The Washington state prosecutor who charged teenagers with felonies, rather than misdemeanors, for marijuana possession says he's been misunderstood during a media feeding frenzy that erupted last week.

In fact, Asotin County Prosecuting Attorney Ben Nichols, who acted to lower the charges to misdemeanors on Monday, tells U.S. News he favors treating marijuana like alcohol and opposes increasing penalties for minors.

That’s unlikely the public perception of Nichols after he caught national headlines following a local news report in The Lewiston Tribune that three teens were facing felony pot possession charges and possibly five years in prison.

Washington is one of four states that, along with the nation’s capital, have legalized possession of small amounts of the drug by adults 21 and older.

The prosecutor says he actually charged six teens with felony marijuana possession – two of whom already have been convicted – but that he did so because he felt that’s what a new state law requires.

That law, passed by the state legislature earlier this year, aimed to clean up the local medical marijuana system and introduced various penalties for marijuana-related offenses.

The bill sponsor, Republican state Sen. Ann Rivers, initially appeared to stand by Nichols’ reading of the reforms, telling The Lewiston Tribune last week, “We have to send a message to our kids: 'This will hurt you in more ways than one.'”

After Democratic Gov. Jay Inslee's office said the harsh under-21 penalty was "unintended," Rivers clarified to Reason magazine that “it's not ever been anyone's intent to create teen felons” and said “we are having all of the stakeholders review the applicable section to make sure it doesn't do what is being claimed.”

Perhaps surprisingly, Nichols says he “absolutely” supports keeping underage marijuana possession a misdemeanor and that he’s “glad to see the media attention and the popular attention is leading to some changes.” He says he now will be pursuing misdemeanor charges as he waits for the state attorney general to weigh in or for the legislature to clarify the law.

“I believe marijuana should be handled like alcohol,” he says, describing it as outrageous in his view that some marijuana crimes – such as store sales to underage buyers – come with much harsher penalties than similar cases with alcohol.

“The state of Washington and maybe the whole country is dealing with how to fit marijuana into our mindset. The status of marijuana has changed. It’s no longer this horrible drug that’s illegal in every situation,” he says, “[but] we’ve got these old laws and this old mindset that’s reluctant to accept change.”

The prosecutor says the Class C felony charges he pursued against the teens, contrary to popular belief, bring the same potential penalties as the misdemeanor charges they otherwise would have faced. In real-world application, the felony charges carry a maximum of 30 days in a juvenile facility, not five years in prison, he says, because of “local sanctions” applied to minors.

The six accused teens include two against whom charges will be dropped when they complete probation, two more against whom charges are pending for allegedly bringing pot to school, and the two others who were convicted but whose felony pot convictions Nichols is asking be set aside in favor of misdemeanors.

One of the young convicts was implicated in a thievery-fueled party alongside the two who were given probation. The group allegedly stole alcohol and Dust-Off cleaner from a local Wal-Mart. He wouldn’t have faced any jail time, Nichols says, had he not committed other offenses while the charges were pending. He spent 17 days in juvenile detention and was sentenced to time served on Aug. 12.

The other convicted teen was found guilty of taking part in a joy ride in which participants stole – and then crashed and totaled – someone’s truck. He was convicted Sept. 14 of criminal trespass and felony marijuana possession, as well as a felony for his part in taking the car.

“One of the guys who called me up was very upset that I was turning these poor kids into felons, but when I explained to him this guy was also involved in a joyriding incident and got 22 days for all the charges … he went from being outraged that these poor children were being sent to prison for five years to being outraged that these ne'er-do-wells who took somebody’s truck and ruined it are getting off with a slap on the wrist,” Nichols says.

Nichols says he didn’t vote for Initiative 502 – which passed in 2012 and made Washington among the first states to pass a legalization initiative – but only because he felt it was too vague. He says his office hasn’t prosecuted an adult between the ages of 18 and 21 for marijuana possession since 2012.

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The prosecutor says he doubts his now-reversed charging of felonies will change teen behavior, though he says that never was his intention anyhow.