When the FBI tampers with data on marijuana arrests, the Justice Department wants to know why!

As cannabis reform and legalization increases in the United States, the number of people arrested for violating marijuana-related laws has declined over the years. Police said they made about 318,000 arrests for cannabis crimes in the United States in 2021. That’s a 23% annual decline, according to data provided by the FBI’s Uniform Crime Report (UCR). That’s a big improvement when you consider that ten years ago, the number of arrests related to cannabis was over 650,000.

While many are celebrating this significant drop in cannabis-related arrests, a local Maryland official with extensive experience in drug policy is now claiming the numbers may be inaccurate. According to the Maryland official, the FBI’s system for documenting local and state cannabis arrests could be seriously flawed. To that end, he has asked the Justice Department’s office to launch an investigation into the entire situation.

Is the FBI’s system flawed?

The stumbling block at the moment is the issue of confusion between local law enforcement agencies. Authorities are unsure if the subpoenas issued for marijuana possession under state decriminalization laws are likely to be filed with the FBI as an “arrest.” This has led to several inconsistencies in the annual report, which calls into question its usefulness as a cannabis policy-making tool.

The FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting program is used primarily by researchers, the media, and most importantly, lawmakers to contextualize and understand enforcement instructions. The FBI’s UCR program is more than that important given. 18,000 jurisdictions report the number and type of arrests to the agency annually.

But when it comes to cannabis-related arrests, there appears to be a dilemma that could significantly discourage observers and policymakers from assessing the impact of decriminalization measures. As if that were not enough, the domino effects can also be felt at the federal level in the area of ​​police funding.

In summary, the data reported by UCR on cannabis arrests can be bolstered. A state police agency told Marijuana Moment that they are filing simple civil offenses for possession of cannabis as an arrest. This uses their interpretation of the reporting guidelines of the FBI. However, a proper assessment reveals an inconsistency in the adoption of such an interpretation by other departments.

This apparent issue prompted Eric Sterling, a member of the Maryland Policing Advisory Commission, to contact state and local law enforcement agencies for explanations. The responses to his questions also prompted him to contact the Justice Department’s inspector general to launch an investigation into the matter.

Wasteful Misconduct?

As advocates continue to lobby cannabis organizations, Eric Sterling has made it his mission to get to the bottom of the situation. As a result, he has contacted the Inspector General of the Justice Department, requesting an investigation into the FBI’s “wasteful misconduct.”

In the letter he wrote, he confirmed that the FBI had instructed law enforcement agencies to inaccurately and incorrectly define key law enforcement dates. He claimed that misleading and false data, as well as multiple and crucial degrees of political activity and arrests related to cannabis violations, were released at the direction of the FBI.

In 2014, cannabis was decriminalized in Maryland, making possession of 10 grams or less a civil violation. This violation is punishable by a fine without threat of imprisonment or imprisonment. However, the Maryland State Police (MSP) confirmed that they still filed such violations as arrests. Meanwhile, Baltimore, a major city in the state, appears to use a different filing system. This has resulted in fewer marijuana arrests being filed in the years since cannabis was decriminalized in Maryland.

As it stands, the MSP has justified their interpretation, claiming that marijuana is only decriminalized in the state, but is still very much illegal. Therefore, the violation still has penalties that result in it being reported to the FBI as an arrest. An FBI specialist, Holly Morris, told Marijuana Moment that a section in the guidance covers the three types of arrests that law enforcement must report, including citations.

Law enforcement agencies only need to document one per violator;

O= On View Arrest (arrest without prior incident report or warrant)

S= Summoned/Cited (not taken into custody)

T=Taken into custody (based on a previous incident report or an arrest warrant)

Most likely, the value “S” was intended to indicate that no formal arrest was made. However, it is unclear whether such information is available in the UCR reports to provide lawmakers, media and researchers with the context needed for their analyzes of cannabis enforcement in cannabis-decriminalized states.

Importance of UCR reports

The meaning of the UCR reports is multidimensional. Sterling, who was a former counsel for the House Judiciary Committee, provided an in-depth look at the UCR reports. He reiterated that bogus arrests in cannabis-decriminalized states seriously sabotage the value of cannabis decriminalization as a cost-saving for law enforcement. This is one of the many arguments advocates often make in favor of cannabis reform

Additionally, Sterling pointed out that arrest dates could also influence police funding at the local and state levels under initiatives such as the Justice Assistance Grant (JAG). A review of the JAG program found that the UCR’s report on violent crime is used as a factor in decisions about police funding. Although it is uncertain if this is the main standard.

As things stand, it remains unclear how many law enforcement agencies share the FBI’s MSP interpretation of the UCR. But a clear example of the wide discrepancy between arrest and subpoena as a result of differing interpretations by the FBI can be seen in Maryland when cannabis was decriminalized in October 2014.

Due to differing interpretations, Baltimore City saw arrests related to cannabis decrease from 3,680 to 509 in 2014 and 2015 respectively. In the same state, Montgomery County saw cannabis arrests increase from 3,296 to 3,651 during the same period. The 2020 figures for cannabis arrests in Baltimore City and Montgomery County were reported as 10 and 1,298, respectively, which is one of the lowest figures since 2009.

Conclusion

The number of cannabis arrests is a statistic of great importance for policy making. It is typically cited by state legislators and congressmen when debating cannabis policy and legislation. Therefore, the falsification of this data distorts crucial national debates about police behavior across the country and the extent to which laws are or are not being implemented impartially. In summary, Eric Sterling’s cause is worth watching to the end.

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