{"id":163,"date":"2021-07-31T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-07-31T07:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/CBMiqwFodHRwczovL3d3dy5qb3VybmFsaW5xdWlyZXIuY29tL2NyaW1lX2FuZF9jb3VydHMvcG9saWNlLWNvbnRpbnVlLXRvLWdyYXBwbGUtd2l0aC1jb25uZWN0aWN1dHMtbmV3LXBvdC1sYXctYW5kLWVuZm9yY2VtZW50L2FydGljbGVfNTAwMGFiZTgtZjE0MS0xMWViLWI3OTYtMDc2Y2Y4MDFmMWY4Lmh0bWzSAQA"},"modified":"2021-07-31T07:00:00","modified_gmt":"2021-07-31T07:00:00","slug":"police-continue-to-grapple-with-connecticuts-new-pot-law-and-enforcement-journal-inquirer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thcinct.com\/?p=163","title":{"rendered":"Police continue to grapple with Connecticut’s new pot law and enforcement – Journal Inquirer"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Although recreational marijuana became legal for adults effective July 1, police departments still are grappling with the new law and how to police the drug.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Under the law, people age 21 and up can legally have up to 1.5 ounces on their person. They also can possess up to 5 ounces in their car, but it must be kept in a locked glove box or trunk.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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While simple possession is no longer illegal, police still have concerns about marijuana.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Sgt. Derek Leab of the East Windsor Police Department said he believes the state will see an increase in drivers operating under the influence, but that can be difficult to determine with marijuana.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cMarijuana is one of those drugs where it\u2019s a status thing to carry around, whereas other drugs people will get it and use it right away because it\u2019s so addictive,\u201d Leab said. \u201cMarijuana, though, the younger crowds tend to carry it around. So, sometimes the car will smell but that doesn\u2019t mean they\u2019re actively smoking it or the driver is impaired, it just means it might be on their person.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Coventry Police Chief Mark Palmer said it can be difficult to determine if a driver is under the influence of marijuana because there isn\u2019t an easily measurable standard, unlike with alcohol.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cUnder the law, an operator who has a blood alcohol content of .08 or greater is considered to be driving under the influence. There is no comparable test for marijuana to say that this amount of marijuana in somebody\u2019s system \u2014 based on the results of a urine or blood test \u2014 indicates that a person is impaired or not.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cI think that is a real drawback in the law. There is no standard, there is no chemical standard, there is no scientific standard that I\u2019m aware of,\u201d Palmer said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Officers still can use standard sobriety tests, such as asking a person to follow a moving pen with their eyes, touch their finger to their nose, and walk a straight line and turn.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Need for training<\/strong><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n
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Many police officials believe the state will see an increase in drug recognition experts \u2014 or DREs \u2014 to address the issue of assessing whether drivers are under the influence from marijuana.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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A DRE is an officer who receives training on the detection of impaired drivers involving alcohol or drugs, Officer Pete Nisyrios, a certified DRE from the Enfield Police Department, said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The state has between 50 and 60 drug recognition experts, he added.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Enfield Police Chief Alaric Fox said the prerequisites to become a certified DRE are substantial, and it can take roughly a month or more to become certified.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThe prerequisite is a program called ARIDE, and that\u2019s a two-day training class and that\u2019s kind of like the foundation of a house, if you will. After ARIDE, then there\u2019s the DRE program. There\u2019s an academic training portion of it that is 72 to 80 hours of classroom time,\u201d Fox said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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ARIDE stands for Advanced Roadside Impaired Driving Enforcement.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cSo, effectively you\u2019re talking about two weeks. During those two weeks there are three written exams, there is a standardized field sobriety test proficiency exam, and then there are five written quizzes.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Fox continued, \u201cAfter the academics, there\u2019s then the certification phase, which requires one week of travel, which traditionally gets done out of state in Arizona where DRE is centered. And then one week of hands-on training \u2026 with an eventual final exam.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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State Sen. Daniel Champagne, R-Vernon, who served as police officer in Vernon for 22 years, said one of the reasons he opposed the legislation legalizing recreational marijuana was the lack of existing certified DREs in the state.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cOne of the questions I asked was, \u2018why are we legalizing this before we get enough officers in the state that can truly get the training needed to identify this problem?\u2019 Because we know everywhere it\u2019s been legalized that fatalities on roads increase a certain percentage,\u201d Champagne said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Brian Foley, spokesman for the state Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection, said every police department in every state wishes they had more DREs.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThat\u2019s not anything new to Connecticut,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Leab said it can often be difficult to find officers who are willing and motivated to become a DRE.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cIt\u2019s not easy,\u201d he said. \u201cYou have to have someone who has a passion about drugs and impaired driving and things of that nature.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Not a reason to search<\/strong><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n
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Another issue for police is that they\u2019re no longer able to use marijuana as a reason for a search that could lead to uncovering other criminal behavior that could be more significant than the possession of cannabis.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cWhen we had an encounter with someone at a traffic stop, if we pull over a car and the car smelled like marijuana, we\u2019re typically looking for other criminality that\u2019s going on,\u201d Leab said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Leab mentioned a routine traffic stop that occurred not long before the bill was signed into law in which a convicted felon was in possession of a gun.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Leab said police were able to search the car after they smelled the odor of marijuana.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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However, Leab said police are no longer able to use marijuana as a justification to search a vehicle with the new law in place.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cIt\u2019s like cigarette smoke now,\u201d he said. \u201cI think that tool of using marijuana to find other felonies or dangers to the community is probably over now.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Foley said departments will have to evolve.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cIt\u2019s definitely a loss of a tool that will take some adjusting, but the bottom line is police definitely have many, many tools in their toolbox, and they\u2019ll have to find other ways to develop probable cause,\u201d Foley said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Foley, who served as a police officer in Hartford for 24 years, said he never felt like he was doing justice when arresting someone for marijuana related charges.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cIt darn near made their lives worse,\u201d Foley said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Palmer, the Coventry chief, said he believes the state, as well as police departments, is trying to figure out every aspect of the legislation.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cI\u2019ve seen law enforcement training material, I\u2019ve seen media coverage trying to explain the nuances of this very complex bill, so I think we\u2019re all learning this together,\u201d Palmer said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Although recreational marijuana became legal for adults effective July 1, police departments still are grappling with the new law and how to police the drug. Under the law, people age 21 and up can legally have up to 1.5 ounces on their person. They also can possess up to 5 ounces in their car, but it must be kept in a locked glove box or trunk. While simple possession is no longer illegal, police still have concerns about marijuana. Sgt. Derek Leab of the East Windsor Police Department said he believes the state will see an increase in drivers operating… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-featured"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thcinct.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thcinct.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thcinct.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thcinct.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thcinct.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=163"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thcinct.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thcinct.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thcinct.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thcinct.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}