Alex Berenson recently had a substack about a large study showing heavy marijuana usage leads to schizophrenia even when genetic factors were eliminated. Furthermore, this diagnosis significantly impacted young men, at over double the rate of non-marijuana users. One rather disturbing tendency in the substack was that Berenson pointed to schizophrenia as being a leading factor in the increase of violent crime. However, the reality is much less clear.
While I think Berenson’s position can be attacked substantially (full disclosure: I do not do drugs, and after seeing firsthand the devastating effects of cigarette smoking on my family, I strongly recommend only putting clean air in your lungs), it does bring up a good point: If I wanted to track mental illness and violent crime, how would I do it?
In my book, I cited a reputable source on the link between mental illness, suicide, and mass murder. Since deaths are investigated thoroughly in the US, these links can be researched. However, we are still looking at a small percentage of violent crime (around 1.3 percent from 2015 to 2019). So the questions are: are there any violent crime statistics that can shed light on non-homicide violent crime and mental illness? What data would need to be gathered? Can this data be collected reliably? Is this data available to law enforcement, and could it be included in the Uniform Crime Reports (UCR)?
The violent crime aggravated assault seems like an excellent category to begin this analysis. It is the most common violent crime by far. In addition, aggravated assault is a weapon-based crime (unless the victim is severely injured without a weapon) and would have the most similarities to murder/non-negligent homicide. Although a promising category, I don’t think the offender’s mental illness data can be gathered reliably. Here are some important considerations regarding mental illness and the offender’s condition:
- Undiagnosed mental illness.
- Diagnosed mental illness and medication not taken or medication schedule not followed.
- Diagnosed mental illness with worse symptoms due to alcohol and drug use (regardless of whether the medication was taken).
- Diagnosed mental illness, medication was taken, and the correct schedule was followed; no alcohol or drug use. As pointed out in the link above, this situation could happen because a medication that wasn’t effective at reducing hostility was prescribed.
There are also further complications. Imagine someone who recently experienced the loss of a loved one and fell into a short period of depression. A few days later, they are involved in an argument. Due to their emotional state, the argument ends up being escalated rather than de-escalated, and the person is charged with an aggravated assault. You can think of the root cause as a transient mental illness. However, a period of emotional distress is normal while grieving. To make matters worse, the aggravated assault charge might combine with the grief and cause symptoms to persist much longer. If the person continued to have symptoms of depression for several months, this would likely be classified as a mental illness.
This circumstance is similar to other phenomena, such as homelessness. You can study people experiencing homelessness and perhaps find that mental illness is common. However, you do not know if a mental illness was the cause of homelessness, if homelessness caused the mental illness, or if homelessness aggravated a minor mental illness.
Law enforcement could not make these distinctions when the crime was reported. It is also unknown whether law enforcement would have access to a patient’s medical records at the time of the incident. Therefore, this reporting would not make sense for the UCR.
As my book’s subtitle indicates, we must look at self-defense holistically. Alcohol abuse, drug abuse, family abuse, and incarceration are all risk factors for someone who may use violence against you. However, when these factors are removed, those who have mental illness may have only a slightly higher risk of violence than the average person.
One troubling thing about the study Berenson cites and the risk factors for violence. Suppose heavy marijuana use does lead to an increased risk of schizophrenia. In that case, heavy marijuana use must stop if the user is diagnosed with schizophrenia and put on medication. Otherwise, the combination of schizophrenia, medication, and drug abuse could lead to more violence in our society.