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By Mustafa Ali-Smith and Keiana West 

Abstract 

This paper examines the relationship between marijuana policy changes, arrest trends, and racial disparities in arrests in two major U.S. cities, Indianapolis and Chicago, between 2014 and 2023. Chicago implemented statewide legalization in January 2020, while Indianapolis decriminalized certain marijuana offenses at the county level in September 2019. By analyzing public arrest data from Chicago and the State of Indiana, this research addresses three key questions: whether marijuana-related arrests declined after these policy changes, how racial disparities in arrests changed after these shifts, and how marijuana arrest trends compare with those for other drugs. Our findings reveal significant reductions in marijuana-related arrests in both cities following policy reforms, though the degree of change varied. The results also demonstrate stark racial disparities in marijuana arrest rates both prior to and following policy changes in each city, though racial disparities decreased in both Chicago and Indianapolis following each policy change during the study period. Ultimately, racial disparities in both cities increased again as time after reform passed, signaling the need for policies and practices that sustain decreases in disparities overtime.

Introduction

The evolving landscape of marijuana policy in the United States has brought significant attention to its impact on law enforcement, policing practices, as well as racial disparities in arrests. While marijuana offenses have historically been a major contributor to drug-related arrests, recent efforts to decriminalize or legalize marijuana in jurisdictions across the country aim to reduce contact with the criminal legal system due to such offenses (Bink 2025). However, these policy shifts raise important questions about their effectiveness in addressing long-standing racial disparities in arrest rates and whether the policy change results in fewer arrests.

This paper examines the relationship between marijuana policy changes, arrest trends and racial disparities in two major cities: Indianapolis, Indiana, and Chicago, Illinois. Chicago, located in a state that decriminalized marijuana in July 2016 and fully legalized marijuana in 2019 (effective January 1, 2020), serves as a comparative case to Indianapolis, where marijuana possession was decriminalized in Marion County in September 2019. These cities offer a unique opportunity to explore how differing approaches to marijuana policy may influence the volume and racial composition of arrests over time.

Focusing on the period from 2014 to 2023, this study analyzes public arrest data from Chicago, Illinois and the State of Indiana to assess whether marijuana policy changes coincide with reductions in overall arrests and disparities between Black and white individuals. Our research aims to answer three key questions:

1. Did arrests for marijuana-related offenses decline following policy changes in each city?
2. How do racial disparities in marijuana arrest rates differ before and after policy changes?
3. Do the observed trends in marijuana arrests align with broader arrest trends for other drugs in these cities?

By leveraging population-adjusted arrest rates and arrest rate ratios, we aim to provide a clearer picture of how marijuana policy changes may impact communities differently along racial lines. The findings of this research contribute to the broader understanding of the interplay between drug policy reform and social justice outcomes, particularly in cities with differing legal frameworks, political dynamics, and demographic compositions.

Background

For this paper, we use the term “Marijuana” instead of “Cannabis.” However, we recognize that the term has roots in racial discrimination in the United States, particularly affecting Black and brown communities. In 1937, the Marihuana Tax Act was enacted, during which time some media outlets spread misleading associations between marijuana and harmful stereotypes of Mexican immigrants and Black Americans (Mikos and Kam 2017). This pattern of discrimination continued, and in the year following the law’s passage, Black Americans were approximately three times more likely to be arrested for drug-related offenses than their white counterparts, while Mexican immigrants were nearly nine times more likely to face arrest for similar charges. The unfair enforcement of these laws, coupled with the spread of false narratives targeting racial and ethnic minorities, contributed to the establishment of discriminatory practices that caused lasting harm to Black and brown communities. These longstanding, racially discriminatory foundations set the stage for the War on Drugs, which further intensified punitive measures and disproportionately targeted Black and brown communities, ultimately fueling the nation’s rise in mass incarceration.

The War on Drugs and Mass Incarceration

The War on Drugs, initiated in the 1970s under President Richard Nixon and intensified throughout the 1980s under President Ronald Reagan, profoundly reshaped the United States’ criminal legal system. Federal initiatives, such as the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986, established mandatory minimum sentencing laws and other punitive measures that dramatically increased the number of people imprisoned for drug offenses. Consequently, the nation’s incarceration rate soared from around 150 per 100,000 residents in the early 1970s to well over 700 per 100,000 by the early 2000s (Johnson 2023). Today, the United States accounts for only about 5% of the world’s population but nearly 20% of its prison population (ACLU n.d.; Cloud et al. 2023).

Although the War on Drugs targeted multiple substances, marijuana offenses—including minor possession—often became a focal point for strict enforcement. Individuals across the country were prosecuted under tough sentencing guidelines, entrenched in a cycle of criminal legal involvement with enduring collateral consequences. Black and brown communities have borne the brunt of these policies, compounding existing inequalities in arrest, conviction, and incarceration rates (Weller, Anin, and Vallas 2022). As discussed more fully in the following section on Arrest Trends for Marijuana-Related Offenses, these enforcement priorities helped make marijuana one of the largest drivers of drug-related arrests nationwide, straining community-police relations and perpetuating racial disparities in the criminal legal system.

Arrest Trends and Marijuana-Related Offense

Marijuana arrests have played a significant role in the rise of mass incarceration (Hodge and Dholakia 2018). Between 2001 and 2010, for instance, more than 8 million people were arrested for marijuana-related offenses—88% of which were for possession alone (ACLU 2013). Even minor marijuana possession charges often resulted in arrest, permanent criminal records, and long-term collateral consequences such as barriers to employment, housing, and education. Black and brown communities have faced the brunt of this, where racially biased policing practices and prosecutorial discretion have exacerbated existing economic and social inequities. In fact, despite comparable rates of marijuana use across racial groups, Black people are on average 3.64 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than their white counterparts, according to a 2020 analysis by the ACLU (ACLU 2020). Over the decades, arresting individuals for low-level marijuana offenses remained one of the primary entry points into the criminal legal system, perpetuating cycles of incarceration and socioeconomic disadvantage among Black and brown populations.

