The murder that occurred on Sunday evening in a “smoke shop” near the intersection of 125th Avenue with the Malcolm X Parkway in Harlem is a brutal reminder of this the state’s stupendously terrible decision to legalise marijuana.
Even at the time of bail reform, it’s difficult to think of another government rollout which was so inadequately designed and implemented.
Regardless of your stance on the issue, New York’s implementation of the repealing of weed prohibition laws was incredibly stupid.
When other states have decriminalised marijuana possession in conjunction with licenced legalisation of sales, Colorado has taken a more “Wild West” approach, effectively erasing all criminal code provisions related to marijuana overnight.
Progressive state politicians, obsessed with a woke perspective on achieving the goal of equality, decided to delay the establishment of a rapid protocol to licence the legal sale of marijuana in favour of allocating the first retail licences to ex-convicts and other “justice-involved” citizens.
The Primary Function Of Legal Marijuana Is Expected To Be To Facilitate Restitution
New York City Beep When Antonio Reynoso voiced his displeasure with the prosecution of marijuana in the municipality, he said, “communities of colour have been subjected to unjust challenges as a result of the disproportionate criminalization of weed.”
In response, Donovan Richards, the Antonio’s Queens counterpart, said, “the push to legalise cannabis must be centered around the need to substitute arrests alongside financial and social possibilities as opposed to an aspiration for revenue.”
In the meantime, business owners have raced to beat the state’s molasses-slow licencing implementation. Around downtown, hundreds of unauthorised smoke shops have appeared up, selling illicit marijuana and other substances.
Individuals with fewer resources have merely set up card booths on the streets and in public parks to sell roll-ups and homemade marijuana edibles in plain sight of the police, who have apparently been instructed not to make any arrests.
The NYPD is hampered in its efforts to shut down these illegal pot shops by hurriedly passed, foolish legislation in Albany. It is not illegal for a store to exhibit marijuana for sale; police must be present to issue a citation.
Even then, closing one of these businesses might take months, and there’s no assurance it will stay closed. The NYPD apparently closed the Manhattan smoke shop wherein a customer was slain on Sunday night just last month, but it reopened shortly thereafter.
Also read: What A Rookie Nypd Officer’s Social Media Efforts Did To Help Bring The Shooter To Justice
You Have To Choose Between Two Tragic Outcomes
Apart from supposedly ending the miseries of “mass imprisonment,” the assertion that the state treasury will become fat on all the taxes imposed on weed sales has always been one of the more extravagant promises of the marijuana-legalization campaign.
What percentage of this tax, if any, is actually being collected, though, when Over 1,000 people establishments are open illegally and only a few are legal?
We are witnessing an increase in robberies of illicit smoke businesses across the city, as a great deal of the business is cash-and-carry.
In 2021, there were 251 robberies, while in 2022, there were over twice as many. Robberies are up by 10% so far this year.
Also read: New York Man Charged With Stealing Cooking Oil From An Island Chick-Fil-A
Daryus Clarke, a 20-year-old cashier at the Plugged Smoking Shop on Queens Avenue early Richmond Hill, Queens, was shot and killed during a daytime robbery in March.
After a fatal shooting at the Level Up Exotics marijuana shop throughout Harlem in February and additional shootings & assaults at establishments in Brooklyn & the East Village, this was the next logical step.
The city administration appears helpless to stop the spread of illegal pot outlets or criminality and violence that inevitably follows. The Harlem slaying that occurred on a Sunday wasn’t even related to a robbery that occurred at the store; rather, the business served only as a staging ground for the murder.
However, The Cannabis In New York City Is Unparalleled
With a shrug of his shoulders, Mayor Adams has called on Albany to take action. In February he raged, “This cannabis thing is a genuine problem!” because store owners view the $250 penalty for selling illegal smoking as just another cost of doing business.
Adams, however, uses the same tactic when arguing that the federal government is the only entity capable of addressing gun crime in Gotham.
It’s unclear whether or not reestablishing the anti-crime unit as a plain clothes group would make a dent in New York’s endemic problems.
The forces of chaos and their acolytes now run the government, write the laws, and punish those who break them. This is the government we’ve chosen, and it will keep doing its job until the people finally had enough.
While it’s true that the state’s marijuana law is horrible, it is Adams’ responsibility to investigate and bring to justice the gangs or crews who attack marijuana cultivation facilities in New York City.
The Finest are adept at spotting the armed bandits who rob and kill defenceless smoke shop employees, and they relentlessly pursue them. The New York Police Department needs to be given more freedom by the civilian leadership.
Conclusion
Rivera and three other candidates recently created the CAURD Coalition to aid others in navigating the application process, which may be difficult to understand due to shifting deadlines and fluctuating governmental guidance.
