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flatfoot: An NYPD detective's eye on crime.

Smoked OutWhat do cops really think of marijuana?

By Lucas Miller
Posted Wednesday, May 3, 2000, at 11:30 PM ET
Illustration by Robert Neubecker

About a week ago, I stopped by my girlfriend's apartment to pick her up for dinner. Her roommate, a nice girl from Long Island who works in advertising, was uncharacteristically unhappy to see me at the door. She gestured me inside but shot a tense look at the friend with whom she had been watching television. I figured that it was just because I was interrupting their lazy Sunday afternoon. My girlfriend was still picking out her clothes for the evening, so I plopped down on the couch with the other two and started watching television. Soon the doorbell rang and the roommate jumped up, a look of horror on her face.

"Who's that?" I asked with friendly curiosity.

"Uh, we ordered Chinese food," she said to me. Then to her friend, "Come on, let's go eat it on the roof."

Off they went. It was a chilly day, but good detective that I am, I tend to believe everything people tell me. What I should have known but didn't guess is that they had just received a little package from one of the many marijuana delivery services that bring pot directly to New Yorkers' doors.

This is far from the first party I've spoiled. I was once told that my presence at a gathering ruined it, since the guest of honor couldn't get high while I was there. At other times, I've been forced to act as a sort of unofficial review board for complaints about my profession. And the most frequent gripe I've heard—well, up until the cops who shot Amadou Diallo were acquitted—is that someone's buddy, sweetheart, or uncle got locked up for smoking a little harmless marijuana.

What pot users may find interesting, if not entirely satisfying, is that the opinions of cops vary almost as much as those of civilians when it comes to drugs and particularly marijuana. Some cops are staunch law-and-order types who believe that laws are made by the legislature and interpreted by the courts, not the police, and that no law is too small and no violation too trivial to take seriously. Other cops believe that the use of drugs, including marijuana, is tied directly to the use of more drugs and the commission of other crimes. Some narcotics officers are embarrassed that they must spend time pursuing violators of laws about which society is ambivalent and whose consequences are so light. And there are those, like myself, who see the virtue of enforcing quality of life laws but can't help but feel bad putting a guy in handcuffs for smoking pot.

My father is a jazz musician, and he and I sometimes joke about the popular image of jazzmen spending a lot of time stoned. Viper, my father told me, was old-time slang for pot smoker; tea referred to pot. Legend has it that Louis Armstrong was a big viper. One day not long ago, my father was telling me that once he'd quit smoking cigarettes, he never smoked again for fear that he'd fall off the wagon entirely. Same for smoking pot, he added. Wait a moment, I thought. My dad smoked pot? I thought we were talking about other musicians. Can I put a guy through the system for something my own father has done?

Well, yes, I can. It's not that I think that you, smoking a little marijuana in the privacy of your own living room, are committing a wrong against society that must be righted. In fact, in New York state, possession of small amounts of marijuana in your home is a "violation," which is less serious than a misdemeanor and not legally a crime. It is on the order of urinating in public or drinking from an open beer in public. Since you're at home, invisible to anyone outside, and since violations are not grounds for a search warrant, you are almost definitely going to get away with it. Buying that pot on a street corner is a different story. The possession of marijuana in public in New York as well as in most states is a misdemeanor; if we catch you, we are supposed to arrest you. Police do have some discretion when it comes to making arrests for minor infractions, but aggressive enforcement of quality of life violations has simply become the normal way we do business.

And I believe this is the way we should do business. One of the lessons we have learned in the last few years is that narcotics enforcement is an effective way to drive down almost all kinds of crime. We've also seen that successful drug enforcement targets buyers as well as dealers. Given the proliferation of marijuana dealers and users in public spaces such as Washington Square Park a few years ago, aggressive enforcement doesn't seem so out of line. And this is where most marijuana enforcement is being conducted—not in anyone's living room.

Moreover, although pot smokers are usually peaceable citizens, their dealers can be dangerous criminals. In 1993, a detective working in Manhattan South Narcotics named Luis Lopez was shot through the heart by dealers while making a marijuana buy. He left a family behind. He was 36. Now, I don't go in for the idea that everyone who buys illegal drugs gets a little of the blood of the policemen killed by dealers on their hands. But Luis' death makes me see marijuana as more sinister, a little less harmless.

Illustration by Robert Neubecker

That said, I won't be hauling my girlfriend's roommate off anytime soon. My department, like many, frowns on off-duty arrests for all but the most serious crimes. Were I to interrupt my dinner dates to make arrests for unlawful possession of marijuana, I would probably get laughed out of my office.

