MARIJUANA ARRESTS IN NEW YORK CITY
Information and News
about New York City's Racially-Biased Marijuana Arrest Crusade
See the new website Marijuana-Arrests.Com for breaking news, columns, editorials, testimony, and
up-to-date information about stop and frisks, marijuana arrests beyond
Essential Information - (many items are pdf files and may take a
moment to load)
Testimony
to the New York State Senate Regarding Marijuana Arrests – June 2011 – new
Includes new data showing NYPD
arrests by precinct and arrests in 13 counties and cites in NY State
$75 Million
A Year: The Cost of New York City's Marijuana Possession Arrests March 2011
– new
Report released with the
Drug Policy Alliance about the cost of arresting and prosecuting 50,000 people
a year
The
Epidemic of Pot Arrests in New York City, by Harry G. Levine,
Alternet.org, Aug 2009
Oped summary of
arrests in NYC and other cities.
New York Civil
Liberties Union (NYCLU) report, 100 pages, graphs and detailed description of
the arrests, April 2008
New
York City's Marijuana Arrest Crusade ... Continues
Brief update of
the above report with new graphs with
2008 data, and a table with 2009 arrests.
Sept 2009, updated Jan 2010
Important News and Commentary in Print
New
York Times editorial, “Trouble With Marijuana Arrests.” September 26, 2011
Police have characterized
marijuana arrests as important for keeping criminals off the street. But, in
testimony submitted to the Legislature this summer, Professor Levine estimated
that a significant majority of those arrested in 2010 had never been convicted
of any crime, based on an analysis of data reported to the state. Young
African-Americans and Hispanics, who are disproportionately singled-out in
street stops, make up a high percentage of people arrested for marijuana
possession — despite federal data showing that whites are more likely to
consume marijuana. This policing practice has damaged young lives and deserves
deeper scrutiny by federal and state monitors.
Much of what we know about the
racial discrepancy between marijuana use and marijuana arrests in
New York Times,
"Drug Bust" column by Charles M. Blow, June 10, 2011 - new
The Drug War: An
effort meant to save us from a form of moral decay became its own insidious
brand of moral perversion — turning people who should have been patients into
prisoners, criminalizing victimless behavior, targeting those whose first
offense was entering the world wrapped in the wrong skin. It feeds our achingly
contradictory tendency toward prudery and our overwhelming thirst for
punishment.
New
York Times, "Escape from New Yorkt" column by Charles M. Blow, March
18, 2011 - new
According to an
analysis of these arrests by Harry Levine, another sociologist at the City
University of New York, the New York Police Department under Mayor Michael
Bloomberg has made more of these minor drug arrests than under his previous
three predecessors combined. These targeting tactics mean that blacks are
arrested for minor drug possession at seven times the rate of whites although
on national surveys whites consistently say that they use marijuana more than
blacks or Hispanics.
New York Times,
"Smoke and Horrors," column by
Charles M. Blow, Oct 22, 2010. - new
Attorney General
Eric Holder Jr.’s recent chest-thumping against the California ballot
initiative that seeks to legalize marijuana underscores how the war on drugs in
this country has become a war focused on marijuana, one being waged primarily
against minorities and promoted, fueled and financed primarily by Democratic
politicians.... This is outrageous and
immoral and the Democrat’s complicity is unconscionable, particularly for a
party that likes to promote its social justice bona fides. No one knows all the repercussions of
legalizing marijuana, but it is clear that criminalizing it has made it a
life-ruining racial weapon. When will politicians have the courage to stand up,
acknowledge this fact and stop allowing young minority men to be collateral
damage?
