Pubdate: Thu, 20 Mar 2014
Source: Seattle Times (WA)
Copyright: 2014 The Seattle Times Company
Contact:  http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/409
Author: Gene Johnson, The Associated Press
Page: B2

ACLU: STEEP DROP IN POT CASES HAS FREED UP RESOURCES

Prosecutor Disputes the Savings

Numbers Show Fewer Cases Than Year Before

(AP) - A steep drop in charges filed against adults over 21 in
Washington state after legalization of marijuana shows the new law is
freeing up court and law-enforcement resources to deal with other
issues, a primary backer of the law said Wednesday.

The state chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) found
that such low-level charges were filed in just 120 cases in 2013, down
from 5,531 cases the year before.

"The data strongly suggest that I-502 has achieved one of its primary
goals - to free up limited police and prosecutorial resources," Mark
Cooke, criminal-justice policy counsel with the state ACLU, said in a
news release.

Ian Goodhew, deputy chief of staff at the King County Prosecutor's
Office, said that hasn't been the case in his office. He said
prosecutors handled only a few misdemeanor pot cases a day before the
law went into effect.

"There's no great relief of workload," Goodhew said. "All this has
meant is maybe our calendar in District Court in the Seattle division
is maybe, instead of 46 cases in a day, 44 or 43 or 42. We're no
longer filing misdemeanor marijuana cases, but we were not expending
any significant resources on those cases at the time I-502 passed."

Cooke conceded the law hasn't fundamentally changed what prosecutors
do every day but said when considered more broadly, I-502 has saved
resources, from basic investigation and filing of paperwork to court
time. He noted King County's adult misdemeanor pot cases fell from
1,435 in 2009 to 14 last year.

"I can't fault their logic," said Mitch Barker, executive director of
the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs. "If we took
speeding off the books, that would free up time. If we took robbery
off the books, that would free up time.

"The question we all have to look at is, is it good public policy? My
sole concern is that when you expand access to marijuana for adults,
you expand access for underage people."

The pot cases that were filed in the state last year likely involved
people caught with more than an ounce of weed, or the 28 grams,
they're allowed to have under Washington's Initiative 502, but less
than the 40 grams that can trigger felony possession charges.

The data, which came from Washington's Administrative Office of the
Courts, also suggest racial disparities remain a concern in marijuana
charges, Cooke said.

Before I-502's passage in 2012, blacks were nearly three times as
likely as whites to face misdemeanor marijuana-possession charges in
Washington, and that remained true among the 120 cases filed last
year, he said.

Of the 120, white defendants accounted for 82 cases and blacks for 11.
That equated for whites to 2 cases per 100,000 residents; for blacks,
to 5.6 per 100,000.

The number of misdemeanor filings for those older than 21 had been
dropping for several years, the group said, from 7,964 in 2009 to
5,531 in 2012.

Court filings for all drug felonies, including marijuana growing and
selling, have remained fairly constant since 2009, at about or
slightly under 20,000.

Among people younger than 21, misdemeanor marijuana-possession charges
have also fallen in the past two years from 4,127 in 2011 to 3,469 in
2012 and 1,963 last year. People younger than 21 aren't allowed to
have pot under the state law.
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