We could pull them over if we smelled it or saw the violation.
Rob Rosado, the chief of police in Meriden, says that his officers are constantly smelling marijuana all over the city.
“ You drive down the road and you can smell that odor,” he told members of the state legislature’s Judiciary Committee in a public hearing on Monday.
Rosado said, as the president of Connecticut Police Chiefs Association he often witnesses people driving while they are consuming cannabis. He said that there are violations occurring all over the city of Meriden. However, this could apply to anywhere in Connecticut.
Police chiefs have asked lawmakers to pass legislation allowing law enforcement to stop people who are driving while consuming marijuana. This bill also calls for the study of a blood-THC limit for drivers.
No matter that it is illegal to drive under the influences of marijuana, the current law states police officers cannot stop a car solely because the driver has used the drug.
This proposed law would allow police to stop someone if they smell the “burnt aroma” of cannabis or see them using it. A police officer could also search the vehicle of a driver who was using cannabis.
Rep. Greg Howard said (R-Stonington), police can search cars if they observe someone drinking and trying to conceal their container. Howard, who echoed the testimony of police chiefs, said that HB 7258 would use a similar standard for cannabis.
Some members questioned if the proposed legislation was sufficiently strong.
Michael Quinn, a D-Meriden representative said: “I believe that it is a step in the right directions but it doesn’t go far enough to make the observation necessary.”
Rep. Steven Stafstrom said the bill wasn’t necessary. He claimed that officers have several reasons to pull over people.
“I think this notion that a car can’t be stopped when a cop quote-unquote knows someone is smoking cannabis—I don’t buy it,” Stafstrom said. Stafstrom said, “I believe there are other possible reasons for a police officer to pull over a vehicle.”
Rosado, however, argued that his aim was to pull over drivers as soon as possible before anything goes wrong. Why wait until there is a traffic violation, when you can pull them over instantly when they are doing it and smelling it? He said.
Connecticut House Republicans have submitted written comments in support of this bill. They called it “commonsense” and “a positive step.”
The smell of cannabis is not something that should be ignored by officers, whereas the smell or alcohol can provide a basis to stop a vehicle and search it. It strains credulity to discern a reason that these two substances—which both are intoxicating and illegal to consume while operating a car—should be treated differently,” they said.
The committee heard from several witnesses that detecting marijuana is more difficult than alcohol, because people process THC differently and are affected by it in different ways.
Rosado also said there are very few drug recognition experts—police officers trained in determining whether drivers are under the influence of drugs—throughout the state of Connecticut. It limits police efforts in identifying impaired drivers.
This bill also requires the Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection of the state to investigate setting a maximum amount of THC that a driver may have in his bloodstream. Five states—Ohio, Illinois, Montana, Washington and Nevada—have established such limits.
The overwhelming majority of those who oppose the bill are against driving under the influence. They also emphasized that the current methods of detecting cannabis use are inaccurate.
John R. DelBarba said that the current drug test doesn’t show if someone is “impaired by marijuana” in written testimony. In written testimony, John R. DelBarba and other experts noted that cannabis can stay in your blood for up to 48-hours after you use it. And that users who are regular may have high levels in their blood.
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DelBarba questioned also whether the smell marijuana would be enough to prove “probable causes” to stop the vehicle.
Josiah Schlee is a member and advocate of CT CannaWarriors. He said that he once was stopped by experts in drug detection on the way back from a concert he worked as a professional photographer. The photographer said that although he did not have any cannabis in his vehicle and was “stone cold sober”, the odor from marijuana permeated the concert.
Schlee claimed he took a test of sobriety, but failed it due to a problem with his eyesight. The next year, he spent fighting the charges at court. This made it difficult for him to get a job.
The man said that he had spent more than 13 months at court fighting the charges.
Some people who oppose the bill said it was a return to the old “drug battles” that disproportionately affected minorities.
“[This bill] Christina Capitan said that she did not believe it would make the roads any safer. It makes it much easier to penalize cannabis users for using an illegal substance, particularly those already heavily policed.
Her and other advocates proposed instead that the state spend money on safe consumption places, ridesharing programs, and education of the public about marijuana.
Duncan Markovich is the owner of Better Ways, a cannabis shop. He said that the infrastructure in Connecticut around experts who recognize drugs needs to be strengthened, and the science needs to keep up. Please always consider education before enforcement when crafting these sensible cannabis laws.
This article first appeared on CT Mirror and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
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Photograph by M. A. N. U. E. L.
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