Marijuana Testing Scandal Creates Push to Reassign Michigan’s Crime Lab

A group of attorneys are pushing to remove the state’s crime lab from the Michigan State Police and reassign it to a more trustworthy department.

Earlier this year, we reported on a scandal involving state prosecutors and the MSP Forensic Science Division, which were discovered to be working together to ensure misdemeanor marijuana arrests were bumped up to felonies. It seems a change in the crime lab’s policy for detecting marijuana has allowed them to rule edibles and oils as inconclusive for being derived from synthetic means, allowing the prosecution to charge defendants with felony possession of synthetic marijuana.

These underhanded actions have caused medical marijuana patients caught in possession of edibles and extracts to not only face felony charges but to also have their kids removed from the home by Child Protective Services.

The Komorn Law Firm, which uncovered the scandal through an analysis of documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, recently filed a federal complaint against the crime lab, and are now lobbying to have it reassigned to another state agency.