Pubdate: Thu, 16 Sep 2010 Source: Pasadena Weekly (CA) Copyright: 2010 Southland Publishing Contact: http://www.pasadenaweekly.com Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/4323 Cited: Proposition 19 http://yeson19.com/ Bookmark: http://mapinc.org/find?272 (Proposition 19) COPS FOR POT Ex-Law Enforcement Officials Say Keeping Pot Illegal Does More Harm Than Good Calling low-level marijuana arrests a "waste of time" that take up valuable crime-fighting resources, a group of law enforcement officials this week called on California voters to pass Proposition 19 to legalize marijuana for their own sake. Comprised of police chiefs, judges and prosecutors, the group Law Enforcement Against Prohibition said marijuana's illegality is doing more harm than good by jamming the justice system with misdemeanor possession offenses that have had no impact on the usage rates and availability of the weed. "It's not working and it hasn't reduced the use of marijuana. No one makes that argument," said Joe McNamara, the former San Jose police chief who now serves as a research fellow with Harvard's Hoover Institution. Legalizing marijuana would do more to undercut the flow of money that illicit marijuana sales provide Mexican drug cartels than any other effort, McNamara said, citing federal estimates that cartels derive 60 percent of their profits from weed alone. "This is a chance for the voters to strike much more of a blow than law enforcement can ever strike against the cartels by taking away those profits," McNamara said. But another law enforcement group, Public Safety First, says Proposition 19 is poorly written and will lead to multiple unintended consequences, including hampering employers' efforts to attain drug-free workplaces and financial and legal complications given marijuana's illegality under federal law. Those are many of the same arguments voters rejected in passing California's landmark medical marijuana law, Proposition 215, about 15 years ago, McNamara said. "I think the attitudes of the public are very clear. They don't buy into the argument of opponents of Prop. 19, that we should do much of the same thing," he said. With 60,000 fewer misdemeanor marijuana arrests to process, the justice system would be able to direct more resources toward more serious crimes that are not getting the proper attention, said James Gray, a retired Orange County Superior Court judge, noting that scores of rape kits remain untested. Apart from support for legalization, there's another stark difference between the law enforcement groups weighing in on the proposition: most of the officials who support Proposition 19 are either retired or former officials. Gray said the politics of law enforcement officialdom preclude many other officers from speaking out in favor of legalization. On Monday, LEAP members released a letter urging voters to pass Proposition 19 in November. "As criminal justice professionals, we have seen with our own eyes that keeping cannabis illegal damages public safety -- for cannabis consumers and non-consumers alike," read the letter, signed by a host of current and former law enforcement officials, among them former LA County Deputy Sheriff MacKenzie Allen and retired LAPD Deputy Chief Stephen Downing. - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake