This long-awaited proposal is comprehensive and includes many of the criminal justice reforms provided in the Marijuana Opportunity, Reinvestment, and Expungement (MORE) Act, which passed the House of Representatives last December, and provides ample deference to the laws already in place in the majority of states that have already legalized marijuana for either medical or adult use.
These are the first of up to 360,000 cases and convictions that are eligible for vacation, dismissal and automatic expungement.
The analysis reported, “Between April 2017 and April 2021, property values rose $17,113 more in states where recreational marijuana is legal, compared to states where marijuana is illegal or limited to medicinal use.”
The lawsuit, which was filed by a 19-year-old patient who uses cannabis for the treatment of severe epilepsy, argues that the proposed changes will unduly restrict medical cannabis access among patients and will discourage physicians from participating in the program
“Our results suggest that young adults who lived in an area with a greater density of any type of outlet were not significantly more likely to report stronger intentions to use cannabis, e-cigarettes, or cannabis mixed with tobacco/nicotine in the future.”
Just over 1,000 people were sentenced federally in 2020 for violating marijuana trafficking laws. That’s down 67 percent since 2016, and over 80 percent since 2012 – when Colorado and Washington became the first two states to legalize and regulate the adult-use marijuana market.
We have many new freedoms to celebrate this year, but we also face new challenges.
Athlete Sha’Carri Richardson has been suspended and barred from running in the Olympic Games in Tokyo after testing positive for marijuana.