LEAP drops NH officer who refuses to arrest medical marijuana patients

Officer Bradley Jardis told to take a flying LEAP for encouraging cops to not arrest medical marijuana patients

We reported on Officer Bradley Jardis in Epping, New Hampshire, back in October when Jardis lost his job because of his outspoken participation in LEAP (Law Enforcement Against Prohibition).  Cannabis Karri updated the story last Monday on NORML SHOW LIVE when Jardis won his job back in court and returned to police work.

However, Jardis then made the public statement “I will never arrest a person who possesses, uses, grows marijuana to treat a medical condition” because he believes that it is “unconstitutional for the state to take action against a sick person who decides to use Marijuana to treat a medical condition.”  Officer Jardis also encourages other officers to not arrest sick people using cannabis by saying “neither should any other NH LEO who intends follow his or her oath.”

This did not sit well with Jack Cole and the executive board of LEAP, which has unanimously decided to drop Officer Jardis for “refusing to enforce the laws as they are currently recorded.”

(Free Keene) The organization known as Law Enforcement Against Prohibition has unceremoniously booted him from their ranks. Brad posted the email he received from LEAP’s head, Jack Cole, on the Free Keene Forum. In it, Cole takes position that while LEAP members are encouraged to speak out about the horrors of prohibition, as long as they are employed as LEOs, they must enforce bad laws, because to not do so would be “unethical and wrong”. It’s a sad statement that outs LEAP as an organization of nothing more than a bunch of talkers, rather than doers. Of course, Cole is incorrect. Enforcing laws that harm peaceful people is what is unethical and wrong.

Other law enforcement officers, who are members of LEAP, have announced they will be sending in their resignations. Many other supporters of LEAP are sending in revocations of their membership, and explaining why. Some of these messages can be found on this forum thread.

LEAP speakers are frequent guests here on the Stash and I have always had a good working relationship with Jack Cole and other LEAP officials.  I support their mission, as having cops running around with “Cops Say Legalize Drugs” on their t-shirts always leads to a good conversation with the public.

However, I think in this situation LEAP has painted themselves in the bad PR position of saying “We think the war on drugs is bad, but since it exists, it’s a cop’s job to lock up sick people.”

We all know that cops have enormous discretion when it comes to enforcing the law.  For example, they are not mindless automatons who are compelled to cite for littering every smoker who tosses a cigarette butt in the gutter (wish that they would!) or citizen jaywalking across the street.  A cop can make intelligent decisions as to which people to cite and which people to warn and which situations aren’t even worth the bother.  I should think that an officer who catches a multiple sclerosis patient in Keene, New Hampshire, with a bag of weed could make a compelling case for why he’d look the other way.

I’ve invited Jack Cole from LEAP (through my contact at the LEAP speaker’s bureau) to join us this Thursday for our regular LEAP segment to discuss this issue.  In the meantime, I think it relevant to repost this Martin Luther King Jr. quote from last Monday’s post:

One may well ask: “How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?” The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that “an unjust law is no law at all.”

Imagine, if every law enforcement officer acted like Officer Bradley Jardis, the war on marijuana consumers would be over tomorrow.