If States Legalize, Expungement Is Next Hurdle: Cannabis Weekly
- Arizona, New Jersey among states voting on cannabis Nov. 3
- Releasing prisoners whose crimes no longer illegal takes time
Cannabis legalization is on the ballot in five states this Tuesday, and polling shows it’s likely to pass in most of them by a clear majority. What’s less clear is what happens to all the prisoners already incarcerated for possessing something that’s now legal.
It’s an increasingly accepted view that you can’t have people serving time in jail for something that companies are freely profiting from. Especially when the prisoners are mostly Black, and the companies are primarily run by White executives. Black people are arrested for marijuana possession at 3.7 times the rate of White people, according to the American Civil Liberties Union. And it’s even higher in some of the states voting on legalization this coming Tuesday: In Montana, it’s 9.6 times; in South Dakota, it’s 5 times.