Another Medical Marijuana Co-Op Raided
June 8th, 2009 by Rick
With a search warrant, deputies from the Kern County Sheriff’s Department’s Major Violator Unit, raided a medical marijuana co-op in Oildale, California last Wednesday.
Despite nobody being arrested, the deputies confiscated four pounds of marijuana that were in a safe. Also found were 299 pill bottles that were labeled individually and contained between a gram to a quarter ounce of marijuana in each (reportedly a total of 14 grams). More than $2000 cash, as well as business records and numerous computers were seized.
Two things about this story:
- If there were 299 pill bottles that contained at least a gram to a quarter ounce of marijuana in each, there would be at least 299 grams… not 14… either someone doesn’t have their facts straight or someone is dipping into the supply.
- How do you serve a search warrant, confiscate a business’s property and then not arrest anyone?.
In early May, the same sheriff’s department raided the Green Cross Co-op in East Bakersfield.
One of the reasons that these co-ops are being raided is the fact that apparently there are new state attorney guidelines that dictate only non-profit medical marijuana co-ops are allowed to conduct business under state law, not the ones that secure profits.
Delaware Senate Committee Approves MMJ Bill
June 8th, 2009 by Rick
Who is going to be the 14th state to legalize medical marijuana? Delaware is a state that just may be in the running.
A medical marijuana bill for patients with “debilitating medical conditions” passed the Delaware Senate health and social services committee last Wednesday, during a 90-minute hearing where no member spoke against the bill.
The main sponsor, Sen. Margaret Rose Henry commented that the bill would need to be “revised and clarified” before having it move to the Senate.
Megan Fox: “Legalize Weed”
June 5th, 2009 by Rick
Another celebrity has come out for the marijuana legalization movement. Hollywood hottie, Megan Fox told British GQ Magazine:
I can’t tell you how much bullshit I’ve been through because I will openly say that I smoke weed. People look at it like it’s this crazy, hippy, (jacked)-up thing to do. And it’s not. I hope they legalize it. [...] And when they do, I’ll be the first person in line to buy my pack of joints.
Say marijuana was legalized and big tobacco or big pharma got their grubby claws on it, then plan on it being less than affordable since the government loves to tax and eventually the state would likely follow their lead. Just like the days of bootlegging during prohibition, it will still be grown by people that would wind up selling it on the black market for less than what you pay at stores or pharmacies.
As long as marijuana equates to some form of currency, it will be a never ending cycle. After all, you can start your own microbrew in the comfort of your home even though most of the alcohol we generally consume are sold in stores and taxed. Would we be able to grow our own plants and do the very same with marijuana?
Garden State May Become Greener
June 5th, 2009 by Rick
New Jersey may just become the 14th state to legalize medical marijuana for chronically ill patients. On Thursday, the Assembly Health and Senior Services Committee approved the medical marijuana bill that the senate had passed, with an overwhelming eight to one (with two abstentions) vote.
The bill already has the backing of State Attorney General Anne Milgram saying “it’s workable” and Governor Jon Corzine has already said that he would sign the bill into a law.
If passed into a law it would allow patients whose doctors have determined them to be chronically ill to be issued an identification card that lets them grow six plants or obtain the medical marijuana at an “alternative medicine center.”
Middlesex Police Chief James Benson, representing the State Association of Chiefs of Police, said:
It will lead to increased marijuana use, increased crime, and an increased threat to public safety.
A co-sponsor of the bill, State Senator Fred Scutari, said:
It will be the most restrictive law in the U.S. … with the most safeguards in terms of abuse.
Per usual, law enforcement officials at a local level continue to repeat the rhetoric that has been whispered into their ears by drug warriors. It doesn’t matter if a state declares medical marijuana legal, city officials and their law enforcement can seemingly do whatever they want when it comes to circumventing a law.
Horizon Shows Desperate Times for Prince of Pot
June 5th, 2009 by RickAs usual, before the Prince of Pot begins talking, we see him toking — yet this time it seems as if he’s more mentally exhausted than ever. His slouched body language and empty stare into the camera tell us that this man has a lot on his mind these days, issues that have been haunting him since the DEA made him their personal pet project by declaring him one of the top 50 drug traffickers of the world.
Emery and his wife Jodie, deliver the sad news that Cannabis Culture magazine has ceased print publication. The main reasons were the cost (every issue lost $40,000), finding printers and the fact that the articles within the magazine would already be covered by various sources online by the time the magazine was released.
Despite the end of the print form of the Cannabis Culture magazine, they are redirecting their energy into concentrating on their online website Cannabis Culture, and having different people in the scene participating. If interested in the remainder stock of back issues of Cannabis Culture magazine, they are being sold in a bundle package (60 issues) for $100. All of the back issues are also in the archives of their website.
Despite the city of Vancouver’s attempt to shut down his storefront businesses or at least wrapping it up with bureaucratic red tape, Emery still seems to be in somewhat good spirits. He’s willing to basque in the spotlight for his supporters — that is until the dark cloud of the U.S. federal government moves in.
There was somewhat good news on the case against Emery’s friends and employees, Michelle Rainey and Gregory Keith Williams who plead guilty to conspiracy to manufacture marijuana (a charge stemming back to the days when Emery’s seed bank was in operation,) are to be sentenced to two years of probation in July.
