pass a drug test

DOESN'T LIKE ASKING SHERIFF FOR MEDICINE

2009-11-09T13:20:00.000-08:00

Well, another week has arrived. Again I will have to ask the sheriff for my medicine. I will be writing him separately. I still must ask you to free our medical marijuana.

I am going to try not to be vulgar or threatening. It has been hard to do of late because I am not even able to get my prescription medication. Can I borrow $50? I really could use my medication. I cannot believe in what was the greatest nation in history I cannot get my pain medication. Oh, have we so fallen.

Here I am in the United States, a U.S. natural-born citizen, and I am unable to get medication. Where is my right to life? How am I supposed to live without my medication that I need to live? Where should I go to get redress of my grievances? Where am I to look for justice?

I know the FBI has said it couldn't do anything. Why don't I believe that? The FBI, I will bet, has hundreds of pounds of medical grade marijuana that has been seized. They could release me my medicine, if they cared about us. As I have said I would keep any info or help to myself. I wouldn't go run out and tell everyone, if said help was offered. I can show you in secret if need be.

What are you waiting for? Do you also not care about being on the right side of history?

Scott Carriere

Springfield

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n1010/a03.html
Newshawk: http://www.illinoisNORML.org
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Wed, 4 Nov 2009
Source: State Journal-Register (IL)
Copyright: 2009 The State Journal-Register
Contact: letters@sj-r.com
Website: http://www.sj-r.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/425
Author: Scott Carriere

MEDICAL MARIJUANA SUPPORTERS TO ADDRESS TULARE COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS

2009-11-08T13:18:00.000-08:00

Some operators of medial marijuana dispensaries in Tulare County said they plan to ask the county's Board of Supervisors to rewrite a series of proposed ordinances that they say could harm their businesses as well as the people who smoke and ingest the plants to treat pain and other ailments.

That may include trying to get the supervisors to better understand how the growing and dispensing of medical marijuana works, said Jeff Nunes, director of the Visalia Compassionate Care, a dispensary south of Ivanhoe.

He said he plans to address the supervisors during their regular meeting Tuesday, during which they may vote to approve the ordinances.

"We're gong to basically insist that the Board of Supervisors tour our [marijuana] farms," some of which are run by professional farmers who also grow nuts, oranges and other large cash crops, Nunes said.

He said he's also hoping to form a group of local experts to further educate the supervisors on the industry and how it helps people.

This follows last week's vote by the supervisors to go forward with the ordinance following some minor revisions. If approved Tuesday, those ordinances would be the first regulating medical marijuana in unincorporated Tulare County.

Among the provisions of the ordinances:

Dispensaries would have to obtain business licenses. Part of that licensing would involve criminal background checks of dispensary operators.

Anyone smoking medicinal marijuana must do so inside a habitable, private residence and not in garages or detached buildings.

Cultivating and storing would be done in fully enclosed, secure buildings with roofs, no visible signage, and monitored alarms. Structural designs would restrict the smell of marijuana from blowing to other buildings and public areas.

An individual, collective or cooperative would be limited to no more than 99 plants.

There could be no more than three collectives or cooperatives in unincorporated Tulare County.

There are five medical marijuana dispensaries in the unincorporated areas, along with two others in the city of Tulare. Those two wouldn't be affected directly by the ordinance, though customers and people growing for the dispensaries outside the city limits might be affected.

Some growers aren't professional farmers producing marijuana as a side crop for extra money. Instead, many are people who grow the plants to treat there own medical conditions and trade some of it to dispensaries for other strains -- which can be more effective against certain illnesses -- or they sell it to the dispensaries.

Nunes said his dispensary alone has more than 3,500 patients, and curtailing how many plants his growers can produce or store could make it difficult to supply his clients, all of whom have doctor's prescriptions for marijuana.

He estimated about 10,000 patients in Tulare County use medicinal marijuana.

Tammy Murray, director of the Compassionate Cannabis Information Center, a dispensary in Goshen, said she believes part of the problem is county officials greatly underestimate the number of people here who depend on marijuana as medicine.

A big reason for that is patients still are leery about getting medical marijuana cards from the county even though it is legal in the state, she said.

The cards are not mandatory for patients.

Unfortunately, Murray said, she believes the county supervisors' decisions also are being driven by misconceptions about people who use medical marijuana and the people who run the dispensaries.

"I do feel the county is being a bit discriminatory of what we're doing because of past taboos that are really unfounded," and paint the patients getting high and posing dangers to the public, she said.

"I have attorneys and all kinds of professional people who come to this dispensary, and a lot of them would be people you would never expect to smoke cannabis."

And about a quarter of those clients are military veterans, Murray said.

"Another problem with this industry is the fear it's being run by thugs," she added. "In my case, at least, that's simply not the case."

All this could be moot, however, because the ordinance states that the county regulation would take effect only if both California and federal laws allow for growing and use of medical marijuana.

No such federal law exists, though federal law enforcement agencies have been directed to avoid arresting people who comply with their states' medical marijuana laws.

Nunes said he's optimistic that could happen within a couple of years.

Strip Clubs

That same set or ordinances includes new rules for strip clubs that include:

Permits and criminal history background checks for dancers.

$60 permit that would include the performers' photos, names, stage names, height, weight and address.

Dancers would be 21 and older and have to cover specified parts of their bodies

Dancers on stage would have to be at least 10 feet from spectators and couldn't make direct physical contact when receiving tips.

[sidebar]

ADDITIONAL FACTS

How to Attend

What: Tulare County Board of Supervisors

When: 9 a.m. Tuesday

Where: Board chambers, 2800 W. Burrel Ave., Visalia

Public comment: 9 a.m.

Get the agenda: Go to www.co.tulare.ca.us, click on "County Government," "Board of Supervisors," "Board Agendas," then the meeting date.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n1010/a09.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 0
Webpage: http://drugsense.org/url/5zlP5NpZ
Pubdate: Mon, 9 Nov 2009
Source: Visalia Times-Delta, The (CA)
Copyright: 2009 The Visalia Times-Delta
Contact: http://www.visaliatimesdelta.com/customerservice/contactus.html
Website: http://www.visaliatimesdelta.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2759
Author: David Castellon
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topic/dispensaries
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?253 (Cannabis - Medicinal - United States)

CONFRONTATION WITH BUSINESS OWNER A MISUNDERSTANDING, GEORGINA COUNCILLOR CLAIMS

2009-11-07T13:17:00.000-08:00

High Street bong shop owners completely misunderstood the intentions and tone of a conversation Oct. 20 with a longtime politician.

