Philadelphia Weekly cover art 3/2/2011
The Philadelphia Weekly has published a groundbreaking feature article looking at the racial disparity of the city’s marijuana arrests. Blunt Assessment: The Need for Legal Weed in Philadelphia explores the issue from the streets to the courts.
Journalist Nina Hoffmann interviewed hip-hop artists, retired law enforcement, marijuana policy experts (including this author) and most revealing; black Philly residents as they go though Small Amount of Marijuana (SAM) program.
Each year PhillyNORML compiles the arrests statistics for the state of Pennsylvania using the annual Uniform Crime report. PA’s crime datatbase is actually easily accessible by the public, unlike other states like New Jersey.
Read the numbers in the following articles:
2008 city stats – Philly: White women rarely arrested for pot
2009 city stats – Philadelphia: Marijuana arrests remain high
2009 PA statewide – Pennsylvania saw 25,635 marijuana arrests last year
In 2009 and 2010 PhillyNORML urged city officials to change local marijuana procedures.
Last year Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams and the State Supreme Court created a diversion process called the Small Amount of Marijuana (SAM) Program. The tangibly eases the penalties for the over 4,700 adults caught with small amounts of pot each year. The successful and publicly popular shift will save the city about $3 million annually.
Unfortunately, Philly still requires the custodial arrest of citizens caught with any amount of marijuana before they go into the SAM program. Most counties in Pennsylvania issue a summary violation: A ticket with no arrest.
Take a moment to read Blunt Assessment: The Need for Legal Weed in Philadelphia