As for Emery, his lawyer basically told him he doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell in not being expedited to the United States. Once here in the states, he will be stuck here by a sneaky stipulation that will force him to pay whatever fine he is subjected to before he can even think about serving x-amount of time in Canada. He plans to plead guilty to one count of marijuana distribution, which doesn’t have a minimum sentencing or fines. The feds want to give Emery five to eight years and Emery plans to receive less.
Like a true master of the matrix, Emery plans on using his cultural influence and his supporters to pimp the system, particularly when it comes to social networking. His idea is to have people contact the federal judge in an effort to give testimonials or essays on why they should be lenient with sentencing. Unfortunately for Emery, if the government has made this much of an effort to convict him, then they plan to make him an example that the drug war is still on. If that’s the case, I’m sure that they will cover their bases and assign a judge to the case that may not be able to be influenced by any outside sources or parties.
LA Loophole Within Moratorium to Be Plugged
June 4th, 2009 by Rick
Back in 2005 there were only four medical marijuana dispensaries in Los Angeles, one each in the areas of Hancock Park, Van Nuys, Rancho Park and Cheviot Hills. Police say now 600 have popped up, with more perhaps out there that they don’t know about.
The rise came about after a moratorium was passed in 2007, that was actually supposed to stop future dispensaries from opening. The 186 that were already registered with the city and operating were allowed to remain open for business.
The moratorium contains a standard provision of a hardship exemption that allows City Council to listen to appeals from the dispensaries to legally operate. Because of typical red tape and city officials not having a clue on how to regulate the dispensaries, none of the 508 hardships applications have been processed (or let alone looked at) but by the dispensaries filing for a hardship application it prevented the city attorney’s office from engaging in prosecution.
Next Tuesday, the City Council’s planning committee intends to send a motion to the council designed to take the hardship exemption clause out of the moratorium, that will essentially close the loophole.
Ed Reyes, Chairman of the committee, said:
I don’t think anyone could have predicted how that clause was going to be used. [...] We’ve got abusive folks who are just gaming the system.
After the motion becomes a law, it is planned to have the city attorney shut down any dispensaries that attempt to open afterwards, allowing the hundreds of dispensaries already operating to be exempt. After the motion is filed it may still take a couple of weeks for it to become a law.
Frank Bush, assistant chief for the Code Enforcement Bureau noted:
Technically, they are not open legally. [...] Before we can take any further enforcement action, the City Council has to review them and take any action.
The concern apparently comes from the 200 complaints filed by citizens to the Department of Building and Safety who in turn sent out 80 orders to those dispensaries citizens complained about to comply with the moratorium. Obviously there is a much bigger agenda at a local city level trying to stifle the medical marijuana community, more than likely taking secret directives from the state, while they in turn are discreetly influenced at a federal level.
British Woman Sentenced to Life in Laos Drug Court
June 4th, 2009 by RussThe tendrils of US drug enforcement reach across borders, over oceans, and even into the legal affairs of foreign nations. When British national, Samantha Orabator was caught concealing a pound and a half of heroin in a Laotian airport last August, her life was nearly forfeited because of a US campaign to toughen drug standards in Asia’s ‘Golden Triangle.’
Only spared execution because she was pregnant, this week’s ruling by a Laotian court imposed the second most stringent possible sentence, life imprisonment. In other words, posession of a pound and a half of a particular opiate extract, nearly cut short the life of a 20-year old girl. Rapists, murderers, and war criminals seem to have better odds of parole in certain parts of the world, than those attempting to profit from unsanctioned substances.
One could chalk up this legal disparity to the oddities of a foreign, facist culture. In actuality, much of the motivation for Laos’ draconian drug policy comes in the form of US dollars. In 1993, Laos was ‘certified for narcotics cooperation ‘ with the US State Department. In return for showing erradication of opium crops and increasing crackdowns on drug trafficking, Laotian officials received training from American drug police as well as millions of dollars to fund the ramping up of their anti-narcotics operations.
In other words, if the Laotian government showed leniency to those convicted of non-violent drug crimes, they could lose an important source of foreign aid.
Meanwhile, the United States drives the demand for about a quarter of the world’s consumed heroin. Instead of acting to reduce demand internally, it has strong-armed, threatened, or outright bribed other nations to impose disastrously incongruous and disproportionate laws that have destroyed tens of millions of lives.
Canada to Conduct Research for Heroin Replacement
June 4th, 2009 by Rick
Free heroin is planned to be given to over 300 addicts in the Canadian cities of Vancouver and Montreal, as part of a three year project called Study to Assess Longer-term Opioid Medication Effectiveness, research designed to find drug replacements to the highly addictive opiate.
In the first stage of the study, researchers plan on injecting some addicts with Dilaudid — a prescribed painkiller that derives from the same opioid family while a control group receives heroin. In the second stage they plan to give the addicts a pill form of Dilaudid and heroin — eliminating the need for nursing assistance.
Trish Walsh, executive director of the InnerChange Foundation, an advocacy group for addicts that funds drug research, said:
We have the potential to revolutionize treatment on an international basis. [...] It gives addicts the opportunity to move from a very unsafe, back-alley drug to taking an oral tablet.
Dr. Martin Schechter, who works at the the School of Population and Public Health at the University of B.C. said the Canadian Institute of Health Research is going to fund the research costs for the study, while the Vancouver Coastal Health and the Quebec Ministry of Health are to fund the clinical costs of the study.