That's the message from Councillor Ken Hackenbrook after returning from a Florida vacation last weekend and finding out Shisha shop owner Gurbaksh Dhoofar had filed a police report stating they were "afraid" to do business in town after talking to Mr. Hackenbrook last month.

But scaring them was definitely not the intent of his visit to the shop, Mr. Hackenbrook told The Advocate Monday night.

"Look, they absolutely took me the wrong way," he said, adding his wife, Lorraine, said nothing to them, but came into the store after being across the street to see what was keeping her husband so long.

"I looked around at all the pipes and asked what they are used for. ( Mr. Dhoofar ) said they are for tobacco. I have never seen these products before," Mr. Hackenbrook said.

"I didn't want to threaten anybody and I wasn't about to tell them to get out of the store. My biggest concern is the kids," Mr. Hackenbrook said.

As far as a police report goes, "( police ) are not going to do anything," Mr. Hackenbrook said, adding he has talked to District No. 3 officers confirming this development.

York Regional Police Const. Laurie Perks confirmed there is an investigation under way regarding a police report filed by Dr. Dhoofar Oct. 23.

"Police are looking into ( all the report's allegations ). The investigation has not concluded but we believe there was no criminal incident here," Ms Perks said, adding any statements made do not appear to be "criminal in nature".

"We won't speculate on whether the comments were appropriate but there is no indication of criminal activity" on Mr. Hackenbrook's part, she said.

There is also no criminal activity going on at the shop, she added.

If there is no advertisement along with the bongs regarding their purpose that they are to be used to smoke marijuana and if there is no marijuana found in or around the bongs, there is nothing illegal about the products being sold, she said.

"There is no offence here," Ms Perks said.

Mr. Hackenbrook told the The Advocate the only reason he brought up any family connections to the police ( several family members are officers with the York force and his brother-in-law is a retired staff sergeant ) was to ensure Mr. Dhoofar and his partner that he is community-minded and encourages peaceful relations as a longtime member of York Regional Police Chief Armand La Barge's Canadian Federation of inter-cultural friendship community police liaison committee.

The councillor said he went in to the shop after receiving several complaints and as a part of his welcoming tour of new businesses that day in town, adding he handed Mr. Dhoofar a town pin and a business card.

The councillor said the shop owners told him they close down every day at lunch so as not to entice teenagers from Sutton District High School, which is walking distance to the store.

"The kids are my biggest concern," he said.

Several readers have made comments about how one councillor's actions might reflect on the town and the way it conducts business.

Mayor Rob Grossi had this to say:

"As far as this incident is concerned, although it's a business I would not patronize and I don't necessarily agree with the legality of the products that are sold there, my responsibility as an elected official is to ensure that the rules and regulations and/or bylaws of the municipality are adhered to. As for any new business that is opened anywhere, its success will be based simply on the patronage by the residents of the area."

Mr. Dhoofar is still in town with a "closing soon" sign on his door.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n1010/a08.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Thu, 5 Nov 2009
Source: Georgina Advocate (CN ON)
Copyright: 2009 Georgina Advocate
Contact: http://www.yrmg.com/forms/lettertotheeditor.html
Website: http://www.yorkregion.com/news/Georgina
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2433
Author: Tracy Kibble

CONSENT SEEMS LIKELY

2009-11-06T13:16:00.000-08:00

To the editor:

Money, while important, is not all that matters ( Taylor Armerding: "State can fill its coffers by treating pot like gambling," Oct. 24 ). What also matters is that our laws comply with the federal and state constitutions; both suppose the consent of the governed. The vote on Question 2 annihilated the notion prohibition of possession backed by criminal sanction had such consent. The vote on Question 2 and the rampant civil disobedience to the law -- over 10 percent of Massachusetts voters consumed it last month -- establish there is not consent here for the prohibition of its commerce.

According to the U.S. Justice Department's medical marijuana policy memorandum issued Oct. 19, the black market provides "significant source of revenue to large-scale criminal enterprises." So too did alcohol prohibition. The only constitutional policy toward marijuana consists of regulations and a level of taxation reasonable enough so that the people will generally send their money to the state rather than resorting to the black market in their pursuit of their subjective happiness.

Steven S. Epstein

Georgetown

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n1010/a07.html
Newshawk: http://www.masscann.org/
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Thu, 5 Nov 2009
Source: Georgetown Record (MA)
Copyright: 2009 GateHouse Media, Inc.
Contact: georgetown@cnc.com
Website: http://www.wickedlocal.com/georgetown/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/3519
Author: Steven S. Epstein

LIES ABOUT MARIJUANA DRIVE PEOPLE TO A MUCH MORE HARMFUL DRUG -- BOOZE

2009-11-05T13:15:00.000-08:00

Anti-Pot Propaganda Drives Most People to Drink Alcohol Instead. But Booze Is Far More Dangerous Than Marijuana.

Professor David Nutt didn't play the game. As the chief drug policy advisor in the British Government, an unspoken part of his job description was to help maintain a public fiction about marijuana - or cannabis, as it is known in the U.K. and other parts of the world. Specifically, he was expected to further the misperception of cannabis as a substance worthy of being classified and prohibited in a manner similar to more dangerous drugs like heroin and cocaine.

He made a big mistake at the end of last month. In a lecture at King's College in London, he spoke honestly - and truthfully - about the fact that cannabis is less harmful than alcohol and urged the government to factor the relative harms of substances into their policy-making. Moreover, he accused the British government of ignoring the evidence about the true harms of cannabis in order to reclassify the drug and increase penalties for possession.

Reacting with the logic and reason of pub patron after last call, Home Secretary Alan Johnson immediately demanded that Prof. Nutt resign as the head of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs. He said Prof Nutt had "crossed the line between offering advice and ... campaigning against the government on political decisions."

