Citation

Kacanek D, Hemenway DA. J. Urban Health 2006; 83(2): 266-274.

Affiliation

Division of Geographic Medicine and Infectious Disease, Tufts-New England Medical Center, Boston, MA, USA.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2006, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1007/s11524-005-9022-5

PMID

16736375

PMCID

PMC2527163

Abstract

This paper examines the relationship between illegal drug economy involvement, gun-related victimization, and recent gun carrying among young men and women incarcerated in a state prison in the United States. Interviews were conducted with 18- to 25-year old incarcerated men (n = 135) and women (n = 69) between July 1999 and October 2000. Forty-five percent of men and 16% of women reported carrying a gun in the year prior to incarceration. Respondents who sold crack cocaine or other drugs were more likely to have carried guns than those not selling drugs. However, hard drug use was not associated with gun carrying among men. All ten women who carried guns had used hard drugs. Sixty-seven percent of men and 28% of women had been shot at. Respondents who sold crack cocaine were at elevated risk of being shot at. Among men, selling crack (OR = 10.2, 95% CI = 2.5, 42.1) and ever being shot at (OR = 4.6, 95% CI = 1.7, 12.2), were associated with carrying guns. These findings provide further evidence of a link between crack selling (but not necessarily drug using) and gun carrying.

Language: en