Assessing the Effectiveness of Organized Crime Control Strategies ...

perspective, as this aggressive law enforcement effort yielded unprecedented totals in terms of
seizures, indictments, arrests, convictions, and asset forfeitures. In 1986 alone, nearly one-half
billion dollars in assets were seized. Cocaine seizures increased from 2,000 kilos in 1981 to
36,000 in 1987. DEA arrests doubled and, by 1987, over 40 percent of all new prison inmates
went in for drug offences (Kenney and Finckenauer, 1995:194).
While these apparent successes were being achieved, the price for the target drugs was dropping
and purity increased significantly. The domestic cultivation of marijuana rose dramatically and
the supply of cocaine more than tripled from 1980 to 1988, from 40 to 140 metric tons per year
(Kenney and Finckenauer, 1995:194). The “wholesale” price of cocaine in Miami dropped by 90
percent from 1980 to 1986, an indication of a major glut in the market (Shannon, 1988:367).
During the same period, cocaine-related hospital emergencies rose more than six-fold.
Examining the evidence as a whole, the United States’ Office of Technology Assessment
(Kenney and Finckenauer, 1995:194) pronounced the aggressive supply-reduction effort a
failure, noting that, “Despite a doubling of Federal expenditures on interdiction over the past five
years, the quantity of drugs smuggled into the United States is greater than ever.”
The picture, however, is not totally negative. The retail price of cocaine on the streets of
American cities did increase from 1989 to 1990, indicating that enforcement efforts may have
started to pay off in the 1990s (Lyman and Potter, 1991:261).
Returning to the 1980s, many American cities became battlegrounds for gangs fighting over
markets and the new drug cartels came to exert considerable influence in several Latin American
and Caribbean countries. The drug war and its consequences strained America’s relations with
several Latin American countries (Nadelmann, 1988). Moreover, the excesses of the zero
tolerance approach were illustrated by the occasional large-scale asset forfeitures of vessels and
vehicles carrying miniscule amounts of drugs (Kenney and Finckenauer, 1995:196). In one case,
for example, a 52-foot vessel was impounded because of cocaine dust found on a rolled up dollar
bill. In another case, an $80 million research vessel was seized after .01 ounce of marijuana was
found in a crewman’s shaving kit. Such examples led some observers to comment that the war
on drugs had significantly diminished the civil liberties of Americans.
Another illustration of the limitations of interdiction strategies was seen in the early 1980s,
following the establishment of the South Florida Task Force in 1982. This broad, anti-drug
effort reduced trafficking to Florida; however, the increased law enforcement pressure resulted in
the displacement of drug smuggling to Gulf of Mexico and Eastern ports of entry. The successes
achieved by the Florida multi-agency approach thereby “exacerbated an already serious
nationwide drug problem” (President’s Commission on Organized Crime, 1986:289).
Nevertheless, this approach served as the basis for the 12 regional Organized Crime Drug
Enforcement Task Forces established in 1983.
While the President’s Commission was supportive of the supply-reduction strategy and the
targeting of high-level OC groups involved in drug trafficking, it expressed agreement with the
concern that supply-reduction alone might be counterproductive in that it might strengthen more
powerful criminal organizations. The Commission noted that such an approach might
“exacerbate the nation’s OC problem by enriching organized crime groups, eliminating their
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