State Sen. William “Bill” Folden (R-Frederick) is sponsoring a bill to allow law enforcement officers to stop and search a vehicle if the odor of cannabis is perceptible from the outside.
The bill, titled the Drug Free Roadways Act of 2024, would reverse a key provision of a law passed on the final day of the 2023 legislative session.
HB1071, which took effect on July 1, 2023, prohibits law enforcement officers from initiating a stop or search of a person, motor vehicle or other vessel based solely on “the odor of burnt or unburnt cannabis.”
Folden’s bill, SB396, would retain the prohibition on stopping or searching a person or their belongings based on the odor of cannabis alone while allowing law enforcement officers to stop and search a vehicle for the same reason.
Folden’s bill would also repeal a section of the 2023 law that states that evidence obtained on the basis of cannabis odor alone, even if obtained through a consensual search, is not admissible in court.
Democrats are not interested in making substantive changes, Senate President Bill Ferguson (D-Baltimore City) has said, and are only considering what they refer to as “improvements” to Maryland’s cannabis law.
“I think we’re going to have a cannabis bill this year that sort of does some — I don’t want to call it clean-up, but adjustments to the system that we passed last year,” Ferguson said, according to Capital News Service. “I don’t think you’ll see major changes to the program, but implementation adjustments.”
During a hearing in front of the Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee on Friday, Folden — who has a background in law enforcement — described the bill as a matter of public safety designed to guard against impaired driving.
