{"id":87124,"date":"2026-10-06T09:39:13","date_gmt":"2026-10-06T17:39:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2026\/10\/06\/tennessee-lawmakers-push-back-on-police-claims-about-marijuanas-danger-and-connection-to-violence\/"},"modified":"2026-10-07T19:46:35","modified_gmt":"2026-10-08T03:46:35","slug":"tennessee-lawmakers-push-back-on-police-claims-about-marijuanas-danger-and-connection-to-violence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2026\/10\/06\/tennessee-lawmakers-push-back-on-police-claims-about-marijuanas-danger-and-connection-to-violence\/","title":{"rendered":"Tennessee Lawmakers Push Back On Police Claims About Marijuana\u2019s Danger And Connection To Violence"},"content":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the state of Tennessee, marijuana is the number one drug associated with criminal activity, including violent crime.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

By Adam Friedman, Tennessee Lookout<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u200bTennessee lawmakers held hearings to discuss implementing a limited medical marijuana program, but the state\u2019s top law enforcement group remains the most vocal opposition.<\/p>\n

Representatives from the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, TBI, emerged as the strongest opponents, stating there were no circumstances in which they thought medical marijuana should be allowed in Tennessee.<\/p>\n

\u201cMarijuana is in fact a dangerous drug, whose use poses a significant threat to public safety, and whose cultivation poses a threat to the environment,\u201d said Erica Stephens, a TBI agent working on the bureau\u2019s Dangerous Drugs Task Force, to lawmakers during the hearing. \u201cIn the state of Tennessee, marijuana is the number one drug associated with criminal activity, including violent crime.\u201d<\/p>\n

Several lawmakers, including Republicans and the lone Democrat on the committee, appeared skeptical of Stephens\u2019s testimony.<\/p>\n

State Sen. London Lamar, a Memphis Democrat, said the correlation between marijuana use and violent crime was \u201cinaccurate,\u201d citing statistics that showed overdose deaths related to pot were virtually nonexistant.<\/p>\n

\u201cCrime is an issue for all of us,\u201d Lamar said. \u201cCalifornia and Colorado have significantly lower violent crime rates than Tennessee. We are a state that has no legal marijuana program, and we have some of the highest violent crime rates in the country.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u200bLawmakers held nearly six hours of hearings last week to discuss the program, with much of the discussion focused on how Tennessee should address marijuana use considering it is either fully legalized or legal for medical use in 41 other states, and widely available on the black market.<\/p>\n

TBI and other law enforcement representatives repeatedly brought up Oklahoma\u2019s medical marijuana program as the most prominent failure of a medical program.<\/p>\n

Sen. Ferrell \u200bHaile, a Gallatin Republican, said during the hearing that Oklahoma\u2019s program, which included smokable products, was \u201cnowhere near comparable\u201d to the program Tennessee lawmakers were studying.<\/p>\n

\u200b\u201cIt\u2019s apples to oranges,\u201d Haile said.<\/p>\n

The bureau\u2019s adamant opposition appeared to rankle several lawmakers.<\/p>\n

State Sen. Todd Gardenhire, a Chattanooga Republican, told committee members that law enforcement\u2019s testimony had \u201cdrifted\u201d the conversation away from what was important.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a way to keep people from having to go to the illicit market,\u201d Gardenhire said. \u201cIt\u2019s a way to get them the help they need in a legal way.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the federal government reclassified marijuana as having potential medical benefits<\/a> in April. Tennessee lawmakers agreed to hear recommendations from the state\u2019s cannabis commission on creating a limited medical marijuana program that doesn\u2019t include smokable products and is only obtainable for a narrow set of conditions.<\/p>\n

\u200bThe state cannabis commission is proposing allowing medical marijuana for those suffering from Alzheimer\u2019s, ALS, cancer, Crohn\u2019s disease, epilepsy, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson\u2019s disease, HIV\/AIDS and sickle cell disease.<\/p>\n

Over the past decade, medical and legal marijuana programs have swept across the nation as the federal government has let states decide how to regulate the product. Most of Tennessee\u2019s neighboring states have either legal or medical marijuana programs.<\/p>\n

This proliferation has made enforcing a state ban difficult, as many Tennesseans can drive across state borders to places where they can legally buy it.<\/p>\n

For several years, Tennessee\u2019s legalization of hemp-derived cannabinoid products<\/a> served as a loophole to the state\u2019s marijuana laws. But lawmakers banned smokable hemp products, all but killing the market in July.<\/p>\n

Christina Flatt, a Nashville pharmacist, said during the hearing that Tennessee\u2019s potential medical marijuana program doesn\u2019t go far enough and should include medical conditions like post-traumatic stress disorder for veterans and hospice patients.<\/p>\n

\u201cCannabis has medical value, and the United States government recognizes it,\u201d Flatt said.<\/p>\n

This story was first published by Tennessee Lookout.<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

The post Tennessee Lawmakers Push Back On Police Claims About Marijuana\u2019s Danger And Connection To Violence<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n


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\u201cIn the state of Tennessee, marijuana is the number one drug associated with criminal activity, including violent crime.\u201d By Adam Friedman, Tennessee Lookout \u200bTennessee lawmakers held hearings to discuss implementing a limited medical marijuana program, but the state\u2019s top law enforcement group remains the most vocal opposition. Representatives from theContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":457,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[81],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87124"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/457"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=87124"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87124\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87125,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87124\/revisions\/87125"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=87124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=87124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=87124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}