MichNews.com, which bills itself as publishing the "Most In-depth, Conservative, Honest News & Commentary", has some excellent news for us to digest. Their report on the National Association of Chiefs of Police 17th Annual Survey of Police Chiefs and Sheriffs, just released in this month's issue of Police Times Magazine, shows that police chiefs favor legalization of medical marijuana by an overwhelming margin (41%). [Note: The previous figure I'd had here -- 68.9% -- was the result of a misreading on my part. Apologies, and thanks to colleague Reena for setting me straight.]

An even more startling fact is that a higher percentage of police chiefs favor decriminalization of marijuana and other so-called "soft" drugs (28%) than think the drug war is working (22%). (These LEAPy numbers don't come from a survey of renegade or retired or libertarian police chiefs -- just your average chief or sheriff.)

Police Execs Speakout About Terrorism, Gun Control, Drugs

The National Association of Chiefs of Police released its 17th Annual Survey of Police Chiefs and Sheriffs and some of the survey findings are surprising and compelling. The survey -- released in the January 2005 issue of Police Times Magazine -- had some surprising results on various topics including terrorism, gun control, homeland security, and drug enforcement.

NACOP asserts that the public perception of how police view certain issues is based on media coverage, which is not necessarily accurate. When police chiefs and sheriffs are allowed to respond to poll questions anonymously, the politics may be removed from their answers.

[...]

Forty-one percent of police commanders surveyed said they believe marijuana should be available for medicinal purposes and 68.9 percent said they've seen an increase in the abuse of prescription drugs such as Oxycontin and other Schedule II drugs. Only 22 percent of police commanders believe the war on drugs has been successful, while 28 percent said they favored decriminalization of "soft drugs" such as marijuana.

Read the MichNews article here.