Pat Dollard

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The Hill:

A top-level staffer for Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) has been arrested and charged with possession of marijuana after he allegedly tried to bring the illegal substance into the senator’s office.

U.S. Capitol Police arrested Marcus Stanley just before noon on Tuesday as he made his way through the security screening area to the Senate Hart Office Building, according to a police report. Stanley allegedly tried to “remove and conceal an item from his pocket,” the report states.

An officer investigated Stanley and allegedly discovered a green, leafy substance, which later tested positive for THC, a main component of marijuana. Stanley was arrested and processed at Capitol Police headquarters.

Afterward, Stanley submitted his resignation to Boxer, according to her office.

“Marcus Stanley is no longer with this office,” said Zachary Coile, a spokesman for Boxer, in a statement to The Hill. “He submitted his resignation and Sen. Boxer accepted it because his actions yesterday were wrong and unacceptable.”

Stanley had served as Boxer’s senior economic adviser for more than a year. He worked as a senior economist with the Joint Economic Committee before that and was an assistant professor of economics at Case Western Reserve University.

Stanley’s arrest comes less than two months after The Hill reported that a dozen people have been arrested for allegedly attempting to bring marijuana into the Capitol over the past 18 months.

This is not the first time in recent years that a senior Boxer aide has left in the face of criminal charges.

In 2008 Jeffrey P. Rosato was fired from Boxer’s office after he was charged with distributing and receiving child pornography in 2008. Six months later, the former counsel to Boxer and policy adviser with the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, was found guilty of the charges and sentenced to five years in prison.

Boxer is in a tough reelection battle this cycle. A proposition to legalize the possession and selling of marijuana will be on California’s ballot in November.