the judicial system and performance enhancing drugs

an unintended consequence of performance enhancing drugs for some people are the emotional or mood changes associated with their use. although the extent of these mood swings, sometimes termed "roid rage", are often over-exaggerated, there still remains a real influence of ped use on behavior. in criminal proceedings, often times substance use is considered by the courts, yet performance enhancing drugs are not often given the same considerations. a fascinating article by dunn et al. (2016) recently explored this relationship between anabolic androgenic steroids in sentencing violent offenses.

researchers looked at a decade of criminal court proceedings in victoria, australia. after filtering by search terms, they included six cases in their analysis. three of the cases included reference to a potential link between the anabolic-androgenic steroid use and the violent acts. however, the cases also included, amount other things, the use of alcohol, cannabis, viagra, and methamphetamine. in one case the court acknowledged that steroid use likely contributed significantly to the violent act, but it did not appear to have any effect on sentencing.

the authors concluded that the steroid use likely did not have a positive or negative affect on sentencing in this cases. the question remains then, should steroid use be considered by the courts as a mitigating factor in their criminal behavior?

reference

dunn, matthew, jarryd bartle, and fiona h. mckay. "exploring judicial opinion on the relationship between anabolic-androgenic steroid use and violent offending." performance enhancement & health 5.1 (2016): 31-33.