Driving under the influence of cannabis could carry big consequences in Missouri

SCOTT CITY, Mo (KBSI) – Missouri is now a cannabis friendly state but not before getting behind the wheel of a vehicle.

Missouri’s first licensed sales of recreational marijuana occurred on February third of 2023, making it legal for recreational use.

Anna Mitchell is a Police Officer for Scott City Police Department, and she explains how officers identify if someone is driving impaired.

“There is not necessarily a limit when it comes to Marijuana, DWI is primarily based on impaired driving.” 

Currently the only way to test for marijuana is through a blood test, there is no breathalyzer scan that can be done to detect how much cannabis is in someone’s system like there is with alcohol and there is currently no limit on how much marijuana someone can have in their system. Mitchell says officers largely base their findings off of how impaired someone seems to appear.

“When it comes to Marijuana and when it comes to impairment as long as we can prove impairment based on observation, field interview, field sobriety testing then that’s impairment. “ 

The consequences for driving under the influence of marijuana and driving under the influence of alcohol are relatively the same. If stopped you could face jail time, fines and revocation of your license.

Chriss Griggs is the Chief of Police for Scott City Police Department, and he says they haven’t really had a lot of issues with impaired drivers.  

“Since it became legal, of course it’s available now to purchase but as far as our enforcement goes, we haven’t really seen a big uptick in that.”