The Concentration of Substance Use, Criminal Justice Involvement, and HIV/AIDS in the Families of Drug Offenders

Although substance use (SU), criminal justice involvement (CJI) and HIV/AIDS occur concurrently in many urban families, little is known about their intergenerational prevalence and the impact of their co-occurrence. In the current study, the researchers determined lifetime prevalence of SU, CJI, and HIV/AIDS in 62 families in which a member, the index case, was on parole or probation for a drug infraction and was also enrolled in the direct service arm of Family Justice, La Bodega de La Familia, which is a community support program in the Lower East Side of New York City.

In the families studied, the index cases were nearly all males (94 percent) and Latinos (97 percent). The median age of index cases was 37. Researchers reviewed the records of 80 percent of open cases in March through May of 2003 (N=62). Family maps, or genograms, were analyzed and coded by age, sex, and relation to the index case to identify all significant members with histories of SU, CJI, and HIV/AIDS. A total of 592 individuals were included.

Of the 62 families, 82 percent had at least one additional member (besides the index case) with a history of SU; 62 percent had two or more; 40 percent had three or more. Seventy-two percent had at least one additional member with a history of CJI; 45 percent had two or more members; and 24 percent had three or more. In 49 percent of the families, at least one member had HIV/AIDS; 16 percent had two or more; and 10 percent had three or more. Of the 105 family members with a history of CJI, 88 percent also had a history of substance use.

The researchers concluded, "These data demonstrate the extent to which many families in communities such as this are struggling with the burdens associated with having multiple relatives involved in the criminal justice system, largely related to drug use and frequently with HIV and AIDS. These data point to an important role for family-focused interventions to ameliorate the consequences of high rates of familial drug use, incarceration, and other forms of CJI, and HIV/AIDS."

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