At a smart dinner party, where cocaine is passed around like canapes, the wealthy guests likely do not think about the class A drug’s dark origins.

Behind these decadent suburban scenes are the end result of a supply chain that involves environmental devastation, violence, high-level corruption and crimes including gang warfare, sex trafficking and terrorism.

And it is why Metropolitan Police Commissioner Cressida Dick told middle-class drug users that they had “blood on their hands”.

Police Federation deputy treasurer Simon Kempton heaped blame on wealthy middle class people for the boom in class A drug sales.

He said: “If you look at why there is a market for cocaine from South America it is because people who can afford it are buying it and fuelling the problem. “Street-level users are a problem because they steal to fund their habit. But on their own they will not support an organised-crime group.

“The big market is people with money to spend and they are often oblivious to the misery they cause because it is not on their doorstep.

“Middle-class drug users do not come across the radar of police because they are consuming it behind closed doors. There’s a lack of personal responsibility.”

Far from a victimless crime, taking cocaine leaves bloody footsteps and even death from the streets in our town and across the world.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/blood-hands-decadent-drug-users-16491263