When Californians voted last month to legalize recreational use of marijuana, they may not have realized they were also allowing retroactive changes that could turn a felony pot conviction into a misdemeanor.

Under Proposition 64, people who have been found guilty of possession, transportation or cultivation of marijuana can now ask the Superior Court to reduce those felony convictions to misdemeanors, as long as there are no disqualifying factors in their criminal histories.

For defendants dogged by a felony conviction, even one handed down decades ago, the ballot measure could be a life changer if they are resentenced or the charges are dismissed.

“It really helps,” said Jane Gilbert, a supervising attorney in the San Diego County Public Defender’s Office. “(A felony conviction) really impacts people’s ability to obtain employment, licensing, security clearances, even student loans.”


Proposition 64, which passed with 57 percent of the vote, expanded California’s existing medical marijuana laws by making it legal for adults 21 and older to “use, possess, purchase and grow marijuana within defined limits.”

Under the law, adults over 21 can buy or possess up to 28.5 grams of marijuana, or grow up to six plants on the grounds of a private residence at any one time.

It remains illegal for anyone under that age to possess the drug for non-medical use. A person under 18 who is caught with a small amount of marijuana could be guilty of an infraction, punishable by completing community service and drug education classes.

Deputy District Attorney Rachel Solov said the measure also changed the maximum penalty for people who sell, transport or grow marijuana — outside what is now allowed by law — to a misdemeanor, the penalty for which would be up to 180 days in county jail.


“So you could be driving with 5,000 pounds of dope in your van and get pulled over near Del Mar, it’s a misdemeanor,” Solov said. (The crime would graduate to a felony, she said, if the defendant is a registered sex offender, has a history of convictions for drug sales or a previous conviction for certain felonies known as super strikes.)

Transporting marijuana across state lines or into the U.S. through an international border are still felonies.

Before voters even went to the polls in November, representatives from the Public Defender’s Office, District Attorney’s Office and the San Diego Superior Court had begun working together to identify people who might be affected by Proposition 64.

The first step was to figure out who was serving time in county jail or state prison for possessing, transporting or growing marijuana in certain amounts.


They found 65 people, all of whom were brought before Criminal Supervising Judge David Danielsen within three weeks of the measure passing.

“There were some that were serving a 16-month sentence, some a few years, some up to 18 years,” Solov said. “In very few cases did it actually result in their release from state prison.”

She estimated that about 20 people who had been convicted in San Diego County were let out of prison or jail early as a direct result of Proposition 64.

The next step, which is ongoing, is to process requests from people who are not in custody, including those on probation or parole, who have a qualifying marijuana-related conviction.


Gilbert said the Public Defender’s Office has pledged to file petitions on behalf of anyone who asks, regardless of whether he or she was previously represented by the office.

“We will do it for free,” she said. “We are doing it as a public service.”

On Dec. 5, the office filed 63 petitions with the court and another 50 on Dec. 12, Gilbert said. The plan is to complete about 50 filings a week.

The District Attorney’s Office reviews each of the cases to determine whether any information in the records would disqualify a defendant. If not, the matter is usually resolved without the defendant having to come to court.


“We’re trying to limit the court hearings to just the ones that really need them,” Solov said.

So far, the process seems to be running smoothly, most likely because the district attorney, public defender and court had already faced similar challenges — on a much larger scale — after the passage of Proposition 47 two years ago.

That proposition allowed people convicted of certain low-level felonies, including simple drug possession and some property crimes, to ask for their crimes to be reduced to misdemeanors, no matter when they were committed.

Once it was voted into law, attorneys began working with the court to process a flood of petitions, work that continues today.


“We learned from a lot of mistakes after Prop. 47,” said Gilbert, who explained that the Public Defender’s Office filed too many petitions all at once after November 2014 without first determining which cases should be given priority.

“We overwhelmed everybody,” she said.

Gilbert said working with the District Attorney’s Office and the court also taught all parties to be more trusting of one another.

“This is not as adversarial as trying to prove someone guilty or not guilty,” she said. “This is pretty straightforward. Either they’re eligible or they’re not.”


Although it’s not clear exactly how many people with marijuana convictions on their records will be affected by Proposition 64, Gilbert and Solov said the number is far lower than those affected by Proposition 47.

“The sheer quantity is a fraction of what was there with Prop. 47,” said Solov, who said her office has reviewed more than 30,400 petitions submitted under that ballot measure.

So far, under Proposition 47, more than 20,500 reductions have been granted by the Superior Court in San Diego County.

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dana.littlefield@sduniontribune.com

Twitter: @danalittlefield