Enthusiastic and enterprising suppliers, ranging from international cartels to street-corner retail dealers, provide a continuous flow of psychotropic material to satiate the appetites of millions of addicted users and to convert newly initiated and casual users throughout the United States, including New Jersey, into lifetime consumers. The trade continues to thrive, its profitability guaranteed by legal prohibition and the addictive nature and hedonistic allure of the drugs.

Alexander Gourley, the Acting Special Agent in Charge of the Newark Division of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), testified about the breadth, diversity and profitability of the distribution chain for illegal narcotics:

For the most part, the drug trafficking industry begins in the underdeveloped countries of South America, Asia, Africa and the Middle East and ends in the cities, towns and communities of America. The international aspect of drug trafficking cannot be separated from the domestic because they are interdependent and intertwined. The illegal drug market in the United States is one of the most profitable in the world. As such, it attracts the most ruthless,  sophisticated and aggressive drug traffickers. Drug law enforcement agencies face an enormous challenge in protecting the country’s borders. Amid voluminous passenger and cargo traffic passing through numerous points of entry, drug traffickers conceal cocaine, heroin, marijuana, MDMA and methamphetamine for distribution in U.S. neighborhoods.

Diverse groups traffic and distribute illegal drugs. Criminal groups operating from South America smuggle cocaine and heroin into the United States via a variety of routes, including land routes through Mexico, maritime routes along Mexico's East and West coasts, sea routes through the Caribbean and international air corridors. Furthermore, criminal groups operating from neighboring Mexico smuggle cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, amphetamine and marijuana into the United States. These criminal groups have smuggled heroin and marijuana across the Southwest border and distributed them throughout the United States since the 1970s. The Southwest border remains the most vulnerable region of the United States for the border security, followed by the Gulf Coast. Interagency assessments report that 60 to 70 percent of the cocaine entering the United States moves across the Southwest border.

The use of the drug MDMA, also known on the street as Ecstasy, has increased at an alarming rate in the United States over the last several years. Israeli and Russian drug trafficking syndicates and Western Europe-based drug traffickers are the principal traffickers of MDMA worldwide. MDMA, primarily manufactured clandestinely in Western Europe, is smuggled into the United States by couriers via commercial airlines, as well as through the use of express package carriers.

Finally, criminal groups based in Southeast and Southwest Asia [have] smuggled heroin into the United States. Using New York City as a major distribution hub, these criminal groups move heroin up and down the eastern seaboard and into the Midwest.

Besides these criminal groups based abroad, domestic organizations cultivate, produce, manufacture, or distribute illegal drugs such as marijuana, methamphetamine, PCP and LSD. By growing high-potency sinsemilla, domestic  cannabis growers provide marijuana that easily competes with other illegal drugs. With demand for methamphetamine remaining high, especially in the West and Midwest, so too does the number of illicit laboratories that supply methamphetamine to a growing number of addicts. Additionally, a small number of chemists manufacture LSD that is subsequently distributed to high school and college students throughout the United States.

Locally, narcotics are distributed from sources of supply to mid-level dealers down to street dealers. For the most part, heroin, cocaine, crack and marijuana can be purchased in open-air drug markets, usually located in major cities throughout the state. Drug deals are also consummated in private residences as well as dance clubs, gyms and other places of business. …If history serves as a guide, drug trafficking organizations will continue to identify and exploit vulnerabilities in order to maintain a steady supply of drugs to illicit drug markets in the United States.

Michael T. Horn, Director of the National Drug Intelligence Center (NDIC), the nation’s principal center for strategic, domestic counter-drug intelligence, based in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, provided data reflecting the tremendous harm inflicted on New Jerseyans by the abuse of illegal narcotics:

According to 2001 Treatment Episode Data, there were 37,540 individuals admitted to publicly funded facilities in the state for drug-related treatment. Drug Abuse Warning Network [DAWN] data indicate that there were 7,045 drug emergency department mentions in New Jersey in 2001. DAWN mortality data indicates that there were 304 drug deaths in the Newark metropolitan area that same year. Illicit drugs also create a tremendous financial burden on the citizens of the state.