By the 2010s, growing awareness of the adverse consequences of this punitive approach—and the racial disparities therein—spurred calls for reform at both the federal and state levels. These efforts include decriminalizing or legalizing marijuana in numerous jurisdictions and reevaluating sentencing guidelines to reduce harsh penalties for drug offenses.

Defining Legalization vs Decriminalization

Legalization and decriminalization represent two distinct approaches to marijuana reform. Legalization involves the removal of all legal prohibitions against marijuana, allowing for regulated production, distribution, and consumption. Legalization must happen at the federal level or state level, as the federal government has the authority to alter the drug classification of marijuana, and states can preempt federal law by passing legislation to change drug regulation (Marijuana Policy Project n.d.). In contrast, decriminalization reduces or removes criminal penalties for certain marijuana-related offenses, often reclassifying possession or use as a civil infraction rather than a criminal offense. This can be done at either the state or the local level. State decriminalization is accomplished through the passage of legislation that specifies a new maximum punishment for the possession of marijuana under a certain amount, with the harshest penalty being a misdemeanor with no jail time, typically a civil or local infraction punishable with a fine (Bryan 2024). This can also be done at the local level through a city council vote or through a referendum voted on by residents (Austin 2005). Additionally, local prosecutors such as district attorneys can take a de-facto decriminalization approach by changing their office’s practices to stop prosecuting certain marijuana offenses, even if the locality or state has not decriminalized marijuana by law (Fair and Just Prosecution 2017). However, as police would still have the authority to arrest people for these marijuana offenses, it is possible for residents to still face the punitive outcome of obtaining an arrest record for such activities in situations where police department practices are not aligned with district attorney practices.

This versatility in decriminalization pathways offers various options for localities that wish to ameliorate the punitive burden on people who possess marijuana for their personal consumption. It is a strategy that can allow more progressive areas to enact criminal legal reform where the state is more conservative, or which can allow local district attorneys to have discretion regarding where to focus their efforts and  resources.

Policy Changes & Landscape Background in Chicago and Indianapolis

Illinois has been at the forefront of marijuana reform in the Midwest, beginning with the authorization of medical cannabis in 2013 (Illinois Department of Public Health n.d.). In 2016, the state decriminalized marijuana, making possession of small amounts (10 grams or less) punishable by a civil fine rather than criminal penalties (Illinois General Assembly 2016). This shift culminated in the full legalization of marijuana in 2020, allowing adults aged 21 and older to legally purchase and possess up to 30 grams of cannabis (Illinois Gov Press Release 2019). In Chicago, the state’s largest city, these reforms had the potential to reduce marijuana arrests while addressing racial disparities in enforcement.

These policy changes occurred against the backdrop of broader struggles with policing, arrests, and violence in both Chicago and Indianapolis. Chicago, in particular, had been at the center of national conversations on policing and criminal legal reform, especially following high-profile cases of police violence. The 2014 murder of Laquan McDonald by a Chicago Police Department (CPD) officer, and the subsequent release of dashboard camera footage showing McDonald being shot 16 times as he walked away, sparked widespread protests and demands for reform (Associated Press 2019). In response, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) launched an investigation into CPD’s practices, releasing a damning 2017 report that detailed a pattern of excessive force and lack of accountability within the department (Department of Justice 2017). This report led to a court-enforced consent decree aimed at overhauling CPD’s policies.

The 2020 murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis also reignited protests across the country, with Chicago experiencing massive demonstrations led by the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement (Silverstein 2021). These protests renewed calls for police accountability and systemic reform. Following the police killing of 13-year-old Adam Toledo in 2021, the city established the Community Commission for Public Safety and Accountability, a civilian oversight body designed to hold CPD accountable and increase public input into policing policies (Waldman 2021). This broader context of police reform and heightened scrutiny of law enforcement shaped the environment in which Illinois’ marijuana legalization took effect, making room for us to consider how these reforms might influence overall arrest patterns and racial disparities in enforcement.

Indianapolis faced its own policing challenges, with key events shaping public discourse on law enforcement accountability. In 2015, the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department (IMPD) debated the adoption of body-worn cameras for officers (DePompei 2020). While advocates pushed for increased transparency, concerns over cost and implementation delayed the program’s rollout. The urgency for reform intensified in 2020 after the police killing of Dreasjon Reed, a 21-year-old Black man who was shot while livestreaming a police chase on Facebook (Mack 2020). His death, which occurred shortly before the national protests sparked by George Floyd’s murder, led to widespread protests and heightened demands for police accountability.

Against this backdrop, policy change in Indianapolis occurred at the county level. In September 2019, the District Attorney of Marion County Indianapolis, Ryan Mears, announced that he would no longer prosecute simple marijuana charges involving less than one ounce, thus decriminalizing these offenses, effective immediately (Hill and Martin 2019). However, because these offenses were still illegal as the underlying laws around marijuana at the state level remain unchanged, it was unclear if and how decriminalization would impact marijuana arrests. In fact, multiple police departments within the county expressed disapproval of the decision and announced that they would continue business as usual (Hill and Martin 2019). For instance, although the District Attorney indicated that among his motivations for decriminalization was to encourage police departments to focus on violent crimes, the Chief of the IMPD claimed that marijuana arrests were an important tool to investigate violent crime, and that the police force would continue to exercise their discretion on such arrests (Reinke 2019). 

The contrast between local decriminalization in Indianapolis and statewide legalization in Illinois offers an opportunity to compare how arrests and racial disparities may change at the city level following county-level decriminalization and statewide legalization. Placing these policy changes within the broader context of police brutality and calls for reform in both cities provide further understanding of how law enforcement priorities and public pressure for reform were shaped and how this may influence short and long-term results of policy change. In both cities, shifting marijuana policies intersects with deeper struggles over law enforcement’s role, and the extent to which reforms are associated with decreases in racial disparities may depend upon both the marijuana policy changes themselves as well as the broader political momentum, or lack thereof, for racial and social justice.

Literature review

Research within the past five years has begun to explore how legalization and decriminalization impact arrest rates and racial disparities. The literature establishes that both decriminalization and legalization have been associated with decreases in arrest rates (Tran et al. 2020). However, other studies finding heterogeneity in results suggests that the impact of policy change may differ depending on the type of offense or the demographic group in question. For instance, Joshi et al. (2023) found that public consumption arrests increased following marijuana policy change. Additionally, Firth et al. (2020) found that marijuana-related allegations among youth increased after legalization. 

