wcbstv.com - NYCLU: City Now World’s ‘Marijuana Arrest Capital’
NEW YORK (CBS/AP) ? Police busted nearly 400,000 people for carrying small amounts of pot in the last decade, making New York City the world leader in marijuana arrests, civil rights advocates said Tuesday while unveiling a study criticizing the war on drugs.

The study by Queens College sociologist Harry G. Levin, titled “Marijuana Arrest Crusade,” accused police of purposely singling out minorities during the 10-year crackdown. It said that data provided by stat Division of Criminal Justice Services showed that between 1997 and 2007, 52 percent of the suspects were black, 31 percent Hispanic and only 15 percent white.

Laws were revised in the late 1970s to largely decriminalize carrying small, concealed stashes of marijuana, Levin said. But he claimed police routinely “manufacture” arrests for possession in public view — still a misdemeanor — by stopping young black men on the street and goading them into emptying their pockets.

According to the study, arrests for marijuana possession began skyrocketing in the late 1990s during the Giuliani administration — a trend that continued under Mayor Michael Bloomberg at an estimated cost of between $50 and $90 million a year. There were 39,700 arrests last year alone, according to the study.

The 2007 total makes the city “the marijuana arrest capital of the world,” Lieberman said. The study says New York deserves that title because it devotes far more resources to arresting and jailing marijuana offenders than other large cities in Europe and elsewhere. It also cites a previous analysis of FBI data showing that five of the top 10 counties with highest per-capita arrest rate were the five boroughs.

Police spokesmen slammed the report, of course, saying Dr. Levine is a “legalizer” and was grossly distorting his research.  Law enforcement believes that marijuana arrests are part of “quality of life” policing under the “broken windows” theory, which states that if you ignore graffiti, broken windows, garbage, etc., then people will believe that they live in a lawless zone and more serious crimes will increase.

The theory isn’t necessarily wrong, it’s the lumping of marijuana smoking in with those other misdemeanors that is the problem.  It has created an adversarial relationship between young minority males and police and drives drug users toward crime and drugs that do create societal problems, like alcohol.  It’s OK for young adults to sit on the stoop and drink a 40-ounce of malt liquor, a drug that’s proven to increase aggression and violence, but not to consume cannabis, a drug that leads to mellow happiness and social belonging.

In 1977, New York State decriminalized possession of personal use amounts of marijuana. Nonetheless, researchers report that New York City is now the national leader in detaining individuals for possession of personal use amounts of marijuana.

Beginning with the advent of quality of life policing, the New York City Police Department dramatically increased the number of arrests for marijuana possession: from 1997 to 2006 the Department arrested over 353,000 people for misdemeanor possession of marijuana; in 2006 alone it arrested 33,000 people for possessing marijuana. The Department also commonly holds marijuana possession arrestees in detention for up to 24 hours pending arraignment.

Published research indicates that the marijuana possession arrests are not in central business districts, and that the police primarily make the arrests in Black and Hispanic neighborhoods.

Join the Committee on Drugs and the Law for a discussion of the costs and benefits of New York City’s marijuana possession arrest policy. This event is free and open to the public.

The event takes place tomorrow at the New York City Bar Association, 42 West 44th Street (between 5th & 6th Ave.) at 6:30 p.m.