New
York Times, "Side Effects of Arrests for Marijuana" By Jim Dwyer,
June 16, 2011 - new
On average last
year, someone was arrested every 10 minutes in
New
York Times, "A Call To Shift Policy on Marijuanay" By Jim Dwyer, June
14, 2011 - new
More people are arrested in
New York Times,
"A Smell of Pot and Privilege in the City" By Jim Dwyer, July 21,
2010
No city in the
world arrests more of its citizens for using pot than
New
York Times, California Blacks Split over Pot Arrests - Jesse McKinley, July 19,
2010
This month, the Drug Policy
Alliance — a New York group that is supporting Proposition 19 — released a
study showing that blacks were arrested for possession at far higher rates than
whites in California’s 25 largest counties, often two or three times higher. In
those 25 counties, blacks make up 7 percent of the population but accounted for
20 percent of the marijuana possession arrests; in Los Angeles County, which
accounts for about a quarter of the state’s population, blacks were arrested
for marijuana possession at three times the rate of whites.
New York Times, "Whites Smoke Pot,
but Blacks Are Arrested" by Jim Dwyer, Dec 22, 2009
Last year, black
New Yorkers were seven times more likely than whites to be arrested for marijuana
possession and no more serious crime. Latinos were four times more likely.
In 2008, the
police made more pot arrests “than in the 12 years of Mayor Koch, plus the four
years of Mayor Dinkins, plus the first two years of Mayor Giuliani,” Mr. Levine
wrote. “In other words, in one year,
2008, Bloomberg made more pot arrests than in 18 years of Koch, Dinkins and
Giuliani combined.”
New
York Magazine, "The Splitting Image of Pot" by
Marc Jacobson, Sept 21, 2009
On the one hand, marijuana is practically legal – more mainstream,
accessorized, and taken for granted than
ever before.
On the other, kids are getting busted in the city in record numbers.
Guess which kids.
Am
New York,
"High Crimes" by Jason
Fink, Sept 14, 2009
With pot as popular as ever,
cops are busting NYers at record levels.
An excerpt from City Limits Magazine's
excellent whole issue on 40 years of the drug war on NY City. The issue can be purchased: here.
Racially-Biased Marijuana
Arrests in
Arresting Blacks
for Marijuana in California, 2007-2009. Oct 2010.
New report released with
California NAACP about arrests of blacks
for marijuana possession in 25 California cities where blacks are arrests at 4,
6, 8 and even 12 times the rate of whites.
Arresting Latinos
for Marijuana in California, 2007-2009. Oct 2010.
New report released with
Latino civil rights organization about the disproportionate arrests of Latinos
for marijuana possession in 33
Targeting
Blacks For Marijuana: Possession Arrests in California, 2004-08 - June-July
2010
New report released in
conjunction with the California NAACP about arrests of blacks for marijuana possession in the 25
largest counties in California.
Marijuana
Law Reform Is a Civil Rights Issue, Alice Huffman, president of the California
NAACP, 2010- new
This is the first major statement by a civil
right leader insisting that racially-biased marijuana possession arrests are a
civil rights issue.
News Articles, Only On The Web
The number of stop-and-frisks by NYPD have
exploded over the past decade, increasing from less than 100,000 in 2002 to
581,000 in 2009. The NYPD's own numbers show that 90% of the people stopped are
non-white and that 85% of those stopped are not charged with any crime. Despite
their innocence, police enter personal information about all of those stopped
into their police database system.... But there's another destructive
consequence of the stop-and-frisk policy that has not received enough
attention: it has made
The struggle to end
While it is clear that drug use doesn't
discriminate and the majority of us are using one drug or another, the reality
is that the war on drug users does discriminate. More than 1.8 million people
are arrested every year on nonviolent drug charges. In
NYC Magazine (website), "NYC Wastes
Tens of Millions on Pot Arrests, 12% of All Arrests Are Marijuana Charges"
By Igor Derysh on December 25th, 2009. For all the talk about crime statistics in New York
City, the irony of all ironies is that the taxpayer is charged tens of millions
of dollars every year so that cops can arrest people for pot
It's no
shocker that the vast majority of marijuana arrests in NYC ensnare blacks and
Latinos. But what's really incredible is how high the number of pot
arrests have risen during Mayor Bloomberg's first two terms.
The NYPD stop-and-frisk program has made New York City
the marijuana arrest capital of the country.