Furthermore, research suggests that arrest trends prior to decriminalization and legalization may differ, which could reflect underlying conditions associated with different forms of policy change. For instance, Sheehan et al. (2021) found that states that decriminalized marijuana did not see decreases prior to policy change, representing a stark difference pre- and post- policy change. On the other hand, multiple studies have found that states that legalized marijuana experienced decreases in arrest rates prior to legalization, likely due to the widespread shift in beliefs and practices related to marijuana enforcement that are needed to make legalization politically feasible. In studies that did not use controls, this makes it difficult to determine the extent to which decreases in arrests are attributable to legalization rather than other factors. Additionally, some research indicates that legalization and decriminalization may have differing effectiveness in decreasing arrests. Specifically, Males and Buchen (2014) found that among five states that either decriminalized for all ages or legalized for people over 21, those that decriminalized experienced larger decreases in arrests.

Other studies found that marijuana policy change is associated with decreases in Black-white racial disparities, though this is not a consistent finding in all cases. While studies have demonstrated decreases in racial disparities in states and cities that implemented decriminalization or legalization, some have found that legalization did not decrease disparities. Additionally, Joshi et al. (2023) found that in Washington, D.C. and Los Angeles, both decriminalization and legalization were associated with decreases in absolute racial disparities. Absolute disparity is calculated by the difference between the Black and white arrest rate, while relative disparity is calculated by the Black-white arrest rate ratio (In this paper, we analyze relative disparity.) However, while relative racial disparities decreased in D.C. after legalization, they increased in Los Angeles. Tran et al. (2020) found that while absolute racial disparities in sales and manufacturing arrests decreased following decriminalization in Philadelphia, relative disparities increased. Additionally, Owusu-Bempah et al. (2024) indicates that Black and Hispanic people in Chicago were more likely to be arrested after a policy change allowing officers to issue tickets in lieu of arrests (Akwasi Owusu-Bempah et al. 2024). Importantly, across all studies – even in cases where racial disparities in arrests decreased – racial disparities still persisted after policy change (Males and Buchen 2014; Sheehan et al. 2021).

Notably, as mentioned above, evidence also suggests that marijuana policy change may have differential impacts on youth and adults (Firth et al. 2020; Sheehan et al. 2021; Gunadi and Shi 2022). While Gunadi and Shi (2022) found that decriminalization was associated with a decrease in arrests among both youth and adults, Firth et al. (2020) found that both marijuana-related allegations among youth and Black-white racial disparities therein increased following legalization. Additionally, Gunadi and Shi (2022) found that racial disparities in arrests did not decrease for youth following policy change. Although the current study focuses on adult arrests, previous research emphasizes the importance of testing for heterogeneity amongst subsections of the population.

This study fills a gap in the literature as the first study to examine arrest trends and racial disparities in localities past 2019. As many localities and states have either decriminalized or legalized marijuana within the past five years, it is crucial to explore how arrests and disparities have shifted since these policy changes have been implemented. This study is also unique in that it compares marijuana arrest data to other drug arrests during the period of study.

Additionally, while most studies have analyzed policy change in the Northeast in the West, little research has focused on Midwestern localities. This study offers the first comparative analysis between Midwestern cities, which have different racial demographics and political dynamics than the localities that research has covered to date. For instance, large Midwestern cities such as Indianapolis and Chicago have distinct socioeconomic and racial dynamics rooted in the Great Migration (Collins 2021). Black families relocated to these cities yet ultimately faced burdens including segregation, inadequate public resources, and harms from policing (Walsh 2021). Each of these factors have the potential to impact the politics as well as the implementation of marijuana reform and thus, could produce different results than similar policy change in other regions. Moreover, since many states in the Midwest are more conservative compared to those in the Northeast and the West, it is important to study policy change at the local level in the Midwest context as progressive cities in this region are experimenting with preempting state law or engaging in contested federalism in a way that may not be necessary in the regions which research has focused on thus far. This is the case in Indianapolis, where the city has more progressive leadership than the state and has advanced local decriminalization while marijuana is still illegal at the state level.

As progressive Midwestern cities and states are often located near more conservative localities and states with varying drug policies, it is likely that reform in a Midwestern city or state could have different implications for surrounding areas than in more progressive hubs like the Northeast or the West. For instance, as Indiana is surrounded by states with varying marijuana policies, there may be different spillover effects of policy change in Indianapolis than in places where the region has similar policies across localities and states – for example, Washington, Oregon and California (Gutta, Jyotsna, and Marion S. Greene 2020). Although this study does not explore changes in arrest rates in surrounding localities, it offers useful analysis, which future research on decriminalization and legalization in this region may consider.

Data & Methods

Chicago and Indianapolis as Case Study Focuses

First and foremost, Chicago and Indianapolis were chosen for this analysis because they have publicly available arrest data including race, allowing us to explore racial disparities in arrests. Additionally, their geographic proximity and similarities in demographic characteristics—despite notable differences in population size—make these cities suitable for a case study. Both cities have significant and similar Black populations (~28% in 2023), which allowed us to explore racial disparities in marijuana-related arrests within a comparable racial context (U.S. Census Bureau 2024).  At the same time, the cities represent different policy approaches to marijuana offenses. Illinois fully legalized marijuana in January 2020, while Marion County, Indiana, decriminalized marijuana offenses in September 2019. These contrasting policy changes provide a framework for examining how varying degrees of marijuana reform are associated with arrest trends and racial disparities among two cities facing similar issues.

Additionally, the geographic closeness of Chicago and Indianapolis minimizes the influence of regional cultural and political differences; they are both Democratic-run cities in the Midwest—despite Indiana being a historically Republican state and Illinois being Democratic—enabling a more focused analysis of how marijuana policies themselves may potentially shape outcomes. While Chicago is significantly larger, with a population exceeding 2.6 million compared to Indianapolis's population of just under 900,000, both cities have sufficiently large datasets to analyze trends over time and compare arrest rates across racial groups.

