Posted by Michael Earl Patton

Photo courtesy of here.

The Vera Institute released a preliminary analysis today of the 2006 jail data.  The full report will be in January.

There’s lot of stuff in the analysis, but I thought I would say a few words about the city’s marijuana ordinance since that is a controversial issue and hard data on incarcerations have been difficult to find.

According to the analysis, there were 1,262 instances where people were arrested and jailed because of the city’s marijuana ordinance.  This is defined as being the most serious charge if there were multiple charges involved.  So if one is arrested for robbery and marijuana possession, the possession charge is not included in the above number.

Possession of marijuna made up 3.6% of the total admissions to the jail for 2006 even though the law was not in effect for the first few months.  The average length of stay was 1.63 days, for a total of about 2,057 jail bed days.  This is about 0.3% of the total jail bed days used.

Even though the city’s law was not in effect the first few months it was still the 5th most common reason for sending someone to jail.  If the law had been in effect for the full year it probably would have been the 3rd most common reason for sending someone to jail, which is all the more remarkable since the law only pertains to less than half of Hamilton County.

The city’s marijuana ordinance is therefore a major contributor to the numbers of people sent to jail but, due to the low average number of days incarcerated, is not a major contributor to “overcrowding” as defined as jail bed capacity.  In the area of intake capacity, though, it is clearly a major contributor.  And there is the question of basic fairness of a law that tags thousands with a criminal drug conviction, yet is considered so minor that the average time served is less than 2 days. 

Thank you for reading (and printing from) The Cincinnati Beacon.