Crime & Safety

Study Finds No Link Between Crime And Pot Dispensaries

The study on which the RAND report is based claims that crime was as much as 60 percent greater around medical marijuana dispensaries that had been shut down by the City of Los Angeles compared to those areas with open dispensaries.

Concern about medical marijuana facilities opening up shop in and around Lake Elsinore and Wildomar have been the subject of debate in recent years. While both cities currently ban pot operations, a new report out from the RAND Corporation urges that arguments linking crime and medical marijuana facilities are ill founded.

The study on which the RAND report is based claims that crime was as much as 60 percent greater around medical marijuana dispensaries that had been shut down by the City of Los Angeles compared to those areas with open dispensaries.

"[W]e found no evidence that medical marijuana dispensaries in general cause crime to rise," said Mireille Jacobson, the study’s lead author and a senior economist at RAND.

Find out what's happening in Lake Elsinore-Wildomarwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

The RAND study examined crime reports for the 10 days prior to and the 10 days following June 7, 2010, when the city of Los Angeles ordered more than 70 percent of the city’s 638 medical marijuana dispensaries to close. Researchers analyzed crime reports within a few blocks around dispensaries that closed and compared that to crime reports for neighborhoods where dispensaries remained open. In total, RAND said that researchers examined 21 days of crime reports for 600 dispensaries in Los Angeles County -- 170 dispensaries remained open while 430 were ordered to close.

RAND calls its study "the first systematic analysis of the link between medical marijuana dispensaries and crime."

Find out what's happening in Lake Elsinore-Wildomarwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Americans for Safe Access, an organization that lobbies on behalf of medical marijuana advocates, is hailing the study and points to previous comments made by Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck.

According to ASA, Beck conducted his own study in 2010 comparing the levels of crime at the city's banks with its medical marijuana dispensaries.

“Chief Beck found that 71 robberies had occurred at the more than 350 banks in the city, compared to 47 robberies at the more than 500 medical marijuana facilities. At the time, Beck observed that, ‘banks are more likely to get robbed than medical marijuana dispensaries,’ and the claim that dispensaries attract crime ‘doesn't really bear out,’” according to a Sept. 20 ASA news release lauding the RAND study.

ASA also pointed out in its news release that the study provides evidence that regulation, not prohibition, is key to keeping illegal drugs off the streets.

Under California's Compassionate Use Act of 1996 and the subsequent Medical Marijuana Program Act that became law on Jan.1, 2004, qualified patients and their primary caregivers are permitted "to use, possess and cultivate marijuana for medical purposes without criminal prosecution” in the state.

"Dispensary regulations bring greater oversight and less crime to local communities," said Steph Sherer, ASA executive director. “We’re hopeful that an objective study like RAND's will help dispel the fear that our opposition is spreading across California and compel more local governments to adopt sensible regulations."

Further information:
RAND Study of Medical Marijuana Dispensaries and Crime:

http://www.rand.org/pubs/technical_reports/TR987.html

ASA Report on Dispensary Regulations:

http://AmericansForSafeAccess.org/downloads/dispensaries.pdf


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