Study Period Choice of 2014–2023

The timeframe of 2014 to 2023 was selected for both practical and analytical reasons. From a practical standpoint, the arrest dataset for Chicago only extends back to 2014, limiting the earliest year we could analyze for both cities. To ensure consistency and comparability, we aligned the study period across the two cities. Additionally, the inclusion of earlier years allowed us to observe arrest trends both before and after Indianapolis’s decriminalization in 2019 and Chicago’s legalization in 2020, and to establish baseline trends in Indianapolis before decriminalization.

From an analytical perspective, a 10-year period provides a robust dataset to assess long-term trends associated with marijuana policy changes. However, it is important to note that Chicago experienced medical marijuana legalization and decriminalization within the 10-year window and experienced more policy changes than Indianapolis. This range captures variations in marijuana arrests prior to and following each city’s respective policy reforms, allowing us to compare arrest rates and racial disparities change over time following different reforms. It also helps ensure that the data encompasses enough years to detect significant patterns or shifts that may be attributable to the policy changes rather than to short-term fluctuations.

Chicago Arrest Data

We obtained arrest data for Chicago from the City of Chicago’s open access data portal. Each record in the dataset shows information about an arrest executed by the Chicago Police Department (CPD). The data set contains arrests beginning in 2014 and is up to date with the most recent arrests information available in 2024. Source data comes from the Chicago Police Department (CPD) Automated Arrest application. This electronic application is part of the CPD CLEAR (Citizen Law Enforcement Analysis and Reporting) system and is used to process arrests department-wide.

The data is limited to adult arrests where the arrestee was 18 years of age or older on the date of arrest. The data excludes arrest records expunged by CPD pursuant to the Illinois Criminal Identification Act (20 ILCS 2630/5.2). Although some arrest records were expunged, we believe the available data remains valuable for analysis. Black individuals are still disproportionately represented in the dataset, suggesting that the trends observed likely reflect broader systemic disparities rather than being skewed by the absence of expunged records. Each record in the dataset includes an associated case number, arrest date, race, and up to four charges, ordered by severity with CHARGE1 as the most severe charge. Severity is defined based on charge class and charge type, criteria that are routinely used by Illinois court systems to determine penalties for conviction. In case of a tie, charges are presented in the order that the arresting officer listed the charges on the arrest report. Each record has an additional set of columns where a charge characteristic (statute, description, type, or class) for all four charges, or fewer if there were not four charges, is concatenated with the “|” character.

The race of arrested individuals, as reported by arresting officers, is categorized as “Black,” “White,” “Black Hispanic,” “White Hispanic,” “Asian/ Pacific Islander,” “American Indian/ Alaskan Native,” and “Unknown/ Refused.” For the purposes of similarity across Chicago and Indianapolis’ data sets, we coded “Black” and “White” to also include the respective arrests for “Black Hispanic” and “White Hispanic” as Indianapolis’s raw data aggregated both.

Regarding drug offenses, the dataset includes binary variables of charges ranked by severity and includes a column with all charges together. For analyses on marijuana arrests trends in Chicago, we filtered the data in the “CHARGES.DESCRIPTION” column which contains all charges across severity to include only arrests where the column contained “cannabis,” “marijuana,” “cann,’ and “pos can,” to account for the various ways marijuana could have been coded by the respective officer. We also analyzed trends for cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine to determine whether arrests rates and racial disparities in arrest rates followed trends similar to marijuana arrests. We followed the same steps used to filter our arrests for marijuana for these charges.

Indianapolis Arrest Data 

We obtained arrest data for Indianapolis from a state-level dataset, as neither the City of Indianapolis nor the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department had raw arrest data publicly available on their websites at the time of the study. Thus, this case study utilizes the Indiana Arrest Data dataset, which was accessed through Indiana’s Management Performance Hub. Although Chicago’s arrest data is available up to the present date, the Indiana Arrest Data includes data from 2008 only until the end of 2023. As the data is stored separately by each quarter of the year, we merged quarterly data from Q1 of 2014 to Q4 of 2023 to form the complete dataset.

As arrests in this dataset are categorized by county rather than by municipality, we filtered multiple variables in order to create a subset of the data, which most reliably comprises all arrests in Indianapolis during this period. Specifically, we created a subset of data for observations where the offense county was Marion County, the arresting agency county was Marion County, and the arresting agency type was local police. This should narrow the data to arrests made in Indianapolis by the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department (IMPD), as this is the only local police agency in Marion County, and the other agency type, “sheriff” would presumably indicate arrests made by the Marion County Sheriff’s Department – likely outside of the metropolitan area, where county sheriffs have jurisdiction.

The other primary variables used in the analyses for Indianapolis include variables for race and a range of binary variables for offense type. The race of arrested individuals, as observed by arresting officers, is categorized as “Black,” “White,” “Unknown,” and “Other.” No category for Hispanic or Latino ethnicity is included.  Regarding drug offenses, the dataset includes binary variables for “Cocaine,” “Controlled Substance,” “Drug General,” “Heroin,” “Marijuana,” “Meth,” “Narcotic,” “Opium,” “Paraphernalia,” Prescription,” and “Sniffing.” For analyses on marijuana arrests trends in Indianapolis, we filtered the data to include only arrests where the value for “Marijuana” is equal to 1. We also analyzed trends for cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine to determine whether arrests rates and racial disparities in arrest rates followed trends like marijuana arrests. Although this is not a causal analysis, this helps infer whether trends are unique to marijuana – regarding which there were policy changes – or whether marijuana arrests merely reflect arrests trends for other drugs.

Population Demographic Data

For both cities, we used population and demographic data to compute arrest rates per 100,000. We relied on data from the U.S. Census Bureau ACS 5-year Estimates for 2014-2022, and the U.S. Census Bureau Quick Facts for 2023. When computing arrest rates by race, we combined population counts for White Hispanic and White non-Hispanic as well as Black Hispanic and Black Non-Hispanic, as Indiana’s arrest dataset is not disaggregated by Hispanic or Latino ethnicity.

