There’s nothing better than a friendly neighbor. And for Indiana cannabis consumers, the recent rollouts of adult-use cannabis sales in neighboring Michigan and Illinois have been all smiles. But there’s at least one Hoosier who’s not on board with the cross-state dispensary trips — state police superintendent Doug Carter.
“Don't get caught. Don’t. Get. Caught,” Carter warned Indiana residents traveling out of state to buy weed at Michigan and Illinois dispensaries. “That substance in Indiana is still illegal.”
With both Michigan and Illinois debuting recreational cannabis dispensaries in just the last few months, Carter said that Indiana cops expected to see an increase in pot stops coming from across state lines. But despite clear reports that Indiana residents are indeed traveling to buy their weed in legal shops, Indiana’s top cop said that local police have not seen the bump in marijuana violations that they had predicted.
“Yes, that was all expected and anticipated as we watched what's happening across the state of Indiana,” Carter told news channel WTHR 13. “The reality is, we haven't seen an uptick, and we were kind of expecting that, but we've not seen it.”
And while Carter stood strong on his personal opinion that cannabis legalization was the wrong decision for Indiana, he said that state police have not increased patrols near state borders. Nor are they specifically looking to bust Hoosiers heading home with personal quantities of out-of-state dispensary weed.
“Oh no, no, no, no, no, no, that's not a good patrol tactic. It's not one I support,” Carter told WTHR. “A lot of those people, they want to participate in that activity on the weekend, or they want to give it to a family member who might be dying of cancer and allow them to have peace. That's not who I’m worried about.”
Of course, like most prohibition-friendly cops, Carter stopped short of supporting marijuana use or criminal justice reform, and made sure to call cannabis “poison” in the same interview. He also told a reporter that he believed marijuana legalization would increase local crime.
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