But nor could I sit idle while Ms. Roommate toked up. A cop is a cop 24 hours a day, and even when I'm off duty, I find it difficult to observe drug use nonchalantly. That's why, as my girlfriend dressed and her roommate consumed her "Chinese food" on the roof, I found myself hitting the redial button on their phone pad, trying to get the number of the delivery service.

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Lucas Miller is an NYPD detective.
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Reader Response from The Fray:


I believe Mr Miller's logic short-circuits near the end of his essay. Murder is always unacceptable. But I think we can be fairly sure that no-one would have died were the police officer not intent on arresting the perpetrators. The crime was not justifiable homicide by any means, but it is comprehensible only in its absurd legal context. Further, though drug arrests may indeed lower crime rates overall, I believe a controlled study might reveal that drug arrests are merely one method of managing an unruly society. And I sincerely wonder whether the drug war is the best use of our resources. Domestic violence is the top killer for women. A little less attention to drugs and a little more to marital disputes might have a more profound effect on murder rates in this country.

--A.W.Cohen

(To reply, click here.)


A cop is a cop 24 hours a day, and even when off-duty is required to follow the Constitutional prohibition against warrantless searches. Officer Miller was in the apartment by invitation, but neither the girlfriend nor the roommate can be said to have consented to a search. A number frozen in flash memory on a telephone cannot be said to be in plain view. I don't think I'd invite the good officer to many parties if I thought he was going to search areas where I had a reasonable expectation of privacy while I was getting dressed.

--CardCarrying

(To reply, click here.)

Reply from the author:
Both roommates have access to the phone. I have permission from the girlfriend to use the phone. Your attack on my search might rest on whether the right to use the phone includes the right to hit redial, but I suspect that at this point we are in uncharted waters. Sorry to miss your parties.

--Lucas Miller

(To reply, click here.)


If, as you say, pot smokers are usually peaceable citizens but their dealers can be dangerous criminals, the solution seems pretty obvious to me. Instead of buying from a dangerous criminal, peaceable citizens should be buying from the local pharmacy or supermarket. Guess that would make too much sense, though.

--Libertarian

(To reply, click here.)


I certainly don't mind a cop telling me that the law is the law, and it's his duty to enforce them whether he agrees with them or not. Cops would just be a mafia in uniform otherwise. But I don't have much patience with cops who try to pull a line on me that they "have seen what drugs can do to a human being, from pot to the hard stuff." Cops should no more be relied upon for their experiences in drugs, legal or illegal, potent or "not the hard stuff", just because they "work with those hooked on the stuff" (read "arresting and booking them") than they should be considered marriage counselors and psychotherapists merely because they encounter husbands and wives in domestic violence situations or try to talk some guy on a bridge or building from jumping off.

Cops are entitled to their uninformed opinions on the pharmacology of hemp and opiates just like any other member of the ignorant masses. Just so long as they are aware of their humility in making such utterances. I am not saying Lucas Miller has pretended he knows that illegal drugs are bad and legal drugs are good--I see he has much more sense than to make such a statement (why isn't he chief?). But he knows the kind of cops I am talking about, and has worked with them most likely. The kind of cops who can never admit that some laws are on the books that shouldn't be, or the ones who go beyond enforcing the law to advocating the law and, in their advocacy, make complete asses of themselves. I am talking about the guy at the DEA with an offensive tackle's build, a crew cut, a degree in sociology--and he is trying to convince a PhD. in biochemistry and molecular biology why pot is the scourge of the earth and alcohol is not.

--Mavi Gozler

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I take issue with people who think they can divide the wold into socially acceptable users and dangerous pushers. Common sense says the war on drugs will be a failure until the penalty for using and for pushing is exactly the same, and much less serious than it is today. The problems posed by drugs may be complex, but the solutions are surprisingly simple.

--David Fourer

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Even though I am not a cop I would have looked at the redial number too--no honor in being ignorant of what is going on around you. Laws are made by us--the majority of the people. Talking about alcohol vs marijuana is moronic--it is like arguing about socialism vs capitalism and ignoring the past 60 years of social experimentation and failures. You don't like the law--convince a majority of us to change it (or move to Vermont).

The only ones arguing for leniency in marijuana law enforcement are those that use it and don't want to pay the penalty if caught--and live by the now very popular moral code of "if I do it or like it, then it is good and just--regardless of what others think or do" (if that is too long for you, just say Liberal or Democrat, it boils down to the same).

I'm a '60s child--been there done that--ain't never gonna let my kids do it, though!

--Radiskull

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