More accurately, Prof. Nutt crossed the line between deceiving citizens and being honest with them. The home secretary, a former member of Parliament, is no doubt comfortable with a little verbal jousting over public policy decisions. What he could not abide by was a top ranking official threatening the anti-cannabis mythology embraced at the very top level of government. Based on Nutt's fateful bout of truthfulness, Johnson said he had "lost confidence" in Nutt as an advisor.

In a letter to Professor Nutt, Mr. Johnson explained how the system is supposed to work. He said: "As Home Secretary it is for me to make decisions, having received advice from the [Council] ... It is important that the Government's messages on drugs are clear and as an adviser you do nothing to undermine the public understanding of them . I am afraid the manner in which you have acted runs contrary to your responsibilities."

The Home Secretary's chief medical officer Sir Liam Donaldson put a similar spin on this hostile reaction to fact-based statements to the public. "These things are best sorted out behind the scenes," he said, "so that the government and their advisers can go to the public with a united front."

In the real world, what this means is that advisors are free to provide research or reports based on an honest assessment of the scientific evidence, but when this research is completely ignored in setting policy, they are expected to keep their mouths shut and move on as if nothing ever happened.

This is all part of the game the government plays in order to maintain marijuana prohibition. In the United States, there are many examples of significant advisory opinions related to marijuana being completely ignored - even where the opinions were part of a decision-making process that should have led to action by the federal government.

In 1970, Congress established the National Commission on Marijuana and Drug Abuse to study marijuana and make recommendations about how to control its use. The Commission's final report suggested removal of criminal penalties, noting, "The actual and potential harm of use of the drug is not great enough to justify intrusion by the criminal law into private behavior." President Nixon ignored the Commission's findings and launched and all-out war on marijuana users.

In 1988, Francis Young, an administrative law judge at the Drug Enforcement Administration ( DEA ), following hearings to determine whether marijuana should be placed into a less restrictive category under the Controlled Substances Act, wrote that marijuana should be moved from Schedule I ( the most restrictive category ) to Schedule II and it would be "unreasonable, arbitrary and capricious" to conclude otherwise. More than 20 years later, marijuana remains a Schedule I drug.

A recently as February 2007, an administrative law judge at the DEA issued an opinion concluding that it would be in the public interest for the agency to grant a license to the University of Massachusetts to grow a limited amount of marijuana to be used to study its potential therapeutic benefits. Faced with this seemingly rational opinion, the political powers at the DEA sat on it for nearly two years and then rejected it by formally denying the University the license in the very last days of the Bush administration.

Of course, ignoring fact- and evidence-based advice about marijuana is just one part of the game our government has played over the past four decades. It has also gone out of its way to promote and spread myths about the drug - from the "gateway" theory to marijuana's supposed connection to cancer to the notion that "potent pot" is somehow more dangerous than "your father's marijuana." Each one has been debunked or proven wrong or misleading, but there is no doubt that they have helped keep marijuana illegal.

Yet there is one myth more insidious than the rest. And it is one that is as devastating as it is subtle.

You see, whether intentional or not, the government's greatest achievement when it comes to keeping marijuana illegal has been its ability to convince a majority of Americans that marijuana is as harmful as, if not more harmful than, alcohol. By doing so, it has secured alcohol's place as the recreational substance of choice for the vast majority of the public.

Influenced by the government's anti-marijuana propaganda, a large segment of our population is comfortable with a system that bans the use of marijuana but allows - and even celebrates - the use of alcohol, despite the fact that alcohol is objectively far more harmful.

Let's consider just a few facts about the two substances. For starters, alcohol is far more toxic than marijuana. Just ten times the effective dose of alcohol can be fatal. Yet there has never been a recorded marijuana overdose death in history. The highly toxic nature of alcohol is also what leads to the all-too-frequent occurrences of nausea and vomiting from over-indulgence.

Over the long-term, alcohol consumption is also far more likely to lead to the death of the user. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, between 33,000 and 35,000 Americans die annually from the effects of alcohol. The comparable number for marijuana? Zero. The supposed cancer-causing properties of marijuana? Non-existent.

Perhaps most disturbingly, as almost anyone who has been exposed to the two substances could tell you, alcohol is far more likely to produce dangerous and socially destructive behavior. It is cited as a contributing factor in 25-30 percent of violent crimes in this country and in about 100,000 sexual assaults on college campuses annually. These kinds of negative associations simply don't exist with marijuana.

As mentioned at the beginning, facts like this were quite familiar to Professor Nutt. Even after his firing, he endeavored to spread the truth about the relative harms of marijuana and alcohol and urged parents to be especially wary of the one that posed the greatest potential for damage.

"The greatest concern to parents," he said, "should be that their children do not get completely off their heads with alcohol because it can kill them ... and it leads them to do things which are very dangerous, such as to kill themselves or others in cars, get into fights, get raped, and engage in other activities which they regret subsequently. My view is that, if you want to reduce the harm to society from drugs, alcohol is the drug to target at present."

Our nation's leaders might think this is a game, but it isn't. There are children and adults seriously suffering and even dying because of alcohol, and it is time our leaders started being honest and realistic about how it compares to marijuana - both in terms of public education and public policies. Neither propaganda nor policy should be used to steer adults - or teens, for that matter - toward alcohol instead of marijuana. This does not mean that marijuana is harmless; it simply means, and all of the evidence indicates, that it is less harmful than alcohol.

And no one should be fired for saying that.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n1010/a06.html
Newshawk: Kirk
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Mon, 9 Nov 2009
Source: AlterNet (US Web)
Copyright: 2009 Independent Media Institute
Website: http://www.alternet.org/
Author: Steve Fox
Note: Steve Fox is the director of state campaigns for the Marijuana
Policy Project and co-author of Marijuana Is Safer: So why are we
driving people to drink? (Chelsea Green, August 2009).

POT IS MORE MAINSTREAM THAN EVER, SO WHY IS LEGALIZATION STILL TABOO?

2009-11-04T07:55:00.001-08:00

More members of Congress have publicly questioned whether President Barack Obama was born in Hawaii than have endorsed legalizing marijuana.

This comes despite the birth announcements printed in the Honolulu Advertiser in August 1961 and marijuana's deep inroads into the cultural mainstream.

