A key Louisiana Senate committee has approved a House-passed bill to streamline expungements for people with first-time marijuana possession convictions.
About a week after the House passed the legislation from Rep. Delisha Boyd (D), the Senate Judiciary C Committee advanced it with a favorable report in a voice vote on Wednesday, sending it to the floor before potentially being sent to the governor’s desk.
The measure makes it so people who are convicted of possessing up to 14 grams of cannabis as a first offense can petition the courts to wipe their record after 90 days from the time of the conviction.
That would significantly speed up the timeline for relief, as current law maintains that people must wait at least five years before petitioning for expungement of certain records.
Boyd told senators at the committee meeting that her legislation is focused on “reducing the fees as well as streamlining the process” for people seeking cannabis expungements and that she has worked with stakeholders such as district attorneys and sheriffs on crafting the bill’s language.
Watch the Senate committee discuss the cannabis expungements proposal, starting at 2:00:23 into the video below:
The bill was previously amended in a House committee to
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