L.A. Seizures of Marijuana Soar in 1996

By BETH SHUSTER

Nov. 25, 1996 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

Marijuana seizures in Los Angeles this year are on a pace that will double 1995’s record haul, signaling the drug’s growing popularity and widespread availability, according to city, county and federal law enforcement agencies.

Since January, the Los Angeles Police Department has recovered record amounts of marijuana, even though it has undertaken no special efforts to target pot sellers or smokers. The Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department reports a similar bonanza. And U.S. Customs inspectors seized a record amount of the drug at the Mexico border during the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30.

Authorities say a growing tolerance of marijuana use, stable prices and more potent strains are stimulating the public’s appetite for the drug. The pot seized this year has been in small and large amounts, discovered during routine arrests and undercover operations targeting cocaine and heroin.

Pot smokers are a diverse group, from young suburban teens to hard-core gang members to upscale professionals, police say.

Passage this month of Proposition 215, the state medical marijuana initiative allowing doctors to recommend the drug for medical uses, has drawn harsh criticism from law enforcement officials already overwhelmed by illegal marijuana users.

“I’m not trying to sound like ‘Reefer Madness’ but . . . the potential for abuse is clearly there,” said Sgt. Rudy Lovio, who oversees the Los Angeles County Sheriff Department’s narcotics intelligence unit. He believes the ballot measure will make a losing battle even worse.

The Sheriff’s Department has made several large seizures in the Angeles National Forest, targeting pot growers. But local narcotics officers say the record marijuana seizures mostly have come without effort, largely because there is so much pot available in Southern California.

From January through September of this year, the LAPD hauled in more than 37,600 pounds of the drug, compared with less than 25,000 pounds for all of 1995. That is an average of 4,177 pounds of marijuana a month this year, contrasted with a monthly average of 2,083 pounds in 1995.

During the first nine months this year, the Sheriff’s Department--helped by the forest raids--seized more than 8,000 pounds, compared to 9,000 for all of last year.

Police estimate that about 70% of the marijuana consumed in Southern California comes from Mexico, following the same smuggling routes that bring cocaine and heroin.

Border seizures in the past year support that belief.

U.S. Customs inspectors at the California border with Mexico captured 272,000 pounds of marijuana during the 1995-96 fiscal year, almost a 50% leap from the 185,439 pounds seized the previous year.

Customs officials say the large hauls are the result of a nearly 2-year-old program called Operation Hard Line, which has provided more investigators and other enforcement help to the Southwest border.

In Los Angeles, narcotics officers targeting heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine traffickers have been stumbling onto marijuana almost by accident.

To these professionals, and the public, marijuana seizures aren’t as glamorous as cocaine or heroin busts, said Abel Reynoso, a spokesman for the federal Drug Enforcement Administration in Los Angeles. “When you seize a ton of cocaine, people think it’s great and it gets a lot of attention,” he said. “But pot?”

The DEA office in Los Angeles also reports an increase in the amount of marijuana seized in California and Arizona. During the fiscal year that just ended, DEA agents seized 132,364 kilograms of the drug in Los Angeles--about 290,000 pounds--up 37% from the previous year.

Drug policy experts say law enforcement should keep its focus on drugs other than marijuana.

“What they should be targeting is the open markets and the drug houses that destroy neighborhoods,” said Mark Kleiman, a professor at UCLA’s School of Public Policy and Social Research. “I wouldn’t turn enforcement around and ignore methamphetamine. That would not be a good use of law enforcement resources.”

Narcotics officers say they are unlikely to take any special steps to target marijuana, largely because they are able to seize so much during their routine duties.

“It’s just out there--everywhere,” said Lt. Bernie Larralde of the LAPD’s narcotics unit. “You can’t get away from it.”

The amount of marijuana being seized in Los Angeles supports national studies showing an increase in marijuana use by teenagers. Those studies, as well as polls, show marijuana smokers are getting younger, including many whose parents smoked pot during the 1960s and 1970s.

“It’s everywhere,” said a Los Angeles high school junior. “I know tons of places I could get it, if I wanted it. I don’t think it’s that bad for you--not as bad as drinking or smoking cigarettes.”

A recent U.S. Department of Health and Human Services survey found marijuana use among teenagers has doubled since 1992. Marijuana use among 14- and 15-year-olds is up 200%; for 12- and 13-year-olds, it’s risen 137%.

White House drug czar Barry R. McCaffrey described the results as proof of “an explosion of drug use.”

A survey by Columbia University this fall found that teenagers and their parents are increasingly tolerant of marijuana use.

Experts say that may be because many parents in their 40s and 50s do not realize how the potency of marijuana has risen since the 1960s.

“There’s a very big difference in today’s marijuana,” said Reynoso, the DEA spokesman. “It’s not even close to what it used to be.”

Even the most inexpensive grades of marijuana have slightly higher levels of THC, tetrahydrocannabinol, the plant’s active ingredient. Police say the THC levels in Mexican-grown marijuana now range between 4% and 6%.

But that the potency jumps as high as 20% in the domestically grown variety known as sinsemilla, the Spanish word for seedless.

“Marijuana has always been the No. 1 drug consumed in this country,” said Lovio, of the Sheriff’s Department. “The thing that scares us, and many medical people, is that marijuana is considered a gateway drug to harder drugs. . . . What will we be seizing in two years from now?”

The notion that marijuana leads to using other drugs is not accepted as fact, according to drug use experts. But typically, cocaine and heroin users begin with marijuana.

“That’s where everybody starts,” said Michael Rock, a drug counselor at the county-funded El Proyecto del Barrio, a public health clinic in Panorama City.

Authorities say many drug users are now combining marijuana with stronger drugs. “Primos” or “chronics” are made from marijuana mixed with crack cocaine.

Also sobering to authorities was the passage of Proposition 215 and a similar ballot measure in Arizona.

State and federal officials met almost two weeks ago with drug czar McCaffrey to discuss what to do about the new marijuana laws. So far, the meeting has produced no recommendations, although McCaffrey has vowed to pursue federal charges against any California doctor who recommends or prescribes marijuana to a patient.

Next month, California Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren will hold a forum for district attorneys and police to plan ways to enforce the state’s marijuana laws in light of the new requirements imposed by Proposition 215. State law enforcement authorities have talked about challenging the proposition in court, but have yet to file any lawsuit seeking to nullify the initiative.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Marijuana Upswing

The Los Angeles Police Department seized more marijuana from January through September than it did in all of 1995. Marijuana seizures have been on the rise throughout Southern California since 1991. Shown are amounts of marijuana seized yearly by law enforcement officials.

All seizure amounts in pounds

L.A. County Sheriff’s Dept.

‘96*: 8,146

* Through October

****

LAPD

‘96*: 37,633

* Through September

****

U.S. Customs Dept.

‘96: 15,669

(Years listed are fiscal, Oct. 1-Sept. 30)