Almost every voter under 65 in this country has either smoked cannabis or grew up with people who did. Among its erstwhile users are the last three presidents, one Supreme Court justice and the mayor of the nation's largest city. The pot leaf's image pervades popular culture, from Bob Marley T-shirts to billboards for Showtime's Weeds.

So why is actually legalizing it still considered a fringe issue? Why haven't more politicians -- especially the ones who inhaled -- come out and said, "Prohibition is absurd and criminal. Let's treat cannabis like alcohol"?

Allen St. Pierre, head of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, blames the hypocrisy of the "baby boomer elite." There are many people in Washington's political and media circles "who know the right end of a joint to light, but are too embarrassed to admit their knowledge," he says. There are members of Congress, he adds, who will greet him at a party with "Allen, got any weed?" but are afraid to go out on a limb for legalization.

Only two current members of Congress have openly advocated ending cannabis prohibition: Reps. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, and Ron Paul, R-Texas.

Even in a Congress inhabited by Republicans Tom "Lesbians Are Terrorizing Our High Schools" Coburn of Oklahoma and Michelle "Carbon Dioxide Is Natural, It Is Not Harmful" Bachmann of Minnesota, the left-liberal Kucinich and the libertarian-conservative Paul might be the two most widely derided as kooks.

A handful of others, such as Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif., have given some indications that they would support legalization. Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., has sponsored a bill to end federal penalties for possession of less than 100 grams, but has not explicitly endorsed making marijuana as legal as alcohol.

In contrast, Salon in July identified 17 members of Congress as "birther" sympathizers who had either openly questioned Obama's birth, co-sponsored a bill on the issue or refused to answer yes when asked if they believed he was a natural-born citizen. The 17 included Sens. James Inhofe, R-Okla., and Richard Shelby, R-Ala.

St. Pierre particularly resents the way the media treat the issue as a joke, in which almost any headline has to include a bad pun on "doobie," "high" or "mellow."

It's deadly serious when more than 800,000 people a year are arrested for it, he argues. Obama's "chuckle," he says, was emblematic. When legalizing marijuana was the top issue cited by visitors to Obama's transition Web site, the president dismissed it with a joke implying that there must be a lot of stoned people on the Internet.

"It's still an issue people are giggling about, not taking seriously," says Noelle Davis, former head of Texans for Medical Marijuana.

State legislators who have sponsored marijuana-related bills say that the two biggest obstacles are fear and cultural stereotypes.

"Elected officials are largely very concerned about being labeled 'soft on drugs,'" says New York State Assemblyman Richard Gottfried. Gottfried, a Manhattan Democrat who sponsored the state's 1977 decriminalization law, has introduced several bills to legalize medical marijuana.

Polls have shown medical marijuana to have the support of 70 to 80 percent of New Yorkers, he says, but "many legislators are afraid to touch it."

Washington State Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Welles says that many legislators, particularly in the state's more conservative rural areas, "buy into the cultural stereotypes about marijuana," such as the idea that it's a gateway to harder drugs.

The Seattle Democrat, who is sponsoring a bill to reduce the penalty for less than 40 grams of pot from a misdemeanor to a civil infraction, says that the state's prosecutors' support for legalizing medical marijuana gave conservatives political cover to vote for it but that law enforcement has largely opposed her decriminalization bill.

One reason for the lack of urgent political pressure, says Deborah Small of Break the Chains, is that the people most likely to get busted for pot are the ones who "don't have a political voice" -- young people of color from poor neighborhoods. In Atlanta, Baltimore and New York, which have among the highest marijuana-arrest rates in the nation, three-fourths of those popped are black or Latino and under 25, she points out. Adults and more affluent youths are largely safe from arrest, she adds.

Frontlines of the Debate

California is the one state where legalization is legitimately on the agenda. "Obama might have dismissed it, but we're having the most serious conversation in 35 years," says Quintin Mecke, spokesman for Assemblyman Tom Ammiano. Ammiano, a San Francisco Democrat, is sponsoring a bill that would legalize marijuana in California. It would let people grow up to 10 plants for their own use and license commercial cultivation and sales, with a smoking age of 21 and a $50-an-ounce tax.

Hearings on the bill are scheduled for January. It would obviously conflict with federal law, but Mecke says, "the intent is to provoke a states' rights conversation A lot of folks are looking to California to push that issue."

Several factors make legalization politically possible in California, Mecke explains. First, it has had legally regulated medical marijuana for 13 years, and people have "seen that the sky did not fall. California may be in a fiscal crisis, but it's certainly not due to marijuana." Taxes and fees on cannabis could raise $1.4 billion in revenue for the cash-strapped state, the state Board of Equalization estimates. In addition, marijuana cultivation is an integral part of the local economy in many areas, especially the rural north.

"We're not expecting this to happen overnight," Mecke says. "But looking at the poll numbers, it will happen."

A Gallup poll conducted in early October backs that prediction. It found 44 percent of the people surveyed supporting legal marijuana, with 54 percent against. In contrast, previous surveys showed Americans rejecting legalization 73 percent to 23 percent in 1985 and 64 percent to 31 percent in 2000.

An overwhelming majority of liberals supported it, as did more than half of Westerners, Democrats and people under 50. Opposition was strongest among Republicans, conservatives and people over 65, but even in those groups, more than a quarter backed legalization.

"Public mores on legalization of marijuana have been changing this decade and are now at their most tolerant in at least 40 years," the Gallup organization stated. "If public support were to continue growing at a rate of 1 to 2 percentage points per year, as it has since 2000, the majority of Americans could favor legalization of the drug in as little as four years."

Disconnect Between the Country and Its Capital

There is a "huge disconnect" between the corridors of power in Washington and the rest of America on marijuana, contends St. Pierre.

Today, even the hardest-line prohibitionists rarely argue that people should go to jail for possession. In Washington, says Kohl-Welles, police and prosecutors claimed that decriminalization would be unnecessary because they don't put a lot of resources into making such minor arrests.

