Pubdate: Mon, 22 Nov 2010
Source: Boston Herald (MA)
Copyright: 2010 The Boston Herald, Inc
Contact:  http://news.bostonherald.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/53
Author: Laurel J. Sweet
Cited: Boston City Council http://www.cityofboston.gov/citycouncil/
Cited:  Massachusetts Cannabis Reform Coalition http://www.masscann.org/
Referenced: The marijuana law 
http://www.mass.gov/Eeops/docs/eops/full_text_for_question_2.pdf
Bookmark:  Massachusetts Cannabis Reform Coalition 
http://www.mapinc.org/topic/Massachusetts+Cannabis+Reform+Coalition

TOKERS BLOW SMOKE AT POT FINES

Potheads who've found the grass is greener under the state's 
mellowed-out marijuana law have racked up as much as $64,500 in 
unpaid fines in Boston alone, thumbing their noses at hundreds of 
citations that cops have written up, but authorities are powerless to enforce.

Now the City Council wants to smoke out the stoner scofflaws.

"Everybody's laughing in the face of this thing. We need to find a 
way to tighten up the loopholes that are allowing precious dollars to 
escape," said Councilor Stephen J. Murphy, chairman of the committee 
on public safety.

Of the more than 760 $100 fines written up in Boston this year as of 
Nov. 4, police list 645 as unpaid with no way of accounting if any 
were cleared up at courts or by drop-ins to City Hall, a Herald review found.

Murphy has formally requested a public hearing to examine the police 
department's struggle to enforce fines for possession of an ounce or 
less of cannabis. He's also mulling measures such as seeking the 
Legislature's permission to collect overdue dope debts through tax 
liens -- such as the city does now with unpaid trash and snow removal 
fines under its so-called "Green Ticket Law."

But Bill Downing, director of the Massachusetts Cannabis Reform 
Coalition, insists the new right to toke should not have a price tag.

"There's this concept called freedom. The people of Massachusetts 
voted to tell the cops to leave these people alone. If they don't pay 
their tickets, who cares? What, are you going to float city and town 
budgets on the backs of the pot-smoking public?"

Presently, a pot-possession ticket is supposed to be paid at police 
headquarters in 21 days. This year, only 52 tokers made the deadline. 
Police credited another 63 as being paid off after the due date, 
including one through South Boston District Court.

Boston police spokeswoman Elaine Driscoll said, "The police 
commissioner feels our responsibility is to enforce the law the way 
it currently stands."

Cheryl Sibley, chief administrator of Boston Municipal Court, said 
there is "very limited recourse" for the courts to force payment if 
potheads don't request a hearing to fight the ticket and police don't 
seek a civil contempt hearing to enforce it.

But the cops and the courts both complain that there is no formal 
process for the exchange of records, so compliance is hard to track.

But among the locations where Hub cops whacked weed whiffers this 
year were Boston Latin Academy and Charlestown High, their records 
show. Murphy suggests that indicates a problem that is not being 
addressed under the law as it stands.

"My own opinion is, we never should have decriminalized it," Murphy 
said. "The question now is what can we develop by way of a system 
that would allow us to enforce the civil side of it."
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake