Marijuana Trafficking Offenses Are on the Decline in the Era of Legal Pot

http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/37090-marijuana-trafficking-offenses-are-on-the-decline-in-the-era-of-legal-pot

The United States Sentencing Commission (USSC), which compiles data on federal law enforcement efforts, recently released its latest drug trafficking statistics. And they show that federal marijuana trafficking offenses have fallen sharply since 2012, the year that Colorado and Washington residents voted to legalize marijuana. The decline continues through 2015, the most recent year for which data is available. "The number of marijuana traffickers rose slightly over time until a sharp decline in fiscal year 2013 and the number continues to decrease," the report says. Meanwhile trafficking in other drugs, notably meth and heroin, appears to be on the rise.

Now, these numbers don't necessarily contradict reports that Colorado weed is making its way elsewhere. "The vast majority of marijuana-related arrests and prosecutions are made by local and state authorities," said Beau Kilmer, a drug policy researcher with the RAND Corp., in an email. The USSC data only tracks federal offenses, so even if state and local cops are seeing more marijuana moving between borders, you wouldn't expect that to show up here.

But the USSC's numbers do show that at the federal level, marijuana trafficking is becoming less of a problem. It's not clear why this is happening. "The Commission is not able to draw further conclusions about the decline using our data," said Jenn Dukes Jordan, a public affairs specialist with USSC, in an email. "Many factors are likely at play (perhaps prosecutorial charging decisions, perhaps legalization, etc.) and there's no information about these factors in our data."