Analyses 

First, we examined marijuana arrest trends in Chicago and Indianapolis by looking at marijuana arrests and arrest rates per 100,000 people in each city between 2014 and 2023. Of particular interest was whether and how arrests after policy change deviated from trends before legalization in Illinois and decriminalization in Marion County. To compare between Chicago and Indianapolis, we analyzed arrest rates by using the populations of Chicago and Indianapolis between 2014 and 2023 and constructing variables for marijuana arrests per 100,000 people to account for city size.

Next, we examined marijuana arrest trends by race in both cities. To accomplish this, we created subsets of the marijuana arrest data specifically for arrests of Black people and arrests of white people. We then used population and racial demographic data from each respective year to compute marijuana arrests rates per 100,000 Black people and per 100,000 white people in Indianapolis and Chicago. This allowed us to examine arrests rates by race while considering the racial demographics of each city. To better understand the racial disparities in marijuana arrest rates, we divided the Black arrest rate by the white arrest rate in both cities to compute the arrest rate ratio, a measure of relative disparity.

Finally, we analyzed arrest trends for other drugs including methamphetamine, cocaine, and heroin per 100,000 white and Black people within the United States. Although this study does not include causal analysis, we were interested in exploring whether marijuana arrest trends – and racial disparities therein – were similar to other drug arrest trends, and whether the trends among marijuana and other drugs diverged following policy change in a way that could indicate that changes in marijuana arrests were a response to policy change rather than a reflection of broader drug arrest trends.

Results

Descriptive Statistics Table

Chicago’s data set contained a total of 28,716 marijuana arrests between 2014 and 2023, where the arrest rate was 147.01, reflecting the overall rate of marijuana-related arrests for all races combined, standardized to a population of 100,000 people. Black people made up 81.1% of marijuana related arrests while white people made up 22.5%. Lastly, the arrest rate ratio was 4.14, indicating that Black individuals are over four times more likely than white individuals to be arrested for marijuana offenses, highlighting a significant racial disparity in marijuana-related arrests within Chicago.

Indianapolis’ data set contained a total of 47,126 marijuana-related arrests between 2014 and 2023. Male arrests represented 83.6% marijuana arrests, and Black people comprised both a higher percentage of total marijuana arrests at 66.5% than white people at 33.1%, and had a higher average marijuana arrest rate per 100,000. Specifically, whereas white people had an average arrest rate of 300 arrests per 100,000 white people, Black people had an average arrest rate 4.37 times higher, at 1,290 per 100,000 Black people.

Marijuana Arrest Rate Trends by Race

Overall, marijuana arrest rates in Indianapolis increased between 2014 and 2017 before trending downwards for the remainder of the study period. The increase in arrest rates in the earlier years of the study period is consistent with arrest trends for the State of Indiana, in which arrests for marijuana and other drugs increased between 2013 and 2017, though such offenses were more likely to receive alternative sentencing in lieu of jail time than in previous years (Indiana Criminal Justice Institute n.d.).

Although Black and white arrest rates in Indianapolis roughly trend together throughout the study period, the Black arrest rate is consistently higher than the white arrest rate, and it decreases most sharply between 2018 (the year before decriminalization) and 2020 (the year after decriminalization).

Additionally, although the Black-white arrest rate ratio trends downwards even prior to policy change, it similarly decreases the most between 2019 and 2020.  However, the arrest rate ratio notably increases again in 2021 and trends upwards until the end of the study period, reaching a racial disparity that exceeds those in previous years. In 2021, the increase in disparity appears to be due to an increase in the Black arrest rate while the white arrest rate decreases, whereas in subsequent years, the increase in disparity appears to be driven by a more pronounced relative decrease in the white arrest rate.

In Chicago, the Black arrest rate similarly remains significantly higher than the white arrest rate across all years. Notably, racial disparities did decrease in Chicago in 2017 after Illinois decriminalized cannabis in July 2016, and again in 2020 when Illinois legalized cannabis in January 2020. Even though these policy changes coincided with temporary declines in the disparity, the arrest rate ratio fluctuates over the long-term. While the racial disparity in Chicago has not increased as much as Indianapolis in the years farther out from policy reform, the initial decreases in disparities observed after legalization were not sustained. For example, while the ratio drops slightly in some years (e.g., 2019 to 2020), it rebounds in others, such as between 2022 and 2023. 

This bar chart compares the Black-white arrest rate ratios for marijuana-related offenses in Chicago and Indianapolis between 2014 and 2023. The blue bars represent Chicago, while the red bars represent Indianapolis. The chart highlights significant racial disparities in arrest rates in both cities.s. The data indicates that the racial disparities in marijuana arrests have persisted over the years, although the disparity has decreased in each case following policy change.

Marijuana Trends vs. Other Drug Trends

In Indianapolis, cocaine arrests provided the best comparison to marijuana arrests as they followed similar trends, both with regards to overall arrests and the racial disparities therein. Specifically, the Black-white cocaine arrest rate ratio decreased sharply between 2018 and 2020, but then increased again, similar to marijuana arrest rate ratios. However, whereas increases in racial disparities during this period for marijuana arrests appear to be driven by a combination of a fluctuation in Black arrest rate and a greater relative decrease in the white arrest rate, the increase in disparity for cocaine arrest appears to be due to a consistent increase in the Black arrest rate after 2020.

This graph displays the trends in cocaine-related arrest rates per 100,000 people in Indianapolis between 2014 and 2023. The data is divided by race, showing a sharp disparity between Black and white populations. Similar to marijuana arrest trends in Indianapolis, the Black arrest rate began decreasing in 2017, continuing to decrease until 2020, post-decriminalization. However, unlike marijuana arrest trends, the Black cocaine arrest rate continues to trend upward again until the end of the study period, suggesting a divergence in drug trends which could potentially be associated with marijuana policy change.

In Chicago, we examined whether marijuana legalization was associated with changing arrest trends for heroin, cocaine, or meth. The data revealed no parallel changes in arrests for these substances, suggesting that trends in marijuana arrests before and after policy change may not be directly correlated with arrests for other drugs. Notably, Black people were arrested at consistently higher rates than white people for cocaine and heroin, a disparity that persisted throughout the period studied. For meth, however, white people experienced slightly higher arrest rates per 100,000.