In New York, where Mayor Michael "You Bet I Did -- And I Enjoyed It" Bloomberg has continued Rudolph Giuliani's war on pot smokers, a police department spokesperson tried to convince reporters that there was no such crackdown, because the number of summonses issued for marijuana possession declined over the last decade. ( Having less than 25 grams carries only a $100 fine under state law, but possession in public is a misdemeanor. New York City police have been arresting more than 40,000 people a year on that charge, mostly young black and Latino men. )

Liberal politicians who believe that the laws are too harsh but don't want to take the risk of siding with stoners often support decriminalization as a middle ground. Decriminalization has definitely been an improvement -- as Gottfried points out, it's made the difference between spending a night in jail and a year in prison for having a small bag of pot -- but it is actually a harsher regime than alcohol Prohibition was. Under Prohibition, home winemaking and medical use of alcohol were legal, and people could keep liquor acquired before the law went into effect in 1920. ( The New York governor's mansion had one such stash of booze, and the Yale Club in Manhattan stockpiled a 14-year supply. )

Obama's Oct. 19 guidelines that federal prosecutors not pursue medical-marijuana cases in states where it's legal are encouraging. On the other hand, like so much in Obama's tenure, they might also be far more symbolic than real. They contain enough wiggle room to permit federal aid to local prosecutors who go after medical marijuana, such as Steve Cooley in Los Angeles.

In general, Obama's positions have evolved in a typically hypocritical manner. He endorsed decriminalization when he was an Illinois state legislator campaigning on a college campus, but he now states flatly that he does not support legalization -- although he wrote in his autobiography that while pot didn't solve your problems, "it could at least help you laugh at the world's ongoing folly and see through all the bullshit and cheap moralism." ( There are photos of Obama as a straw-hatted college student, smoking an ambiguous cigarette with his thumb and forefinger and looking blissfully slit-eyed. )

"Legalization is not in the president's vocabulary, and it is not in mine," federal drug czar Gil Kerlikowske has reiterated, although he is relatively liberal on other drug issues.

According to St. Pierre, the staff of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., specifically warned the pot-legalization movement not to pressure the Obama administration or congressional Democrats because they were preoccupied with the economy, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and health care. The message, he says, was "We are not going to advance this issue, and you need to cut us some slack."

Change You Can Put in Your Pipe

What can be done? What would change the political climate to enable a reasonable discussion of legalizing and regulating marijuana?

Deborah Small says it would take a society that cared about black and Latino youth instead of criminalizing them in the name of "quality of life" policing.

Politicians talk about keeping young people in school and getting them jobs, but then they support "policing tactics guaranteed to bring them into the criminal-justice system for relatively minor offenses." If Obama had been busted for pot when he was a young man, she asks, would he be president today? "Certainly not."

She finds it remarkable that the hip-hop generation that emerged after the crack epidemic of the late '80s eschewed hard drugs in favor of marijuana -- and the system responded by arresting them more, with policies that rewarded large numbers of petty-possession busts.

Kohl-Welles says legalizing cannabis would take a critical mass of legislators, and that budget issues might help create the climate for that. Gottfried says that it will take "very strong public support for it to become part of mainstream debate, let alone pass the Legislature."

To win that support, St. Pierre says, the legalization movement needs to sustain grassroots activism and become more multiracial instead of being almost all-white and mainly male. Advancing legalization would also need the support of charismatic politicians early in their careers, as "it's impossible to flip a 50- or 60-year-old alpha male in Washington."

Another danger, he says, is politicians who modify their positions to suit their ambitions. San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, he notes, was an early and "full-throated" supporter of medical marijuana, but is now running for governor of California and opposes legalization.

In Texas, says Noelle Davis, activists face the daunting task of trying to persuade legislators in the Republican majority -- and the primary voters who elect them. This would require educating them about the safety of marijuana versus alcohol and the economic benefits that cannabis cultivation and sales could bring to the state.

One largely overlooked issue in Texas, she says, is drug violence on the border. Infighting among rival smuggling gangs has claimed hundreds of lives in the Mexican cities of Nuevo Laredo, just across the river from Laredo, and Juarez, across from El Paso.

For all the hype about potent domestic homegrown, commercial-grade Mexican dominates the cheaper end of the cannabis market, and "a lot of marijuana comes up IH-35," from Laredo through San Antonio, Austin and Dallas.

"We're still putting our hands over our ears and saying 'la-la-la,' " she says. "If marijuana were legal on a federal level, it would dramatically reduce the deaths associated with the drug trade."

Meanwhile, she says, the "silent majority" of pot smokers has to overcome their fear and get vocal. "When I was circulating a petition for medical marijuana, often people would giggle and say 'I'm not putting my name on a list,' " she recalls. "Don't be afraid of your legislator. Take time and build a relationship."

St. Pierre agrees. "We have not achieved the political legitimacy of the gay and lesbian community," he concludes. "As long as 0.1 percent of cannabis consumers are involved with their own liberation, reform is unlikely." If just 1 percent of the nation's estimated 36 million pot smokers would get involved, he says, that would be a constituency of 360,000 activists.

Legalizing cannabis may not be as life-and-death an issue as health care, global warming or the war in Afghanistan, but it is not a frivolous cause. Not any more than repealing Prohibition was in the depths of the Depression.

When the nation is mired in an economic and environmental crisis, why should we waste lives and money enforcing repressive, racist and crime-creating laws? In May 1932, thousands of people marched in the streets of New York, Detroit and other cities to demand the legalization of beer. They carried signs reading "We Want Beer and We Will Pay the Tax" and "We Want Beer but We Also Want Jobs."

Later that summer, the Democratic party, battered for being "wet" in the previous presidential election, endorsed the repeal of Prohibition. On Dec. 5, 1933, the 21st Amendment went into effect, and Americans could legally drink again.

Of course, there was a fanatical former Prohibition official named Harry Anslinger, who had recently become head of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics -- and was looking for a new way to advance his career.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n983/a07.html
Newshawk: Kirk
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Thu, 29 Oct 2009
Source: AlterNet (US Web)
Copyright: 2009 Independent Media Institute
Website: http://www.alternet.org/
Author: Steven Wishnia
Note: Steven Wishnia is a New York-based journalist and musician. The author of Exit 25 Utopia and The Cannabis Companion, he has won two New York City Independent Press Association awards for his coverage of housing issues. He is looking for a job.

