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Doña Ana County Sheriff remains optimistic about marijuana legalization in New Mexico


IMG_5Doña Ana County Sheriff Kim Stewart speaks on marijuana legalization. (Credit: KFOX/CBS)181.JPG
IMG_5Doña Ana County Sheriff Kim Stewart speaks on marijuana legalization. (Credit: KFOX/CBS)181.JPG
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The Doña Ana County Sheriffs office is weighing-in on the legalization of recreational marijuana across New Mexico.

Doña Ana County Sheriff Kim Stewart said she’s remaining optimistic about the legalization and what this means for her law enforcement officers, but still, she said it has her on her toes.

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“This is a very, very complicated process and there’s a lot of moving parts,” Stewart said.

While some Las Cruces residents feel the move to legalize marijuana is a step in the right direction, others feel the state is taking a step backwards.

“New Mexico has such a problem with alcoholism, drugs and stuff, to legalize marijuana it only enhances the problem that people have here in New Mexico,” Michael Potts said.

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“I think it’s about time that we start realizing that there’s things that are more important crime wise, for police force to focus on, than people doing whatever they want with their own mind,” Lorenzo Zepeda said.

Stewart said, that’s not the case.

“It’s been stated that we’re going to have more free time to do other things, that hasn’t been proven to be the case. I think the expectation is that we’re going to see less trafficking of marijuana, large quantities, I don’t believe that’s true, we’re going to continue to see it,” Stewart said.

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Stewart said she’s not sure if this will contribute to an increase in crime, but over the last several years they have seen a decrease in arrests for possession of the drug.

“It was about priorities, we try to spend time where we’re going to get the most out of our money and our manpower,” Stewart said.

While arrests were still relevant, it will change and perhaps complicate the way her officers do things.

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“A lot of enforcement right now has been about using the odor of marijuana, for instance, if you approach a car as a probable cause to investigate further, of course once it’s legal that's no longer illegal, so you cannot use it for probable cause,” Stewart said.

She said there’s a lot of unanswered questions.

“If a juvenile comes to high school or grammar school and he or she smells of cannabis, and he or she is going to say, ‘Well my parents smoke it all day long, I’m in the house with it, I didn’t smoke it,’ what are you going to do? I mean is there an issue about welfare there?” Stewart said. “I know the Governor has expressed many times that we want to do this right, so I’m going to have to trust that she’s well aware of the hurdles.”

CBS4 requested an interview with Las Cruces Police, but they declined.

“The Chief cannot speak on the new law until we learn more about it,” LCPD Spokesperson Dan Trujillo said.

The department did though see a significant decrease in possession arrests from 2019 to 2020.

  • 2019= 86
  • 2020= 16

They said part of the decrease has to do with school being out, because that’s where several of these arrests were made.

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