City, county set to decriminalize pot
Officials say new policy for low-level possession cases will save taxpayers’ money, law enforcement’s time
Houston and Harris County are poised to decriminalize low-level possession of marijuana in a sweeping move that puts the area at the forefront of efforts in Texas to halt minor drug arrests that clog jails and courts.
District Attorney Kim Ogg is set to announce the policy Thursday with Mayor Sylvester Turner, Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo and Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez.
The policy, which begins March 1, means that misdemeanor offenders with less than 4 ounces of marijuana will not be arrested, ticketed or required to appear in court if they agree to take a four-hour drug education class, officials said.
“You do not get charged with anything,” Assistant District Attorney David Mitcham, who heads the DA’s trial bureau, said Wednesday. “You have a pathway where you can avoid going to court.”
The move would save Harris County more than $10 million yearly by diverting an estimated 12,000 people from the criminal justice system and would save officers hours of processing time now spent on low-level cases, officials said.
Since there is no arrest, there is no arrest record. Since there is no court date, there are no court documents connected to the encounter. The plan calls for officers to seize the marijuana and drop it off at a police station at the end of their shift, along with a record of the encounter in case the suspect does not take the class.
Every Harris County law enforcement agency would be affected, since they rely on the district attorney’s office to prosecute their cases.
Ogg, a Democrat who beat incumbent Republican District Attorney Devon
Anderson in the November general election, campaigned as a reform candidate who pledged to reduce arrests for low-level drug offenses.
Reaction to the proposal was immediate, coming even before details of the program were unveiled. Montgomery County District Attorney Brett Ligon sharply criticized the plan, saying Ogg was trying to legalize marijuana.
“Unlike Harris County, Montgomery County will not become a sanctuary for dope smokers,” Ligon said in a news release. “I swore an oath to follow the law — all the laws, as written by the Texas Legislature. I don’t get to pick and choose which laws I enforce.”
Given wide latitude
At the sheriff’s office, the policy will save up to 12 hours of processing time per month for as many as 1,000 suspects, a move that will ease the workload on administrators and jailers who transfer and process inmates, officials said.
“We’re really encouraged by these swift actions by the district attorney,” said sheriff’s spokesman Ryan Sullivan. “And we are looking forward to working with Harris County’s criminal justice leadership identifying common-sense solutions to our broken criminal justice system.”
Sullivan said the move would likely not affect the jail population significantly, since most misdemeanor marijuana offenders move quickly in and out of jail. On Wednesday, just 12 people were jailed on misdemeanor marijuana offenses and unable to make bail, he said.
Elected district attorneys are given wide latitude in their discretion about how to enforce laws in their jurisdictions. Diversion programs, such as drug courts, have been widely used across Texas, and Austin has launched a “cite and release” program in which low-level drug offenders are given tickets and required to appear in court.
Under the local program, police would identify a suspect to make sure they do not have warrants or other legal issues, then would offer them the option of taking the drug education class. If the suspect takes the class, the drugs are destroyed and the agreement is filed away.
A suspect would be able to take the class over and over again regardless of past criminal history, officials said.
The new program will keep police on the streets longer each day and reduce costs for lab testing of the drugs, Mitcham said.
If the suspect does not take the class, the contraband will be tested, and prosecutors will file charges and issue an arrest warrant. Offenders could then face up to one year in jail if convicted of the Class A misdemeanor.
In the past, police union officials have supported marijuana diversion programs as long as officers are allowed to drop evidence at police stations, instead of having to take it downtown.
‘Movers and shakers’
Shortly after taking HPD’s top post in December, Acevedo — who previously was chief in Austin — voiced similar sentiments about low-level drug cases, saying police should go after drug dealers rather than users. He could not be reached for comment Wednesday.
“For those that are involved in the violence of the drug trade, that’s who I want to focus on,” he said in December. “I want to focus on the people that are the big movers and shakers that are poisoning young people.”
Mitcham, who is one of Ogg’s top lieutenants, agreed.
“We don’t want people to go through an arrest, and all that entails, over simple possession of marijuana,” he said. “We don’t want the cops spending the hours it takes to book somebody into jail while the burglars conduct their business because there’s no cop on the beat.”
Ogg, who lost the 2014 election for DA before unseating Anderson last year, has long campaigned on a diversion initiative.
Part of Ogg’s platform was adopted by Anderson, who created a diversion program in 2014. Under Anderson’s plan, only first offenders were eligible to take the diversion program and could take it only once.
Under that plan, they were arrested, jailed, had to arrange bail and come to court to apply for a yearlong probation.