State Senator William “Invoice” Folden (R-Frederick) is sponsoring a invoice to permit regulation enforcement officers to cease and search a automobile if the odor of hashish is detectable from the exterior.
The invoice, titled the Drug-Free Streets Act of 2024, would have reversed a key provision of a regulation handed on the final day of the 2023 legislative session.
HB1071, which took impact on July 1, 2023, would prohibit regulation enforcement officers from initiating a cease or search of an individual, motorcar or different vessel based mostly solely on “the scent of burnt or unburnt hashish”.
Folden's invoice, SB396, maintains the ban on stopping or looking out an individual or their belongings based mostly solely on the scent of hashish, whereas permitting regulation enforcement officers to cease and search a automobile for a similar purpose.
Folden's invoice would additionally repeal a bit of the 2023 regulation that states that proof obtained on the idea of the scent of hashish alone, even whether it is obtained by way of a consensual search, shouldn’t be admissible in courtroom
Democrats aren’t desirous about making substantive modifications, Senate President Invoice Ferguson (D-Baltimore Metropolis) mentioned, and are solely contemplating what they name “enhancements” to Maryland's hashish regulation.
“I believe we're going to have a hashish invoice this 12 months that does one thing – I don't need to name it cleansing, however changes to the system that we handed final 12 months,” Ferguson mentioned, in accordance with Capital. Information Service. “I don't suppose you'll see main modifications to this system, however implementation changes.”
