A report commissioned by the National Association of Drug
Court Professionals
puts it nicely:
When a closer look at the data is undertaken, a different picture -- something other than "crime is down" -- appears to emerge. ...
[L]egalization proponents should not infer causality regarding the downward trend observable when isolating just the UCR's Part I crime index.
When I asked the president of the Colorado Drug Investigators Association, Ernie Martinez, about these statistics, he urged me to look at the crimes that have been happening in connection to marijuana -- even after legalization:
Across the Front Range, we are experiencing more and more butane explosions due to hash extraction methods, calls for service on strong smells, and calls to ER's on adverse effects after either ingestion or smoked use. Black-
marketcontinues to exist unabated, availability of black market marijuana is ever present and cheaper than legalized MJ. Medical marijuana registrants continue to rise due to many factors such as more quantity allowed and more plants allowed, all due to Physician recommendations.
So if crime is up, can we blame legal pot? We do not know whether legalization has anything to do with it. But we do know that reputable news organizations should stop relying on the Big Marijuana lobby for statistics. They wouldn't blindly trust coal-industry statistics on the environmental effects of strip mining, and they should bring similar skepticism to propaganda claims disseminated by this new industry.