Marijuana Arrests Hit a Two-Decade Low but Are Still an Outrage
The number of pot busts is down 26 percent since 2007 but is still more than twice the 1991 total.
New FBI numbers show there were fewer marijuana arrests last year than at any point since 1996. But as I explain in my latest Forbes column, we still have not recovered from a cannabis crackdown that began in the early 1990s:
FBI statistics released this week show that the number of marijuana arrests in the United States, after rising slightly in 2014, fell by 8 percent last year, reaching the lowest level in two decades. The total was nevertheless more than twice the number in 1991, before a nationwide cannabis crackdown that peaked in 2007. The number of marijuana arrests has fallen more or less steadily since then, reflecting a growing consensus that cannabis consumers should not be treated as criminals.