LAWMAKERS HEAR HOW FORFEITURE LAWS WORK IN THEORY, IN REALITY

2009-11-03T07:54:00.000-08:00

After hearing hours of testimony Thursday about how state forfeiture laws are supposed to work, many legislators had vanished by the time two citizens spoke of their problems after police seized their property.

One of them was Terrance Frelix Sr., 34, of Minneapolis. He and a business partner owned some properties and were running behind on a mortgage in 2006, Frelix testified at a hearing. His partner borrowed $4,000 and had just given Frelix the money when a Metro Gang Strike Force officer took them in for questioning.

Police released them without charging them with a crime. The strike force later informed Frelix they were forfeiting the cash and Frelix's truck.

Frelix had been outside his vehicle when police swooped in and -- unbeknownst to him, he said -- a relative was smoking a marijuana joint inside. Police said the small amount of marijuana was the reason they were forfeiting the property.

Frelix went to court but hasn't gotten his property back. He said he's still out the $4,000, plus $3,500 in attorney's fees. His truck is gone, along with the property management equipment inside.

"Even to this day, I'm still frustrated," he said after Thursday's hearing.

Earlier in the hearing, legislators had been walked through flow charts and other documents explaining how the state's forfeiture laws work.

After hearing Frelix's account, Sen. Ron Latz, DFL-St. Louis Park, said the information about what was happening on the streets was "nowhere near what happens on the flow chart."

Thursday marked the fourth joint legislative committee hearing held in the wake of the Metro Gang Strike Force's demise.

An independent review of the now-defunct strike force, released in August, found some officers seized money and property from people never accused of a crime, then took the property for personal use. The FBI is investigating.

The August report said some gang strike force members felt they needed to obtain forfeiture funds to keep the multi-agency task force running after its budget was cut.

The review panel recommended the Legislature "examine whether Minnesota's current forfeiture statute should be revised to provide more protections against the type of conduct described in this report." Legislators heard about how the law works, but Thursday's hearing wasn't intended to cover suggested changes.

In basic terms, under state law, police can seize all money, guns, cars, "precious metals, and precious stones" found in proximity to drugs, drug manufacturing or distribution operations. The property can be seized without drug-or gang-related criminal charges filed against the owner.

The law requires property owners be notified within 60 days of their right to try to get their property back through "judicial determination." If the owner files no claim within that time, the property is considered unclaimed and it's forfeited.

A legislative auditor's report on the gang strike force released in May found the gang unit couldn't document that it had served seizure notices in 202 of 545 cash seizures that auditors tested. Frelix told legislators he wasn't initially served notice and that his attorney had to discover where his property was.

Because it is a civil statute, citizens who challenge forfeiture must prove they acquired the property through legal means.

Police and prosecutors told legislators Thursday about safeguards they take to ensure property is properly seized and forfeited.

Rep. Tony Cornish, R-Good Thunder, questioned whether the forfeiture laws needed to be changed if law enforcement is given proper training and current statutes are followed.

"Do we need to overhaul everything?" asked Cornish, who is the Lake Crystal police chief.

Stearns County Sheriff John Sanner said, "If there are officers that are misusing these tools ... either intentionally or unintentionally, they have got to be held accountable because it's a black eye for everyone in law enforcement."

But he continued by asking legislators to consider that the "overwhelming majority of task forces" are doing things correctly and said sweeping legislative reform would be "unwarranted and damaging."

One problem with the administrative forfeiture process, as was evidenced by the problems with the Metro Gang Strike Force, is it "puts too much authority and too much discretion into the hands of

law enforcement  officers," said Howard Bass, American Civil Liberties
 of Minnesota board member. Because there are no real  checks and

balances, "this creates a potential for abuse," he said.

Because forfeitures are a civil matter, public defenders aren't assigned to such cases. Many people can't afford to hire private attorneys; if they can, attorneys' fees can "vastly ... exceed" the value of property taken, Bass said.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n982/a06.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Thu, 29 Oct 2009
Source: St. Paul Pioneer Press (MN)
Copyright: 2009 St. Paul Pioneer Press
Contact: letters@pioneerpress.com
Website: http://www.twincities.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/379
Author: Mara H. Gottfried
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/af.htm (Asset Forfeiture)

A MAN WITH NO-HANDS AND MANDATORY MINIMUM SENTENCES

2009-11-02T07:53:00.000-08:00

Terry Bazzani could star in an ad campaign about the foolishness of mandatory minimum sentences.

Bazzani has no hands and short arms. He has only half of his left foot. He's had a series of surgeries on his face. He has no criminal record.

And he has pleaded guilty to importing heroin. He was a drug mule; he swallowed heroin capsules in Colombia and flew to Toronto. Police had been tipped off and arrested him.

It's a serious crime. It's also the kind of offence that some politicians would like to see linked to a mandatory minimum sentence. Judges would have no discretion. Anyone guilty would receive a guaranteed term in a penitentiary.

Fortunately, the measures aren't in place. Bazzani will be sentenced later this month, based on the judge's analysis.

The politicians think they can decide the appropriate punishment without knowing about the crime or the people sitting the courtroom - not just the criminal, but the victims too.

But crime circumstances vary. For some offenders, serious prison time might be appropriate - a repeat drug trafficking offender or high-volume importer. A strong deterrent sentence might be needed.

Bazzani has no convictions. He said the smuggling wasn't planned. He traveled to Colombia to see a woman he had met online. He was approached in a bar, offered $10,000 to swallow the drugs and fell for the lure of easy money. ( That might not be true of course, but the Crown has offered no evidence to contradict the story. )

And offenders' circumstances vary. Imprisonment is a serious punishment for anyone.

But Bazzani would do spectacularly hard time. No hands, remember? He can't feed himself, except sandwiches. He can't clean himself after going to the bathroom, unless he has a shower. He spent five weeks in pretrial custody and went without brushing his teeth, cleaning himself and ate little food.

And he certainly can't stand up for himself. Which means that in prison he will be a victim, or locked up a protective custody. Bazzani's doctor spends two days a week providing care for inmates at the Vancouver Island Regional Correction Centre. The handless man would be in danger in prison, says Dr. James Henry, who said he treats inmates who are victims of violence.

