What legalization of marijuana means for Maryland’s criminal justice system – The Southern Maryland Chronicle

Marylanders voted final month to permit the legalization of hashish for leisure use, making the state the twenty second jurisdiction and the final state within the DMV space to take action.

The laws, which works into full impact on July 1, 2023, permits the possession and sale of hashish merchandise as much as one ounce for anybody 21 or older and can imply the expungement of cannabis-related information for hundreds of individuals.

“It’s a big step ahead for the felony justice system,” mentioned Del. David Moon, who served on the Home Hashish Referendum and Legalization Work Group as chair of its felony justice impacts subcommittee. Charging folks for hashish possession, he mentioned, was “actually messing with folks’s lives for a lot of non-violent occasions, and also you’re creating felony information that affect their scholar mortgage eligibility, their eligibility for federal advantages, for some employments, for some housing. I may go on and on.”

Whereas it’s not clear how many individuals at present have a marijuana possession cost on their document, roughly 15,000 folks in Maryland have been arrested for cannabis-related fees between 2018 and 2020, in response to knowledge from the Maryland Division of Legislative Providers and the Nationwide Group for the Reform of Marijuana Legal guidelines, a marijuana advocacy group. By July 2024, Maryland fees will mechanically be cleared for anybody whose document solely consists of easy possession. For these at present incarcerated, the laws now permits for resentencing and launch.

Whereas decriminalizing marijuana has created a multimillion-dollar trade in medical marijuana merchandise, legalization will pave the way in which for an expanded hashish trade. In Washington, D.C., a metropolis with roughly a tenth of the inhabitants of the state of Maryland, the leisure marijuana trade is estimated to be a $200 million enterprise, in response to projections by MJBizDaily, an trade information outlet.

In 2014, when Maryland decriminalized possession of 10 ounces or much less of marijuana, the state had the eighth-highest price of marijuana arrests within the U.S. in 2018; over half of all drug-related arrests in Maryland have been marijuana-related. About 87% of these arrests have been for possession.

Since 2018, nevertheless, 12 states have legalized hashish for leisure use, and all however 11 states have authorised it for medical use.

The laws may have the best affect on the Black inhabitants in Maryland, which, whereas utilizing hashish at roughly the identical charges as white folks, is twice as more likely to be arrested for possession as in comparison with the state inhabitants, in response to Maryland’s Division of Legislative Providers. In 2020 alone, 1,072 folks have been arrested for marijuana possession. Of the people arrested, nearly 60% of them have been Black. Solely 29.2% of the Maryland inhabitants is Black.

Olivia Naugle, the senior coverage analyst on the Marijuana Coverage Mission and a lead in organizing the Maryland Hashish Coverage Coalition, one other advocate of the referendum, was impressed to advocate for marijuana reform after her father was arrested for marijuana possession when she was youthful. Naugle mentioned legalization was simply as a lot a racial justice difficulty because it was a felony justice difficulty.

“Communities of coloration have borne the brunt of prohibition,” she mentioned.

Eugene Monroe, a former Baltimore Ravens participant and chairman of the “Sure on 4” marketing campaign, which advocated for the approval of the referendum to amend the state’s structure, argued that assets to keep up “prohibition” can be higher allotted towards fixing issues resembling murder charges, which have risen nationwide.

“Placing folks in jail for a small quantity of hashish isn’t enhancing, you understand, public security by any means,” Monroe mentioned.

“That ‘sure’ vote on 4 is an indication of hope, as this, you understand, ought to result in document expungement and alternative for these, you understand, for these of us who’ve information to be away from hashish,” Monroe added.

Whereas the laws was within the works for months, the referendum got here shut after President Joe Biden introduced his pardon of all individuals who have been federally charged with easy marijuana possession, affecting roughly 6,000 folks. In saying the pardon, Biden urged state governments to comply with swimsuit.

However Moon doesn’t suppose that’s the final of Biden’s work on hashish reform. He predicted that the Biden administration would drop marijuana’s label as a Schedule I drug, which defines it as a extremely abusive drug that can not be used for medical functions.

“I wouldn’t be shocked to see that in any respect,” Moon mentioned of his prediction. “I feel instances are altering.”