Discussion

Our analyses suggest that the largest decrease in arrest rates occurred immediately following marijuana policy changes. This is consistent with the established literature finding that marijuana policy change is associated with decreases in arrests. It is worth noting that in both cities, changes in overall arrests rates were mostly driven by shifts in the Black arrest rate – which decreased the most following policy change.. This is also in alignment with previous research indicating that Black arrest rates decrease the most following policy change (Jones et al. 2021). 

Importantly, racial disparities also decreased most significantly immediately following marijuana policy change in both cities, and this was also primarily driven by a decrease in Black arrests. This adds to some existing evidence which suggests that both decriminalization and legalization can decrease racial disparities. However, despite these initial decreases, disparities increased again in both cities: in Chicago, to pre-legalization levels and in Indianapolis, to levels exceeding those prior to decriminalization., Our results reflect mixed findings within the literature and encourage future research on short-term versus long-term impacts of reform across localities.

Decriminalization in Indianapolis and legalization in Chicago both happened near the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. One question that arose in the process of this study was whether decreases in arrests and racial disparities were merely a result of pandemic conditions or whether any of the decreases could be associated more explicitly with marijuana policy change. The pandemic reduced public activity, potentially leading to fewer opportunities for drug-related arrests. The pandemic also disrupted daily life with stay-at-home orders, social distancing measures, and reduced public activity which could have all potentially led to fewer opportunities for drug-related arrests. Additionally, police departments nationwide, including in Chicago and Indianapolis, reported operational changes during this time, such as prioritizing high-risk crimes and reducing proactive policing to limit officer exposure to the virus (Nielson, Zhang, and Ingram 2022). We infer that these shifts suppressed arrest rates for marijuana and other drugs during the pandemic years, making it difficult to determine the extent to which the observed trends during this time were related to marijuana policy change. 

Nonetheless, our findings provide some evidence that these shifts were not solely a consequence of the pandemic. Specifically, Chicago saw similar decreases in marijuana arrests after Illinois decriminalized activities involving less than 10 grams in 2016. However, arrest rates were already on the decline prior to both decriminalization and legalization, so it remains unclear the extent to which these decreases resulted from policy change.  This is consistent with previous research which has found more dramatic decreases in arrests following policy change, though these decreases occurred at a time when arrests were already trending downward (Sheehan, Grucza, and Plunk 2021). Chicago also saw a distinct decrease in the Black arrest rate in 2017 after decriminalization, and a decrease in the Black-white arrest rate ratio. 

Additionally, in Indianapolis, the fact that the Black arrest rate for cocaine began to increase again following the pandemic while the Black arrest rate in marijuana trended downward after the pandemic, despite increases in disparity, indicates that factors beyond the pandemic – potentially decriminalization – have resulted in a sustained decrease in the marijuana arrest rate of Black people.

Insights from Chicago

There is a substantial difference in the marijuana arrest rates between Indianapolis and Chicago, with Indianapolis having an arrest rate roughly double that of Chicago’s throughout the study period. We infer that this discrepancy is partially due to top-down directives implemented by Governor Pritzker. When Governor Pritzker signed HB 1438, legalizing marijuana for adults 21 and over, the bill also offered relief by expunging the records of roughly 770,000 people with marijuana-related offenses (Marijuana Policy Project n.d.). This expungement meant that any past arrest, including those within our study year of 2014-2024, were removed from official records. Since Chicago's data portal excludes expunged arrests, the city’s lower marijuana arrest rate can be attributed, in part, to the hundreds of thousands of marijuana arrests no longer reflected in CPD’s dataset.

Beyond expungements, several key events likely influenced Chicago’s arrest trends. In April 2015, the city settled with the family of Laquan McDonald for $5 million, months before footage of his fatal police shooting was released to the public (Davey 2015). The settlement and subsequent public outcry contributed to heightened scrutiny of the CPD, potentially leading to a drop in arrests that year. Similarly, in 2017, the U.S. Department of Justice released a report accusing CPD of excessive violence civil rights violations, further intensifying demands for reform and coinciding with another drop in arrest rates. It is also likely that the national protests George Floyd’s murder in May 2020 coupled with shifting policing priorities and public pressure, likely contributed to the sharp decline in marijuana-related arrests in 2021.

Whereas in Indianapolis, the white arrest rate consistently decreased following decriminalization,, both the Black and white arrest rates in Chicago experienced fluctuations after the initial decrease following both policy decriminalization and legalization.. Similar to Indianapolis, racial disparities increased again as well – though the white arrest rate did not consistently trend downward following policy change. Thus, in Chicago, reversions to racial disparities after the years immediately following policy change were not due to a disproportionate decrease in arrest rate for white Chicagoans.

We speculate that after an initial decrease in arrests and disparities following decriminalization in 2016, there could have been a reversion to traditional policing practices as the policy change receded from the public and media spotlight, given that marijuana possession was still illegal. By “traditional policing practices,” we are referring to the historical pattern of the over-policing of Black and brown communities, practices which have been widely criticized for failing to contribute meaningfully to public safety while perpetuating systemic inequities. Additionally, following legalization, it is possible that law enforcement shifted their focus to higher-level marijuana offenses, including illegal marijuana sales, and that previous racial disparities were mirrored.

It is also possible that some of the hurdles Chicagoans faced to establish marijuana businesses once legalization occurred could have led to an increase in higher level marijuana offenses. The Chicago Tribune highlighted some of the barriers that impeded Black and Latino entrepreneurs from entering the legal cannabis market (Williams 2021). According to their reporting, Illinois’ marijuana industry, dominated by well-funded white-owned dispensaries, made it exceedingly difficult for Black and Latino business owners to obtain licenses, secure capital, and navigate the complex regulatory environment (Williams 2021). Without equitable access to the legal market, many Black and Latinos, historically marginalized by the war on drugs, remained relegated to an illegal market, which may have been targeted more acutely following legalization. It is possible that this could account for arrests going back up after marijuana legalization. Facing these obstacles, some may have instead chosen to continue or increase illegal sales of high amounts of marijuana to sustain livelihoods, particularly in communities disproportionately affected by systemic inequities. This dynamic could help explain why arrests for marijuana-related offenses among Black and Latino individuals have remained disproportionately high, even after legalization.