Actor Matt Damon supports Mayor Michael Bloomberg's
bid for re-election. But what may not be clear to Matt Damon, an admitted
marijuana user, is that despite the mayor's "moderate" and
"independent" reputation Bloomberg is a full-fledged drug warrior.
New
York Times (website), "Drug Science, 1937-2009" by John Tierney, Sept 18, 2009
New York
Magazine’s article on marijuana includes an interesting
bit of scientific history. After noting that Mayor Bloomberg has presided over
more marijuana arrests than any mayor anywhere, Mark Jacobson writes...
New York Daily News (website),
"Stop The War On Pot Users" by
Tony Newman, Aug 24, 2009
What do President Obama, Mayor Bloomberg and
California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger have in common? They are all elected
officials who have admitted to smoking marijuana.
In 1993, there were only 900 arrests for possession of
small amounts of marijuana, while 40,000 people were arrested in 2008 – mostly
young Black and Latino men.
Alternet (website) "The Epidemic of
Pot Arrests in New York City" by
Harry G. Levine, Aug 10, 2009
Marijuana
possession is legally decriminalized in
TV, Video and Radio Coverage
RNN-TV did a 15 minute segment devoted to the
marijuana arrests in NY City and it is in three parts on you tube. Includes interviews with public defenders
from the
Marijuana
and The Law Part 1 Marijuana
and The Law Part 2 Marijuana
and The Law Part 3
NYCLU 5 minute video of press conference about the
epidemic of marijuana arrests in New York City including black police, public
defenders, nyclu staff. New York City's Marijuana
Arrest Crusade
Latino USA (NPR)
5 minute radio
interview on NPR show about drug wars in Mexico, marijuana prohibition, and
marijuana possession arrests of black and Latino youth (excellent) Latino
USA with Maria Hinojosa
Other Media
Coverage of Marijuana Arrests
Alternet. I'm Not
Pro-Drugs, I'm Pro-Life and Pro-Choice, by Tony Newman, July 20, 2010 - new
I am in favor
of sensible regulation rather than prohibition because I am pro-life. I want to
end drug prohibition because I want to keep people from getting HIV by allowing
them access to clean syringes. I want to end the prohibition of drugs because I
want to reduce people dying from drug overdoses. I am pro-regulation because it
saddens me to read about 20,000 Mexicans being killed over the last three years
because of drug prohibition. I want people who have drug problems to get
treatment and help and not be locked up in a cage for 10 years - that does
nothing to help them and makes their children's and loved ones lives more
miserable.
The war on drugs will be on the ballot in
First person account by a young man, currently serving
in
Pot is indeed flourishing in the mainstream as never
before, but the sometimes giddy discussion overlooks a sinister parallel
phenomenon: More people are being arrested for pot crimes than ever; they are increasingly
young and disproportionately nonwhite.
LATimes Online, "The Racism of
Marijuana Prohibition" by Stephen Gutwillig, Sept 7, 2009
Enforcement of marijuana laws
disproportionately affects young African Americans -- even though their usage
rates are lower than whites.
Reason Magazine Hit and Run
(website) "Drug Arrests Headed Down?"
By Jacob Sullum, Sept 14, 2009
Marijuana accounted
for about half of all drug arrests, and nine out of 10 pot arrests were for
simple possession, as opposed to cultivation or sale.
It's not
just that Michael Phelps did what millions of other twenty-somethings do; it's
that he did what over one hundred million Americans have done at least once in
their lives, including the president, former presidents, members of the U.S.
Congress and Supreme Court, and a significant proportion of the country's most
distinguished businessmen, scholars, artists, entertainers and leaders.
By age 25, 54 percent of the population has admittedly
used marijuana. Does anyone still believe that marijuana prohibition is working
— or that all of these people deserve to be behind bars?
Media
Coverage of Marijuana Arrest Crusade, May 2008
NY Times, Newsday, NY Daily News, Reason, and many others write about
____________