U.S. Attorney in Colorado may shut down pot shops. Here’s why.

U.S. Attorney Bob Troyer

Writing in the Denver Post, U.S. Attorney in Colorado, Bob Troyer, says you may see his counterparts begin to criminally prosecute licensed marijuana businesses and their investors. Colorado legalized marijuana in 2012 but has not gotten what proponents promised. Here’s what it’s gotten instead:

Youth

  • Youth marijuana use is 85 percent higher than the national average.
  • The industry targets kids by selling marijuana consumption devices to avoid detection like vape pens that look like high-lighters and eye-liner.
  • Marketers advertise super high potency gummi candies to youth whose developing brains make them more vulnerable to addiction. The vast amount of industry profits come from heavy and addicted users.

Marijuana-Related Traffic Fatalities

  • Marijuana-related traffic fatalities are up 151 percent.

Environmental Damage

  • An indoor marijuana grow consumes 17 times more power than an average residence.
  • Each marijuana plant consumes 2.2 liters of water—per day.

Contaminated Products

  • Colorado has issued more than 40 recalls of plants laced with pesticides and mold.

Burgeoning Black Market

  • Rather than being eliminated, the state’s black market has exploded. Colorado has become a source state for international drug trafficking and money laundering operations from Cuba, China, Mexico, and elsewhere.
  • Last year, the regulated industry produced 6.4 metric tons of unaccounted-for marijuana. More than 80,000 black-market plants were found on Colorado’s federal lands.

Read U.S. Attorney Troyer’s op-ed here.

Colorado legalized marijuana commercialization for medical use in 2009 followed by recreational use three years later. Like Colorado, the other seven states that fully legalized marijuana commercialized the drug for medical use first.

If you don’t want your state to become Colorado 2.0, make sure your state senator and state representative hear from you. Now, they are hearing exclusively from the marijuana industry, which is contributing to their campaigns.

If you live in Colorado or one of the seven other states with full legalization, ask your legislators to modify or repeal legalization.

If you live in a state that allows medical use of the drug, ask your legislators to prevent full legalization and to modify or repeal medical legalization.

If you live in a state that has done neither, work with your legislators to keep it that way.

You can find your state representative and state senator along with their contact information here. To the left, click on “Engage.” Click on “Who represents me?”


Colorado produced over 6 million marijuana plants, more than one plant for every man, woman, and child in the state.

Between January and June 2018, Colorado marijuana cultivators grew 6,011,678 marijuana plants, according to the Colorado Department of Revenue’s Marijuana Enforcement Division. The data come from the division’s just released mid-year update.

Reading from the bottom of the graph above, the counties of Denver (A-dark blue), Pueblo (B-dark red), El Paso (C-green), and Boulder (D-purple) produced 80 percent of the plants grown across the state. See key, below.

Access Marijuana Enforcement Division report here. This key and graph above are on pages 7 and 8.


Violent crime up 25 percent in Colorado since 2013, latest CBI report shows

Crime has surged in Colorado since the state legalized marijuana, says the Colorado Crime Bureau of Investigation:

  • violent crime up 25 percent (18,426 in 2013 to 23,009 in 2017)
  • aggravated assaults up 31 percent (9,714 to 12,711)
  • drug violations up 53 percent (13,878 to 21,166)
  • motor vehicle thefts up a whopping 73 percent (12,806 to 22,187)

Colorado legalized marijuana for medical use in 2000, legalized dispensaries in 2009, and legalized “recreational,” “retail,” or “adult use” (choose one, the state has used all three names) marijuana in 2012.

Read Denver Post story here. Access Colorado Crime Stats here.

EDITORS NOTE: The featured photo is by Thomas Bjornstad on Unsplash.

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