Decriminalization and Depenalization of Marijuana Possession: A Case Study of Enforcement Outcomes in Prince George’s County

In recent years in Maryland, two significant legal reforms were enacted which successively depenalized and decriminalized low-level marijuana possession.  This case study examines the impact of these legal changes on the type and levels of enforcement activity – including arrests and criminal citations — in the state’s second largest jurisdiction.  The goal of marijuana possession-related legal reforms is to eliminate or reduce associated sanctions for behavior increasingly viewed by the public and policymakers as less serious, and thus addressing it through the criminal justice system, a misallocation of resources.  However, little attention has been paid to how resources – especially law enforcement attention – are allocated after such reforms.  This study describes two types of displacement that occurred in Prince George’s County, MD, subsequent to legal reform.  The first result is that possession arrests are not completely replaced by citations, especially when it is unknown how many previous arrests were eligible for citations.  Furthermore, total marijuana possession enforcement increases after the reform, as the availability of the criminal citation as an enforcement tool appears to produce enforcement net-widening.  The second result is that overall levels of misdemeanor arrests – of which marijuana possession is top-ranked – do not decline, as police discretion and unchanged expectations of enforcement activity result in different misdemeanor arrests replacing marijuana arrests.  These potential unintended consequences of reform are discussed in terms of their impact on enforcement outcomes, and more fully assessing the relative success of such reform efforts.