The War on Marijuana: The Transformation of the War on Drugs in the 1990s

Ryan S. King and Marc Mauer, "The War on Marijuana: The Transformation of the War on Drugs in the 1990s," Harm Reduction Journal 3 (February 9, 2006) published online, http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/tocrender.fcgi?iid=127423.

Two analysts from The Sentencing Project analyzed data on drug arrest from 1990 to 2002. During this period, U.S. marijuana arrests skyrocketed, making minor marijuana offenses the main focus in the "war on drugs." The majority of the rapid increases in marijuana arrests have been for possession, while serious trafficking arrests have barely budged. As a result, courts are bogged down with arrests that often are thrown out or sent for probation, as well as sending a sizable number of first-time possession offenders to jail sentences as long or longer than trafficking sentences.

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