## Facts

- Andre Lee Juwaun Maestas was an Arizona State University student and a qualified Arizona Medical Marijuana Act (AMMA) registry cardholder.
- An officer encountered Maestas on campus near his dormitory and found his valid AMMA card in his wallet.
- Maestas admitted he had marijuana in his dorm room.
- Police obtained a warrant and found two envelopes containing about 0.4 grams of marijuana in the dorm room.
- The amount was well below AMMA’s allowable possession limit of 2.5 ounces.
- Maestas was charged with obstructing a public thoroughfare and possession of marijuana.
- Maestas moved to dismiss the marijuana charge, asserting AMMA immunity from “arrest, prosecution or penalty” for compliant possession.
- The trial court denied the motion and, after a bench trial, convicted Maestas of marijuana possession.
- The court of appeals reversed, concluding A.R.S. § 15-108(A) was unconstitutional under the Voter Protection Act (VPA).
- The Arizona Supreme Court granted review to decide whether § 15-108(A) violates the VPA by effectively amending AMMA.

## Issues

1. Whether A.R.S. § 15-108(A), which prohibits marijuana possession or use on public college and university campuses, “amends” AMMA for VPA purposes when applied to AMMA-compliant cardholders.
2. If it is an amendment, whether § 15-108(A) “furthers the purposes” of AMMA as required by the VPA.
3. Whether Maestas’s marijuana-possession conviction could stand given his AMMA-compliant possession on a public university campus.

## Decision

- The Arizona Supreme Court held that § 15-108(A) violates the VPA as applied to AMMA-compliant marijuana possession or use by qualified cardholders on public higher-education campuses.
- The Court concluded § 15-108(A) changes AMMA’s scope and effect by re-criminalizing conduct that AMMA immunizes, making it an “amendment” under the VPA.
- Although § 15-108(A) passed with the required supermajority vote, the Court held it did not “further the purposes” of AMMA because it narrows voter-conferred immunity beyond AMMA’s specified exceptions.
- The Court vacated Maestas’s marijuana-possession conviction.
- The Court vacated the court of appeals’ opinion and substituted its own narrower VPA analysis while reaching the same outcome for Maestas.

## Legal Principles

- AMMA grants qualified cardholders substantive immunity from “arrest, prosecution or penalty in any manner” for AMMA-compliant possession and use, subject only to voter-specified exceptions.
- Under the VPA, a statute is an “amendment” of a voter-approved initiative if it changes the meaning, scope, or effect of the initiative, including by re-criminalizing conduct the initiative immunized.
- Even with a three-fourths legislative vote, an amendment to a voter-approved initiative is invalid unless it furthers the initiative’s purposes.
- A law that restricts voter-conferred immunity by adding broad new location-based prohibitions not contained in the initiative does not further the initiative’s purposes.
- The VPA defect in § 15-108(A) arises only where the statute conflicts with AMMA immunity; the statute may remain enforceable against non-cardholders or noncompliant conduct.

## Conclusion

Because Maestas was a qualified AMMA cardholder and possessed a lawful amount of marijuana, applying § 15-108(A) to criminalize his campus possession impermissibly narrowed AMMA’s voter-granted immunity and violated the VPA, requiring vacatur of his marijuana-possession conviction.


State v. Maestas, 244 Ariz. 9, 417 P.3d 774 (Ariz. 2018)