Bazzani illustrates one problem with mandatory minimum sentences. Some people are going to be punished with sentences far out of proportion to their crimes, because judges are fettered with arbitrary, political sentencing rules.

There are other problems. They don't actually reduce crime, for starters.

And they cost taxpayers a fortune as more prisons are built and staffed to house a growing number of inmates.

B.C.'s jails are already overcrowded. The Solicitor General's Ministry service plan says there are "dangerous levels of inmate overcrowding" and reveals prisons are operating at 185 per cent of capacity. The situation "increasingly compromises community and staff safety," the ministry says.

The federal government has passed legislation to impose mandatory minimum sentences for a wider range of drug offences. The Senate is now reviewing the law and the Conservatives have already complained its not moving quickly enough to "get tough on crime."

The Conservatives won't reveal the cost of imprisoning more people as a result of their changes to the Criminal Code. But the government has doubled the capital budget for building new cells. At a minimum, analysts suggest, it will cost more than $100 million a year to lock up the new inmates.

Which might be fine it reduced crime and made Canadians safer.

But it doesn't. The Americans have been down this road. Thanks in part to mandatory minimum sentences, the U.S., on a per capita basis, imprisons six times more of its citizens than Canada. Crime has not been reduced; it is not safer. Just poorer

And more people like Bazzani have ended up in desperate situations behind bars.

Judges - the people who actually hear the evidence and study the laws - - - are far more likely to impose effective, appropriate sentences than politicians looking for some good headlines.

Footnote: Here in B.C., the problem isn't just jail overcrowding. The Solicitor General's Ministry service plan also notes that the number of offenders under community supervision orders jumped by 10 per cent last year, to 22,000. The increases, without a corresponding increase in staff to ensure offenders obey the rules of their release, are also compromising public safety, the ministry notes.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n982/a07.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 1
Pubdate: Wed, 28 Oct 2009
Source: Nelson Daily News (CN BC)
Copyright: 2009 Nelson Daily News
Contact: http://www.nelsondailynews.com/section/nelson0303&template=letter
Website: http://www.nelsondailynews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/288
Author: Paul Willcocks
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?199 (Mandatory Minimum Sentencing)

STUDENTS FIGHT BACK AGAINST METH

2009-11-02T07:52:00.000-08:00

Boys & Girls Club, COMA offer meth education

In the middle of a white poster were four letters scrawled in purple.

M-E-T-H.

Samantha Caudillo worked with her group to hastily cover up the letters with post-its, pictures from magazines and drawings of their own.

Each one represented something a community could use to battle meth abuse.

"This looks like a good community," Caudillo said, pointing to a picture of children playing in a park. "Let's put this on there, because if you do meth, then you can't have this."

She and her group were in the midst of a seminar Tuesday at the Boys & Girls Club of Craig about meth abuse and its effect on individuals and communities. Communities Overcoming Meth Abuse worked with the club to incorporate educational programs into national Methamphetamine Awareness Week.

Jonathan Judge, a program manager with the Colorado Meth Project, brought a new curriculum and fresh information for the classes he will teach during the week.

On Tuesday, he focused on meth in communities and how the destructive drug can break down not just individuals, but the structure of an entire community.

He began with an exercise that wove a web of colorful string around the room, each of which represented something the community took pride in, like the Moffat County School District, the Craig Police Department and the outdoors.

When Judge cut one string, the entire web fell apart.

"It's not an individual problem," Judge said. "It affects everyone around that person."

He discussed with the students how toxic waste from meth labs can contaminate natural resources and how two thirds of identity theft cases are meth related.

While the class was meant for students as young as 10, many of the students already have experienced the force of meth within their social network.

Tatam Hickman, 10, said she had a family member who was addicted to meth.

"She had two of her teeth fall out," Tatam said. "And she had to get fake ones."

Samantha said she also had a family member who went through a battle with meth.

"We told her she had to stop or we would all go to therapy or something," Samantha said. "She would act all weird and think people were after her."

She said she understood how meth could grab hold of an entire community.

"It would affect people because once they do it will keep spreading," she said. "It will affect the whole environment. People would just hide in their rooms."

However, she said the community can react and support one another.

"We can tell them their lives will be better if they don't do it," she said.

Although meth education tends to focus its efforts on teens and young adults, Judge said it's important to keep children as young as 10 aware and informed of the drug and its consequences.

"We want to give them sound information and reinforce their healthy habits and identify the negative ones," he said. "There's a lot of ignorance and misinformation surrounding the drug, and we just want to equip them with facts."

Judge said he was not well informed when he started his job with the Colorado Meth Project. His background was in education, not substance abuse.

Through working with addicts, their families and communities, he has seen the effect that meth can have on individuals, communities and society.

He admitted that what he saw was worse than he had imagined.

"The drug is worse than I thought," he said. "The consequences of using are worse than I thought. But the hope is greater than I thought, too. When I see the Boys & Girls Club and COMA working together to educate children, that gives me hope."

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n981/a02.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Wed, 28 Oct 2009
Source: Craig Daily Press, The (CO)
Copyright: 2009 The Craig Daily Press
Contact: http://www.craigdailypress.com/site/feedback
Website: http://www.craigdailypress.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2334
Author: Nicole Inglis
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/youth.htm (Youth)

WILL TOO MANY POT DISPENSARIES SATURATE THE MARKET?

2009-11-01T07:50:00.000-08:00

Maybe, But Not Yet, Say Owners Of Medical Marijuana Businesses

GLENWOOD SPRINGS - No one seems to know how many medical marijuana dispensaries have opened in Colorado in recent years, although a frequently expressed estimate is that "a lot" of the centers are operating.

And along with that rather vague assessment is the belief that right here in the vicinity of Glenwood Springs -- in the nearby towns of the Colorado and Roaring Fork river valleys -- the density of the dispensaries may be as high, per capita, as anywhere in the state.

Colorado voters approved the medical use of marijuana, for certain ailments, by voting for a constitutional amendment in the 2000 general election.

A continuing federal prohibition against any use of pot slowed acceptance of medical marijuana in Colorado, but a recent policy reversal by the Obama administration changed all that. Attorney General Eric Holder's statement that federal agents are to leave medical marijuana patients and providers alone has spurred a sudden surge in the industry statewide.

