PHOENIX — The head of the Arizona Department of Public Safety is against Proposition 205, which would legalize the recreational use of marijuana in Arizona.

DPS Director Frank Milstead said, even though the drug is illegal in Arizona, people still manage to get their hands on it for recreational use. Milstead called medical marijuana a lie and a joke.

“People in Arizona who want to smoke marijuana today can smoke marijuana,” he said. “They just have to go see one of the quacks to get a medical marijuana card, and they can smoke all of the grass that they want to smoke.”

He claimed that it is primarily young people who are using medical marijuana cards to get the drug and he doubts if most of them have any kind of medical problem.

“Eighty-some-odd percent of (the cards) are issued to white male kids under the age of fricking 25,” Milstead claimed. “If I had chronic pain at 25, I don’t know where I’d be today.”

Milstead said nothing good will come out of legalizing marijuana for recreational use. He believes that marijuana is a gateway that leads to heroin and other dangerous drugs.

Milstead also cited personal experience when explaining why he doesn’t believe it should become legal. He said he’s seen how marijuana can cause problems for people, including members of his own family.

“He was a very good lacrosse player, and was very much into his team sport,” Milstead said of his son, who was doing well at school until he began using the drug.

“He ended up getting kicked off of the lacrosse team, and he ultimately got himself kicked out of the high school because he couldn’t stop himself,” Milstead said.

However, the story has a happy ending: Milstead said his son eventually stopped smoking marijuana and turned his life around. He, like his father, now advocates against marijuana.

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