The murder of two Appalachian State University students in the past 13 months - Joey McClure and Stephen Harrington - is tragic. That both were drug-related might lead some to draw false conclusions about the university and the surrounding communities, including any of the following misconceptions: First, that ASU is not a safe campus; second, that Boone and the surrounding communities are dangerous; third, that ASU has a rampant drug problem; fourth, that illicit drug use drives violent crime; and fifth, that the most dangerous drugs are illegal drugs.

First, these murders occurred off campus. Appalachian State University is a very safe place. Police statistics and surveys of students by campus criminologists show that the grounds of ASU are not dangerous, that students are generally not afraid of crime, and that they perceive minimal threats to their personal safety.

Second, Watauga County is a very safe place. Murder is very rare in the mountains. In fact, most crimes known to the police, especially violent crimes, occur infrequently in Watauga County, and the county's crime rate is far below the national average.

While there are likely many violent crimes that are not reported to the police, Boone and the surrounding areas are not generally characterized by the social and environmental factors that criminological research suggests are related to high violent-crime rates.

Third, there is little evidence to suggest that ASU has a significant drug problem. While the university's judicial system handled more drug violations last year than any other school in the University of North Carolina system, this is due not only to actual variation in drug use rates but also to the fact that the university more strictly pursues such violations.

Further, it is highly likely that law-enforcement agencies serving and surrounding ASU are more focused on drug offenses than law-enforcement agencies serving and surrounding other university campuses. Given that Watauga County has so little violent crime, and because of the local concern over methamphetamine laboratories in the area, illicit drugs are viewed as more problematic by officials working on and around ASU than at other state university campuses.

Fourth, research by drug-policy experts illustrates that most drug-related crime is not psychopharmacological in nature. That is, the bulk of violent crime associated with illicit drugs is not due to individuals committing violence under the influence of illicit drugs. Instead, drug-related violence is mostly systemic and economic compulsive.

Systemic violence is criminality driven by the black market (for example, when one dealer kills another dealer or a buyer who owes him money). Economic compulsive violence is criminality committed by people to obtain money to buy drugs, which are higher in price, given their illegal nature.

The murders of ASU students Joey McClure and Stephen Harrington are good examples of systemic violence, which makes up the majority of murders associated with illicit drugs. One proper conclusion to draw from these deaths is that, in many cases, America's drug war actually produces violence and murder. Since drug dealers cannot solve their disputes legally - in a court of law, for example - they turn to violence to settle their disputes.

This in no way reflects badly on ASU, the surrounding communities, or the law-enforcement officers who serve the area. Instead, it suggests that national drug policy is fundamentally flawed because it actually produces many violent crimes committed by people engaged in the illicit drug market.

Fifth, the most dangerous drugs are legal. For example, tobacco kills 420,000 Americans every year. According to ASU, the university enrolls 14,653 students. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, approximately 22 percent of college-age youth smoke cigarettes and one-third of them will die from tobacco-related causes. This means approximately 1,064 current ASU students will suffer tobacco-related deaths. Further, according to the Office of National Drug Control Policy, the drug most likely to produce violent behavior is alcohol, which happens to be the drug most widely used by ASU students.

The available evidence concerning drugs and crime thus suggests that if ASU wants to protect its students from drug-related harms, it should push for alternatives to the drug war that actually reduce harms, and focus most of its efforts on making sure that its students do not smoke cigarettes and drink alcohol heavily.

• Matthew Robinson is an associate professor of Criminal Justice at Appalachian State University in Boone.