Alan used to do a few robberies. Now he carries everything he needs in his jacket. He has a plastic Coke bottle filled with brown liquid in the right-hand pocket. His measuring vial to give himself his daily dose of physeptone is in the left.
He gets more than a litre of the legally-prescribed heroin substitute a week and sells some to make money for the cost of the Dublin hostel where he sleeps. Each 100 mls that costs him £4 in the chemist's sells for £10 on the street.
He says the "phy" is so strong that street heroin doesn't give him a high if his supply is stolen. Now all he needs is a reason to give up drugs.
People like Alan are part of the reason that the number of serious crimes reported to the Garda fell by 10 per cent last year and the trend looks set to be repeated this year. The last Garda research in Dublin linked two out of three crimes to drugs.
In one central Dublin Garda district 82 robberies of tourists were reported in the first six months of this year, compared to 130 in 1996 and 88 last year. Tourists and their hired cars were easy targets for a drug addict. A rental car is one of the few new cars to be seen without hubcaps, as most companies remove them before the addicts do.
One of the most frightening drug-related crimes - robbery with a blood-filled syringe - has fallen more dramatically in the same district. In the first half of 1996 there were 50 syringe robberies, almost two a week. This year there have been just over 20 in the first six months.
Improved security around cash machines is partly responsible. And a large number of syringe robberies were carried out by a small number of addicts - those often described in courts as "human crime waves". The courts have taken a very strict line on syringe robberies, according to Dublin Garda Supt John Mulderrig. "If someone is charged with a syringe attack it's seen as a valid reason for keeping them in custody until a trial."
The fight against heroin began in workingclass communities in late 1995, with marches on dealers, and 24-hour vigils to keep dealing out of their neighbourhoods. At the same time politicians began hearing about drug fears from middle-class constituents as ecstasy arrived on the club scene and young people started dying.
But the response would have been different without the murder of journalist Veronica Guerin in June 1996, which changed the attitude of government to drugs and crime.
Less than four months after the murder Operation Dochas began in Dublin, with uniform gardai patrolling the streets and Garda resources targeted at heroin-dealing.
Figures seen by The Irish Times show that gardai have carried out over 94,000 searches of people on the streets since Dochas began. Around 30,000 further drug searches, where people suspected of carrying drugs have been taken into stations, and more than 21,000 vehicle checkpoints have been carried out.
More than 21,000 people have been arrested, with around half of those charged and a further 18,000 people summonsed. Over 57,000 people have been cautioned and drugs worth £7 million have been seized.
However, most city stations do not have the facilities and resources to detain and monitor people suspected of carrying drugs. Many of the specialist drug units can find themselves reassigned to other duties if there is a serious crime, like a murder, in the district.
Communities criticise gardai for allowing drug-dealing to be carried out in certain estates. Gardai say the dealers that are pushed out of one area simply move to another. "We treat the crime problem but we don't cure one drug addict," is a senior garda's view.
In the past two years the number of treatment places for addicts in Dublin has risen by 2,000. Ninety-two GPs now dispense methadone, compared to only 15 two years ago. And the number of pharmacists dispensing the drug has more than doubled to 88. The number of treatment locations has increased from four to 28.
More addicts are getting treatment. And more addicts are committing different types of crimes to feed their habits. But there is no sign that fewer people are becoming addicted. The Merchants Quay drug project saw 933 new heroin addicts last year, and increasing numbers of teenage addicts, most of them not interested in treatment.
As increasing private security and Garda activity makes shoplifting more difficult addicts have turned to prostitution. According to Merchants Quay director Tony Geoghegan, more of the young women who come to the centre are making their heroin money on Benburb Street. As a crime that does not result in a "victim" the trade only comes to notice when women are murdered.
Drug dealing has become a way of raising the money for a heroin habit. Last month dealers in the north of the city were offering a four-for-50 deal, with four street deals of heroin for £50.
The price means the addict can use two deals, and will try to sell the remainder for £20 each, giving them a heroin high for just £10. As a marketing device it turns more addicts into pushers, with new users being introduced to heroin because it is cheap enough to smoke.
The Government's £20 million over three years for a young people's facilities-and-services fund is designed to provide activities that compete with the teenage thrill of smoking heroin. According to Fergus McCabe of the Inner City Organisation Network, there is a "danger that the money will go into basketball and snooker clubs".
The money should be aimed at those "kids who aren't playing basketball in youth clubs," he says. By the end of next month funding for the 13 drugs task forces is due to be announced, following a review of their activities by independent consultants.
"It is still just as urgent as when the marches were going on," Mr McCabe insists. "Drug dealers are obviously being replaced because the supply is still there."
And while crime is dropping, a new generation of heroin addicts is being created by dealers anxious to keep demand high. Without a booming economy, a political will to resource treatment, policing and community efforts there is nothing to stop the graph climbing again.