Indopedia All Things Marijuana
Attorney General Jeff Sessions directs prosecutors to seek toughest drug charges, harshest practices of the drug war. How will cannabis industry professionals respond to Jeff Sessions memo?
In a two-page memo sent to more than 5,000 assistant U.S. attorneys across the country and all assistant AGs in Washington, the policy orders prosecutors to “charge and pursue the most serious, readily provable offense.”
The tough approach had fallen out of favor in recent years with a bipartisan movement to undo the damaging effects of mass incarceration. The new measures are expected to lead to more federal prosecutions and an increase in the federal prison population. The sweeping criminal charging policy overturns a 2013 memo issued under former attorney general Eric H. Holder Jr., who instructed his prosecutors to avoid charging certain defendants with drug offenses that would trigger long mandatory minimum sentences.
The growing and fledgling cannabis industry in the U.S. will definitely need to band together perhaps now more than ever in order for us to not lose any of the ground we gained prior to this administration.
Priscilla Vilchis is an Los Angeles-based…