Insights from Indianapolis

Contrary to Sheehan et al. (2021)’s finding that states that decriminalized did not see decreases in arrest rates prior to policy change, arrest rates in Indianapolis began to decline two years prior to decriminalization. Potential explanations for this diversion from previous research could include that our study was at the municipal level rather than the state level, and that the time period differed, with Sheehan et al. (2021) analyzing data beginning as early as 2008, when arrest trends overall may have been different than in the late 2010s. Without a control city, this decrease in arrests predating decriminalization makes it difficult to determine the extent to which subsequent decreases in arrests were attributable to decriminalization.

Although racial disparities ultimately increased after the years immediately following decriminalization – mostly driven by more pronounced decreases in white arrest rates than Black arrest rates – it is of particular interest  that trends in the Black arrest rate  diverged between marijuana arrests and cocaine arrests following marijuana policy change. Given parallel trends in Black arrests rates for cocaine and marijuana prior to policy change, this could indicate that absent marijuana policy reform, the Black arrest rate may have increased overall in subsequent years, similar to cocaine. Specifically, while the Black cocaine arrests decreased along with the Black marijuana arrest rates  from 2017 to 2020, the Black arrest rate for marijuana arrests continued trending downward, whereas the Black arrest rate for cocaine began trending upwards again.  A lack of causal analysis prevents a definitive conclusion that the overall decrease in the Black marijuana arrest rate is attributable to decriminalization. However, the establishment of parallel trends with cocaine arrests prior to reform could indicate that overall decreases in the Black marijuana arrest rate were not only due to the temporary changes inflicted by the pandemic but rather could be a sustained change resulting from policy change. Nonetheless, a more rigorous analysis is needed to infer causality.

Limitations & Future Research

Data

Limitations in both the available data and the study’s design highlight the need for further research on the impact of decriminalization and legalization on arrests and racial disparities. For instance, Chicago’s dataset includes only arrests of adults 18 years of age and older, whereas Indiana’s arrest data includes youth as well as adult arrests. It was not possible to filter out all arrests of individuals in Indiana under the age of 18, as the lowest age bracket is categorized as 1-14 years, and the second lowest age bracket is 15-24 years. Arrests of people aged 1-14 years comprise only .0003% of the Indianapolis dataset, so we opted to include these observations. However, differences in arrest trends between the two cities could be partially explained by a difference in the age composition of arrest data.

Additionally, public arrest data for Chicago and Indiana store information on marijuana-related offenses differently, which means that the observations analyzed for both cities might not be directly comparable. Moreover, the expungement of some Chicago marijuana arrest data could mean that the types of offenses included in Chicago’s dataset could be characteristically different than those in Indianapolis (i.e. Chicago’s dataset could include more higher-level offenses, since arrests for many low-level offenses were removed). A more in-depth exploration of the types of charges included in each dataset is warranted, especially as research indicates that impact of policy change on arrests differs by offense type (Joshi, Doonan, and Pamplin 2023).

More generally, the standardization of data collection methods for drug offenses across localities could facilitate future research on the impact of decriminalization and legalization. Additionally, access to further information from the Chicago Police Department regarding demographic information linked to arrests – such as age and gender – could allow researchers to look at heterogeneous results and compare with Indianapolis, which does include this information in its public arrest data. In fact, previous research at the state level has found that youth and adults have been impacted differently by marijuana policy change, so future research should explore implications for different age groups at the municipal level as well (Sheehan, Grucza, and Plunk 2021).

Research Design

This study employed a case study approach, and did not include control groups or account for other variables that may have influenced arrest trends, such as broader shifts in policing priorities, economic factors, or other concurrent policy changes unrelated to marijuana legislation. This lack of controls limits our ability to isolate the effects of decriminalization and legalization from other influences. Additionally, the analysis is limited to only two cities, making it difficult to generalize findings to other cities or to draw broader conclusions about the impacts of marijuana policy changes across different jurisdictions. Local factors, such as political climates, policing practices, and demographic compositions, likely influenced the outcomes observed in Chicago and Indianapolis, and these factors may differ substantially elsewhere.

A further confounding factor was the COVID-19 pandemic, which overlapped with part of the study period and complicated the interpretation of results, as some changes in arrest trends may be attributable to pandemic-related shifts rather than marijuana policy changes. Future research should examine arrest data in cities where similar policy changes occurred outside the context of such a significant global event.

To address these limitations, future studies could incorporate more rigorous research designs, such as difference-in-differences analyses, which compare trends in jurisdictions with and without marijuana policy changes while controlling for confounding factors. Expanding the scope to include a greater number of cities or states could also help identify broader patterns and enhance the generalizability of findings.

Conclusion & Policy Recommendations

Despite the limitations of this study, both the research process and the findings reveal insights with significant policy implications. By examining trends in marijuana-related arrests rates and racial disparities in two major cities, Indianapolis and Chicago, our analysis highlights how local and state-level decriminalization and legalization policy changes could work to meaningfully decrease involvement in the criminal legal system and mitigate racial disparities. Although these trends varied across jurisdictions, the study underscored the power of targeted marijuana policy reforms to reduce arrests and disparities in the years immediately following implementation. These findings align with the growing body of research demonstrating that thoughtfully crafted policy change can help address the historical and ongoing harm that specific drug laws have imposed on Black and brown communities. Considering these insights, local and state actors should pursue the following recommendations: 

• Pursue marijuana policy change as a tool to decrease criminal legal system involvement and racial disparities therein. 

  Although trends in post-policy arrest rates and racial disparities differed over time between Indianapolis and Chicago, it remains true that both arrests and racial disparities decreased in the years immediately following each marijuana policy change during the study period. This finding extends beyond the current study and has been demonstrated in other contexts. Although many factors can influence the extent to which such decreases are observed and whether they are sustained, it is clear that marijuana policy change can reduce the harms associated with the criminal legal system. Black people nationwide are 3.64 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than their white counterparts, but thoughtfully and strategically implemented policy change has a strong potential to ameliorate this inequity (ACLU 2020). Even in contexts where political dynamics hinder marijuana policy change at the state level, district attorneys can reduce police contact within Black communities and decrease racial disparities by pursuing decriminalization of marijuana offenses.

