Registering Criminal Offences and Measures - Oapen

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2. First steps and development of draft definitions and
questions
Drug Offences
At the beginning it was agreed that the Sourcebook definition of drug offences
does not seem to pose problems; the issue with drug trafficking was seen to be
more complicated.
“New” data could be collected regarding the issues of drug offences and drug
trafficking. For example, it was discussed to look at drug seizures (type of drug
and quantity) in order to provide a better idea of the drug market. The EMCDDA
in Lisbon has collected information on that for EU countries, 35 as well as the UN
in a worldwide approach. 36 The European School Survey Project on Alcohol and
Other Drugs (ESPAD) 37 could also be a valuable source of information regarding
drug consumption across countries. It is necessary to reflect that drug seizures
reflect police work, not the drug market itself. The Sourcebook group later on
decided not to include data on drug seizures in the fourth edition, based on the
collected information.
There is neither a unique concept of drug trafficking, nor one of aggravated
drug trafficking. As with drug seizures, or small theft offences, what we seem to
measure is in fact police work. Drug trafficking is an aggravated circumstance
among others, such as the type or quantity of drug, whether trafficking is organized,
etc. It is necessary to collect such information. Therefore, the drug offence
part had to be redesigned, for example by first disaggregating between simple and
aggravated drug offences, and, second, between different circumstances/types of
aggravated offences.
Therefore, a proposal for revised drug offence definitions was presented. Major
changes included questions regarding drug quantity limits below which offences
are not counted, and the reintroduction of aggravated drug trafficking.
Some members were concerned about aggravated drug trafficking as it was previously
(i.e.: in the first edition of the Sourcebook, where it had been included)
answered only by a few countries. In addition, the idea of having a list of substances
was not very appealing for some members. The group, however, decided
that it would be valuable to ask this information, even if only the most common
drugs were included.
3. Trial questionnaire and evaluation
Based on the proposal, a draft of the new definitions for drug offences was
adopted. It was added to the trial questionnaire. The text is reprinted here:
35 Global report and country reports available on http://www.emcdda.europa.eu/?nNodeID=435.
36 World Drug Report: http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/data-and-analysis/WDR.html.
37 www.espad.org.