How illegal cannabis smoked California

California voters legalized cannabis in 2016, and one of the issues that was supposed to be solved was the violence and environmental wreckage associated with the drug’s illegal trade. But that hasn’t happened.

Inside California’s famed “Emerald Triangle,” a region north of San Francisco known for its weed, there’s an estimated 5,000 to 10,000 illegal cannabis farms alone. The under-the-radar cultivation is messing with once-peaceful communities. Today, we get into this issue. Read the full transcript here.

Host: Gustavo Arellano

Guests: L.A. Times investigative reporter Paige St. John

More reading:

Legal Weed, Broken Promises: A Times series on the fallout of legal pot in California

Nobody knows how widespread illegal cannabis grows are in California. So we mapped them

The reality of legal weed in California: Huge illegal grows, violence, worker exploitation and deaths