Drugs on your money?
Keywords:
Health, Probability/Statistics, CocaineAbstract
It is already public knowledge that there are traces of cocaine on the majority of UK banknotes and US dollar bills [1]. This paper investigates how many notes and therefore how much currency a person would need to qualify for being in possession of 100 mg and 5 g of cocaine which, in usual circumstances, would be seen as a criminal offence [2]. On average, to accumulate 100 mg of cocaine on UK sterling £ 5 notes, a person would need £ 17,575. To accumulate the same amount of cocaine on US $ 1 bills the total came to $ 3,782. To accumulate 5 g worth on £ 5 notes a person would need £ 878,350 whilst for US $ 1 bills this came to $ 175,670. In usual circumstances, possession of cocaine in this quantity would result in a maximum sentence of 7 years and 6 months imprisonment [3].
References
Biello, D. (2016). Cocaine Contaminates Majority of U.S. Currency. [online] Scientific American. Available at: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/cocaine-contaminates-majority-of-american-currency/ [Accessed 04/03/2016].
London Criminal Solicitors (2016). Drug & Cocaine Possession Charges - Class A B Offence London. [online] Available at: http://londoncriminalsolicitors.co.uk/drug-crimes/possession-cocaine-drug/ [Accessed 24/03/2016].
Cps.gov.uk, (2016). Supplying or offering to supply a controlled drug: Sentencing Manual: Legal Guidance: The Crown Prosecution Service. [online] Available at: http://www.cps.gov.uk/legal/s_to_u/sentencing_manual/supply_class_a_drugs/ [Accessed 04/03/2016].
BBC (2016). BBC News | UK | Banknotes 'tainted with cocaine'. [online] Available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/464200.stm [Accessed 15/03/2016].
Zuo, Y., Zhang, K., Wu, J., Rego, C. & Fritz, J. (2008). An accurate and nondestructive GC method for determination of cocaine on US paper currency. J. Sep. Sci., 31(13), pp.2444-2450.
Downloads
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
This journal provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge. All content is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence (CC-BY 4.0).
