Marijuana arrests rising on campus
Arrests for the use of controlled substances such as marijuana at USU have nearly doubled from last year, according to Capt. Steve Milne of the USU Police.
“For 2011 we have 41 arrests for controlled substances,” Milne said, “compared to 22 for all of 2010.”
Milne said there has also been four more alcohol-related arrests this year compared to last year, and he pointed out there is more than one month before the year is over.
Most of the students arrested for substance abuse have been first-year students, Milne reported. He said many of the freshmen are not aware of a freshman student who died of alcohol poisoning during a fraternity hazing incident at USU in 2008.
“I think a lot of it has to do with the freshmen students that are entering school have no idea who Michael Starks was,” Milne said. “When that happened, I think they were roughly freshmen in high school, and I don’t think they paid much attention to what was happening in the outside world.”
Milne said arrests involving drugs and alcohol decreased for a period after Starks’ death, but are currently on the rise.
“It’s always been here,” Milne said. “But this is definitely, by far, our busiest year. We’ve seen more cases of it than I’ve ever seen in the 29 years I’ve been here.”
Ryan Barfuss, prevention specialist at the Student Wellness Center, said recently fewer USU students claim to have tried marijuana than in past years.
“It went from — in 2011 — 89.8 percent of students have not used,” Barfuss said. “In 2009, 89.2 percent of students had not used. So actually the numbers have gone up of people who have not used.”
Barfuss said many students think drug use is more common than it actually is. According to his survey, only 2.8 percent of students at USU have used marijuana in the last 30 days.
However, the 2011 American College Health Association Survey reports perceived use is at 43.3 percent of college students, within the last 30 days.
“There’s some use, but not a lot of use,” Barfuss said.
Barfuss said the use of marijuana hasn’t really gone up, but more people are getting caught.
Milne said it used to take hours to obtain a search warrant, but now with the the ability to apply for an electronic search warrant, officers can obtain warrant within 20-30 minutes.
He said officers used to find a judge to sign the warrant, but now they apply for it digitally, and a rotating shift of judges will review it any time of day. This change is one of the reasons Milne said he thinks police have an easier time catching students with illicit drugs.
“A lot of the drug arrests that you’re seeing started with the odor of marijuana, which gives us probable cause,” Milne said. “In the old days where it may have been too time consuming to apply for a warrant, now within 20 minutes or so the officer has the search warrant, is knocking on the door, is serving the search warrant, and we’re finding those drugs.”
Milne said the electronic search warrants aren’t the only reason arrests have increased. He said the USU Police Department has also received more calls informing police of illegal drug activity.
Barfuss said he associates the amount of drug use to the growing movement to legalize marijuana in states like Colorado and California. In those states people can apply for a medical marijuana card to be able to legally take the drug.
He said out-of-state students often come to Utah with a different mindset, and they think marijuana use isn’t as heavily enforced as it is.
“We’re getting a lot of students from California that come with marijuana cards,” Barfuss said. “It’s so normalized there in their state that they come here and they assume it’s not a big deal until they get caught, and then it’s a huge deal for some of these students.”
Barfuss said many students who are caught with marijuana, even with a card, have legal issues pile up on them causing a large amount of stress and anxiety. He said some students have come to his office for drug counseling because they tested positive for marijuana they smoked out of state with a marijuana card during a school break.
Marijuana stays in the body for 30-45 days, Barfuss said. Unlike other drugs, marijuana users don’t experience withdrawal symptoms if they stop using the drug, because the psychoactive chemical in marijuana — tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) — is stored in the body’s fat cells and is slowly released over time, he said.
Barfuss said states with legalized medical marijuana have seen an increase in the use of other, harder drugs such as heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine.
“A lot of people think, ‘It’s not a big deal, I just smoke marijuana,'” Barfuss said. “But you’re associating yourselves also with the people who are using harder drugs, and that association definitely can lead people into using different drugs.”
Barfuss said other harder drugs can spread infections such as HIV or hepatitis. He said drugs taken by snorting can destroy people’s nasal cavities.
He said a danger associated with prescription drugs is the way they are disposed of. He said there are studies being conducted to see how drugs have affected the local drinking water. He said people should dispose of their unwanted prescription drugs by taking them to a prescription drop-off box.
“We have a prescription drop-off box here on campus,” Barfuss said. “People just go in, just drop it off — no questions asked — and then what (the police) do is take it to the incinerator here on campus.”
Barfuss said prescription drop-off boxes are located at the campus police headquarters, the Sheriff’s office, city offices in Hyrum and at the Logan City Police Department.
– chris.w.lee@aggiemail.usu.edu