

According to Lt. Danny Maguire of the Weston Police Department, "The biggest challenge we have is to convince people that, just because the law has changed, marijuana has not become 'legal,' and that the problem of drug addiction is still just as severe as always. There is also the danger that people will think it’s actually OK, under the new law, to smoke a joint or two and get behind the wheel of a car."

…

One ounce of marijuana is the equivalent of 200 to 300 joints, according to Maguire.



Police don’t just get the facts wrong about the dangers of marijuana and the impact of commonsense reforms like decriminalization. Frequently, they’re wrong about marijuana itself, making wild claims about the street value of the latest bust or exaggerating plant yields to make small growers sound like major traffickers. If you think you’ve heard it all, here’s a cop from Massachusetts who says an ounce equals 200-300 joints:This is just shockingly crazy and wrong. Researchers have estimated the average size of a joint between 0.4 and 0.9 grams, which would equal 30-70 joints per ounce. If you roll more than 70 joints from an ounce, they’ll be empty toothpick-sized joints with more paper than pot. They won’t even work and no matter who you are, I’m sure you know someone who can assure that this is true.Claiming that you can roll up to 300 joints from an ounce is a total lie. It’s hilarious to anyone who’s ever smoked or even seen a joint. It’s like claiming a bag of skittles will serve 300 people, when there’s actually only 70 Skittles in the bag and most people don’t find an individual Skittle very satisfying anyhow.So what the hell is this guy talking about? He’s angry that voters in Massachusetts decriminalized possession of up to an ounce of marijuana, and he’s trying to pretend that’s a huge amount of pot. It isn’t. His lie, on the other hand, is enormous.