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On November 4, 2008, Michigan voters passed Proposal 2008-01: Medical Marihuana Act. Michigan is the 13th state that has passed laws legalizing medical marihuana.

The Medical Marihuana Act (hereinafter referred to as “Act”) places the responsibility for implementation and administration with the Michigan Department of Community Health (MDCH), which would be required to set up a medical marihuana registry system and issue registry identification cards to qualifying patients or primary caregivers

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TRAFFIC SAFETY Case of the Month

Rodney Gant was arrested for driving on a suspended license, handcuffed, and locked in patrol car before officers searched his car and found cocaine in a jacket pocket. The Arizona trial court denied his motion to suppress the evidence, and he was convicted of drug offenses. Reversing, the Arizona State Supreme Court distinguished New York v. Belton, 453 U. S. 454—which held that police may search the passenger compartment of a vehicle and any containers therein as a contemporaneous incident of a recent occupant’s lawful arrest—on the ground that it concerned the scope of a search incident to arrest but did not answer the question whether officers may conduct such a search once the scene has been secured.

 

Because Chimel v. California, 395 U. S. 752, requires that a search incident to arrest be justified by either the interest in officer safety or the interest in preserving evidence and the circumstances of Gant’s arrest implicated neither of those interests, the State Supreme Court found the search unreasonable.

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