Possession of Cannabis (1223A/22)
Request
Please can you make disclosure of any force policies, procedures and/or guidance documents which refer to and/or detail the forces position in relation to dealing with members of the public who are found to be in possession of cannabis for personal use (including where the person believes in its assistance in alleviating medical conditions).
Please can you confirm the forces policy in relation to any member of the public who presents with a Cancard™ upon being questioned, detained and/or arrested for offences relating to the possession of cannabis for personal use (including where the person believes in its assistance in alleviating medical conditions).
Please can you confirm the number of people a) arrested and b) convicted in accordance with s.5(1) of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 within your force area for the Year ending March 2022 and September 2014.
For clarity, I can confirm that Cancard™ is a medical ID card, recognised by the police. It is a validated indication to any third-party that someone is consuming cannabis for medical reasons.
CLARIFICATION
I can confirm that I wish to receive disclosure of the number of people a) arrested and b) convicted
in accordance with s.5(1) of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 within your force area for the Year ending March 2022 and Year ending September 2014 (annual stats – 12 month period, if available).
Response
Please find attached our response.
Please note that these data should be interpreted with caution. Comparing numbers of incidents/crimes can be misleading and does not necessarily indicate the likelihood of someone being a victim of crime. In addition, the number of incidents/crimes recorded in an area over a period of time can be influenced by a number of factors. Consequently statistics on incidents/crimes for one period may not necessarily be a good indicator of future incidents in that area.
Every effort is made to ensure that the figures presented are accurate and complete. However, it is important to note that these data have been extracted from a number of data sources used by forces for police purposes. The detail collected to respond specifically to your request is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large scale recording system. As a consequence, care should be taken to ensure data collection processes and their inevitable limitations are taken into account when interpreting those data.
The figures provided therefore are our best interpretation of relevance of data to your request, but you should be aware that the collation of figures for ad hoc requests may have limitations and this should be taken into account when those data are used.
If you decide to write an article / use the enclosed data we would ask you to take into consideration the factors highlighted in this document so as to not mislead members of the public or official bodies, or misrepresent the relevance of the whole or any part of this disclosed material.