[joebuck]

I'm not sure what these statistics really mean. Although pot posession busts are up I seriously doubt that investigations for pot posession are up. I practiced criminal law during the first 15 of my career and I don't think I ever saw a police investigation of a mere posession charge. 98% of all Pot posession busts were cases where the defendant was being busted for something else (DUI, trespass, disorderlly conduct or more serious charges) and the cops happened to find some pot on the guy. Or the cops were investigaing a complaint (ie. noise, fighting, etc.) and the cop turns up some pot while investigating the original complaint. I don't believe cops devote any real resourses to investigating cases of possible marijuana posession. If anything, more posession busts probably means more people are smoking the stuff or fewer cops are looking the other way when some pot does turn up during an investigation or bust.

[TKDietz]

I do nothing but criminal defense and I see a lot of marijuana cases coming to court where there are no other charges filed. I don't know that police are out really "investigating" these cases, but some of them are making a real effort to bust people for pot. I'm in a small town where police have a good idea who uses drugs and they pull people over and shake them down for drugs a lot. They'll have some bogus excuse like a cracked windshield or a license plate light out or some minor traffic infraction of some sort. When they make the stop, they'll question these people about drugs, ask for consent to search which is often granted, or they'll do "weapons patdowns" where they are really searching for drugs. The judges here never suppress evidence on cases like these, so all of these charges stick.