New data released by the FBI’s Uniform Crime Report (UCR) has found that the number of drug abuse violations in 2016 were up from a year earlier.
There were more than 1.5 million people arrested which was almost 100,000 more than 2015.
According to Forbes reporter Tom Angell who requested the data, marijuana arrests made up 41% of the 1.5 million that were arrested last year.
According to Angell, this averages to about one arrest for marijuana every 48 seconds.
Morgan Fox, spokeswoman for the Marijuana Policy Project, commented, “Arresting and citing nearly half a million people a year for a substance that is objectively safer than alcohol is a travesty. This is a shameful waste of resources and can create lifelong consequences for the people arrested.”
She said users of marijuana “continue to be treated like criminals throughout the country.”
She remarked, “It is time for the federal government and the rest of the states to stop ruining peoples’ lives and enact sensible marijuana policies.”
