- In Lincoln, Colorado officer says legalizing marijuana is a bad idea
- By Joe Duggan / World-Herald Bureau
- Nov 13, 2015
LINCOLN — Before Colorado voters legalized marijuana three years ago, advocates argued that the move would afford police more time to crack down on really serious drug offenses.
Put that argument in the “mythical” category, a Colorado drug investigator said Thursday during a presentation at the Nebraska State Capitol.
Legal pot shops have failed to wipe out the black market for marijuana, where there’s still money to be made, said Sgt. James Gerhardt of the Thornton Police Department. But now criminals often try to hide behind the state’s personal and medical use laws, which makes investigations more difficult than before legalization.
“Our resources are not being freed up,” he said. “They’re absolutely being consumed by marijuana investigations.”
Gerhardt, who supervises undercover drug investigations in the north Denver metro area, has shared the law enforcement perspective on Colorado’s marijuana experience in other states considering similar legislation. On Thursday, he gave his hourlong presentation to a group of Nebraska state senators and law enforcement officers, urging them to stand against a bill that would legalize medical marijuana when it comes up for debate next session.
Sen. Tommy Garrett of Bellevue, the bill’s sponsor, said it’s impossible to compare Colorado with what is proposed in his legislation. His bill would prohibit patients from growing their own plants or even smoking cannabis — they could take it only in a pill, liquid or oil.
“There’s a dramatic difference between recreational use and very limited use of cannabis for a limited number of medical conditions,” said Garrett, who said he had to attend to work Thursday and could not attend the presentation.
Nebraska Attorney General Doug Peterson invited Gerhardt to Nebraska after hearing him speak at a conference. Peterson said that while he feels compassion for those seeking relief from their ailments, he firmly believes that the drug needs to go through the FDA approval process like any other medicine.
The attorney general also said he’s convinced that marijuana advocates will push for broader legalization in Nebraska if they win approval for medical cannabis.
“There’s a multibillion-dollar industry that wants every state to drop its guard on marijuana,” Peterson said.
Colorado voters first approved medical marijuana in 2000, and for eight years, the program was limited in scope. But in 2009, after a court ruling removed limits on the number of patients a caregiver could supply, the program exploded in the number of patients — from about 6,000 to more than 100,000 — and the number of commercial dispensaries.
Ever since, law enforcement authorities have found it harder to track whether the drug is being illegally diverted for recreational uses, Gerhardt said.
Colorado voters made recreational marijuana legal, effective in 2014. In the nearly two years since, impaired driving and traffic fatalities linked to marijuana have increased, as have pot-related emergency room visits, he said, citing statistics compiled by the Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, an agency funded by the National Office of Drug Control Policy.
As for the impact it has had on children, Colorado now ranks third in the nation when it comes to youths between the ages of 12 and 17 who use marijuana, Gerhardt said. Drug-related school suspensions increased by 40 percent in 2013, compared with the 2008 school year.
Some of the edible products — cookies, candy bars, sodas — contain high concentrations of THC, the compound in marijuana that produces the high. Not surprisingly, the edibles appeal to kids, Gerhardt said.
He described a case in which middle school students brought marijuana to school and another in which a 10-month old child was hospitalized after eating marijuana-infused trail mix. Other incidents had tragic results, such as an 18-year-old high school student who stabbed himself to death after smoking a highly potent strain of pot.
“As more of these products are available and more of our culture is accepting of marijuana, we’re also seeing a lot of collateral increases in problems,” he said.
About a year ago, Nebraska and Oklahoma filed suit against Colorado, challenging the state’s legalization of marijuana on the grounds that it affects bordering states. The Supreme Court has not indicated whether it will consider the suit.
Gerhardt said Thursday that he hopes Nebraska ultimately wins the challenge and returns Colorado to the days when pot was illegal.
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