While marijuana has recently been decriminalized in Washington, DC and Philadelphia, New York continues to arrest people for pot in record numbers - this despite the election of Mayor Bill de Blasio, who promised to end the controversial policy.
It hasn't been the case, as the latest numbers compiled by the Marijuana Arrest Research Project and the DPA clearly show.
Here are the marijuana arrest totals for the first eight months of 2014 and 2013:
2014 - 19,207 (2,401 per month); 28,810 (estimated total for 2014)
2013 - 20,557 (2,570 per month); 28,664 (total for 2013)
These numbers reflect a 9%-decline in the total number of arrests from 2013 to 2014.
"Most of the NYPD's marijuana possession arrests have been made when police found marijuana during a search or when police officers ordered people to empty their pockets," the report written by Harry Levine and Loren Siegal states. "NYPD is on track to make 28,000 to 30,000 of these arrests and jailings in 2014.
'New York City continues to make more marijuana possession arrests than any city in the world.'
During his campaign, deBlasio opposed the stop-and-frisk policy that leads to the vast majority of pot arrests. "I would instruct the NYPD (to) stop arresting people for displays of small amounts," he maintained. "It doesn't make us safer." De Blasio added on his website, "Low-level marijuana possession arrests have disastrous consequences for individuals and their families."
This has yet to change significantly in de Blasio's first year in office.