• All police departments should collect race and ethnicity information during arrests and publish it in open arrest datasets. 

  Arrest datasets vary widely across localities, which makes it difficult to study the impacts of policy change in different jurisdictions. Although the Federal Bureau of Investigations has managed the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program since 1930, in an attempt to standardize data collection by local and state law enforcement, including information related to race and ethnicity. This is a voluntary program, and not all law enforcement agencies are forced to comply with these standards (Rantala 2020). This presents a challenge to researchers aiming to disaggregate data by population demographics. 

  As of 2021, 40 states reported race in arrest records, and only 15 reported ethnicity (Rodriguez 2021).  However, even if states report and publish this data at the state level, municipal police departments may not have open datasets, making it difficult to study racial disparities at the local level. This is the case in Indiana; the State has a public arrest dataset, which includes race information, whereas the City of Indianapolis did not have public arrest data at the time of this study. Thus, additional analysis was necessary to filter marijuana arrests conducted within Marion County by the local police, which was the most comprehensive approximation for arrests made by the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department.

  The lack of accessible local arrest data, especially that containing race and ethnicity information, hinders the ability to assess how policies, including drug reform, may impact various subsets of the population. Thus, local and state policymakers should work to ensure that law enforcement is required to report the race and ethnicity of arrested individuals, and share it publicly in de-identified datasets, to enable researchers to effectively monitor racial disparities in drug arrests and evaluate the impact of policy change. For instance, states have passed legislation requiring local law enforcement agencies to record and report race and ethnicity information in traffic and pedestrian stops to increase transparency regarding racial profiling (Ramirez, McDevitt, and Farrell 2000). Similar laws can be pursued as a tool to study racial disparities in arrests—including marijuana arrests—and to track any shifts in disparities associated with policy change.

• When advancing local marijuana policy change, stakeholders should collaborate to achieve alignment on the goals of marijuana policy change, including comprehensive implementation plans.

  The ability of marijuana policy changes to reduce arrests and racial disparities long-term depends, in part, on buy-in from the various stakeholders involved in the enforcement of drug laws, as well as those responsible for overseeing the legal sale of marijuana. For instance, facilitating equitable access to the marijuana industry post-legalization could help ensure that demographics historically harmed by drug laws—especially marginalized Black and brown communities—can benefit from policy change. Additionally, as highlighted in the literature review, legalization has in some cases led to an increase in arrests for particular populations, such as youth, or for particular offenses, such as public consumption. This could be due to confusion regarding new drug policies or a change in access to marijuana following policy change. In order to prevent marijuana policy change from having inadvertent negative impacts on subsets of the community, it is important that stakeholders prepare for and reduce the risk of negative outcomes.

  For example, regulation could help prevent dispensaries from selling marijuana to underage people and thus could reduce youth arrests for marijuana-related offenses. Additionally, after policy change, local and state governments can advance public education to clarify, for example, the places where and the people for whom marijuana consumption is legal. They can also urge police departments to exercise leniency in the period directly following policy change to prevent any confusion or adjustments during the transition period from increasing the burden of policing for some populations.

  Furthermore, especially in the case of decriminalization, local officials should aim to achieve alignment on the importance of policy change and desired outcomes. For example, when district attorneys advance de-facto decriminalization by opting to not prosecute certain marijuana offenses, it is ideal for police departments to be on board with this shift in policy to prevent unnecessary arrests. In cases where marijuana possession is still illegal, but a locality has decriminalized marijuana by not prosecuting certain drug offenses, ensuring that law enforcement is aligned with the goals of this policy change may enhance the ability of the policy to reduce arrests and disparities. This could be achieved through the co-production of an implementation plan which takes these risks into consideration and includes data monitoring to track the impact of marijuana policy change over time. 

• Policy design and implementation should ensure that decreases in disparities following reform are sustained overtime.

  Policymakers must work to prevent increases in racial disparities in arrests that may occur after initial decreases following policy change, as was the situation in both Chicago and Indianapolis. Although both cities saw temporary decreases in racial disparities after reform, racial disparities ultimately persisted. If it is the case that, in Chicago, police diverted their resources to making arrests for the illegal sale of marijuana or for the illegal use of marijuana, such as public consumption, it is important for stakeholders to ensure that any new policing practices are implemented in an equitable way to reduce the risk that racial disparities are merely displaced to other offenses. Additionally, although decreases in white arrest rates signals progress, drug policy reform should not disproportionately benefit groups along racial lines, which appeared to be the case in Indianapolis, where greater relative decreases in the white arrest rate towards the end of the study period led to even greater racial disparities than pre-reform. Thus, further research should explore mechanisms that may lead to prominent decreases in Black arrest rates following policy change, and local practices that can enable this progress towards racial equity to continue in the long-term. 

*This article was edited by Paco Gonzalez (Princeton University) and Derek Hoot (Princeton University).

About the Authors

Mustafa Ali-Smith is a social justice advocate who has worked around criminal justice issues for several years in both the non-profit and government spaces. He holds a B.S. in Public Administration from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and an interdisciplinary M.A. from the University of Pennsylvania, with concentrations in Criminal Justice, Education, and Race. Mustafa is set to earn his MPA from Princeton University's School of Public and International Affairs in May 2025

Keiana West is a second year MPA student at Princeton University’s School of Public and International Affairs. She specializes in advancing racial equity, community safety, and public health alongside local and state governments and community coalitions. Keiana earned a B.A. in Psychology and a concentration in Africana Studies from Williams College.

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AI Statement

Throughout the writing process, we used AI to identify and correct grammatical errors in our article. Additionally, we used AI to support our R coding by troubleshooting errors and optimizing code efficiency as we analyzed our data. However, all intellectual contributions, interpretations, and conclusions remain our own.

February 20, 2025
Mustafa Ali-Smith & Keiana West

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