Finn Selander, AZ I See It
Former DEA agent: After a career of taking weed off the streets, I now know our efforts could have been better spent.
I was a warrior in the war on drugs.
I spent 20 years fighting the flow of drugs into America, including 18 years as a DEA special agent. As a special agent, I helped spearhead the Drug Enforcement Administration’s marijuana efforts in Florida and New Mexico before retiring.
I spent a lifetime’s work in law enforcement, mostly centered on stanching the flow drugs into America, and have come to one conclusion: I don’t believe marijuana should be illegal.
Yes, despite a career spent trying to take marijuana off our streets – targeting low-level drug dealers, mom-and-pop grow operations, mega-growers and foreign drug traffickers – I realize our tax dollars and law enforcement resources could have been better spent.
While I believe I did a good job during my time in the DEA, I have come to the conclusion the war on marijuana has been a wasted effort and should end. In Arizona, we have a chance in November to do just that.
Why prohibition doesn't work
I can speak freely only now because I am retired. I worked with many colleagues who have similar views but must keep quiet for fear of retribution.
Prohibition of marijuana just hasn’t worked to reduce its use. Marijuana is readily available to anyone who wants it, easy to produce and used typically in the privacy of a home. But here's another important reason to legal the drug: We get to control and regulate the growth and purchase of marijuana from reputable dispensaries, and take it out of the hands of the otherwise unstoppable drug cartels.
Legal marijuana: Pros and cons
We're outgunned against the cartels
We often faced off against heavily armed traffickers sporting Tech-9s and various assault weapons. They had better equipment, state-of-the-art surveillance abilities and a long supply of young men willing to live a gangster lifestyle.The DEA estimates that about half of the profit for the cartels comes from marijuana. And they plow those profits back into creating a better cartel to sell their products.
No law-enforcement member wants to waste time investigating and then busting low-level marijuana users. Instead, our resources should be used to prevent or solve real crime. Just two-thirds of murders are solved, down significantly since 1960 when the clearance rate was about 90 percent. Instead of targeting potheads, we need to focus our resources on violent crimes that cause actual pain and suffering.
A few years ago I decided it was time to leave the DEA. After targeting low-level offenders for petty marijuana violations, it no longer seemed a job worth doing.
I support the effort underway to allow adults to legally use marijuana. In part this is because marijuana is safer than alcohol and it doesn’t make sense to punish people who use it. But more importantly, I support regulating the production and sale of marijuana so that we can deliver a serious blow to the powerful cartels that cause so much crime and violence in Arizona.
Finn Selander is a retired DEA agent in New Mexico and Florida who now lives in Phoenix. He is a member of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, a nationwide organization of more than 150,000 former law enforcement offices, criminal justice professionals and supporters working to end the drug war.
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