According to an informal count by the Post Independent, based on the advertising department's accounts list and other reports, there are as many as 19 or 20 dispensaries serving the area between Aspen, Glenwood and Rifle.

Some, however, are interlopers from outside the immediate area, such as one in Leadville and one in South Park, which are advertising in the Roaring Fork Valley.

The website, coloradomedicalmarijuana.com, in its "dispensaries" section, listed 30 outlets on the Front Range from Fort Collins to Pueblo.

One Carbondale dispensary operator said there are probably "hundreds" operating around the state by now.

In light of what one man called "a modern gold rush," some are asking whether there will be any such thing as saturation of the local market.

"I think about that almost daily," said Billy Miller, co-owner of the LEAF dispensary, which has outlets in Aspen and Carbondale.

It was Miller who likened the valley's newest growth industry to the California gold rush of 1849, when miners known as "49ers" streamed into the state from all over the country and the world.

"I've been calling all of us the '09ers," Miller said.

Cheryl Sullivan and her stepsons, Sean, 26, and Keaton, 19, operate the Green Medicine Wellness dispensary in Glenwood Springs, which opened its doors on Oct. 26.

Green Medicine, said Cheryl Sullivan, is "not just a medical marijuana facility," but also offers different types of massage therapy and, soon, acupuncture -- a diversity of services that is not uncommon in the industry.

As for whether they worry the market is becoming oversaturated, Keaton Sullivan said, "Yes and no. I've noticed some of ‘em are in it just for a quick buck. But we're in it for the mission."

The Sullivans got into the business, they said, after an uncle of the two young men died of cancer and spent the last part of his life in severe discomfort, which they felt could have been lessened if he'd had access to medical marijuana.

"It just didn't seem right," said Keaton, and when they moved to Colorado a couple of years ago they decided to go into the business to keep others from having the same fate.

"My issue is, there are patients out there who are suffering," said Sean. If that remains the case, he predicted, "then there aren't too many dispensaries.

"We believe it's a healthier form of medicine" than pain pills or other, more traditional treatments for ailments, he continued, adding that with "vaporizers" [a less painful inhaling device] and pot cooked into food, "you don't even have to smoke."

Joseph Jones, who said his CMD dispensary in Carbondale was the first on the Western Slope when it opened last July, predicted that "the numbers will continue to grow" but added, "I feel there should be a limit to it at some point."

But, like others interviewed for this story, Jones said the limit will come organically, as competition eliminates some and permits others to thrive.

"We'll weed out the phonies," he joked.

Different operators had differing opinions about how many customers an individual outlet needs to stay in business. Jones said 50 or so; the Sullivans believe it is closer to 100.

The sense of competition that exists seems to be on a friendly basis, to date.

"Everybody in the industry kind of knows everyone else," Jones said.

"We're on good terms with other dispensaries," Keaton Sullivan said. "We're not trying to cut each others' throats. The sandbox is big enough for everyone."

The Sullivans said their marketing plan includes "reaching out" to the American Cancer Society and area physicians, to discuss the benefits of medical marijuana for their constituencies. Cheryl Sullivan said that they have learned of some patients who might qualify for medical marijuana, whose doctors refused to "recommend" them for the treatment.

Concerning the potential for competitive thinning of the ranks among dispensaries, an Aspen attorney who represents a number of dispensaries is optimistic about the survival of those that are open now.

"I think competition has to take care of itself," said Lauren Maytin, whose client-dispensaries can be found from Aspen to Rifle. "I think the market will level out, become stable."

As for the dispensaries closest to her office, two of whom are her clients, she said, "I firmly think the four will survive in Aspen, because they're all a little bit different."

The consensus among the vendors interviewed for this story was that, if there is a saturation point in the local market, beyond which additional dispensaries would become a problem, it has not been reached yet.

"If there's not enough patients, obviously, we [some of the current crop of vendors] don't make it," Sean Sullivan said. "We believe that the patients are here."

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n981/a04.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Fri, 30 Oct 2009
Source: Aspen Times Weekly (CO)
Copyright: 2009 Aspen Times
Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/zKpMPhQ7
Website: http://www.aspentimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/3784
Author: John Colson, Staff Writer

COLFAX BANS PRESCRIPTION POT SHOPS

2009-10-31T07:50:00.000-07:00

Council Allows Existing Collective To Stay

With the chances dwindling of a medical marijuana dispensary opening in western Nevada County, the Colfax City Council voted 4-0 Wednesday night to ban any more of them there.

The council's vote grandfathered in the city's existing dispensary, Golden State Patient Care Collective, because it is an existing business that was legally approved five years ago and doesn't cause problems in town, city officials said Thursday.

Meanwhile, Nevada City postponed its second reading of a pot shop ban late Wednesday, when City Manager Gene Albaugh pulled it off the City Council agenda for more work. The ordinance will come back for the final reading and vote Wednesday, Nov. 18, Albaugh said.

The city manager did not want to predict the outcome of that vote, but it could be academic because the council already voted 3-2 for the ban during the first reading of the ordinance in September.

The Colfax vote that left Golden State Patient Care intact pleased employee Bob Henry, son of owner and Nevada County resident Jim Henry.

"It's good for people to be able to go somewhere safe to get their medicine," Henry said Thursday. "I'm very happy that Colfax is compassionate."

The dispensary has never had any crime problems because it is run tightly, Henry said. "We don't let anybody in unless they have I.D. and a recommendation" from a doctor.

"The police are right down the street, and we have them on speed dial," Henry said. "People can't use their medicine here or sell it. I'm glad we'll be able to stay here."

Mayor Suzanne Roberts admits she opposes any use of marijuana and does not understand why the dispensary has to exist.

"It needs to be dispensed through a pharmacy like any other drug," Roberts said. "It's not a good image for our community or something I want to promote. I'm anti-drug, and I don't think its' necessarily a benefit for anything."

The Union could not locate other council members for comment.

Golden State still operates because "it was an allowed use at the time it was established," said Colfax Planning Director Gary Price. "The treated it like a grocery store at the time."

When another application for a dispensary surfaced in March, the criteria and outlook had changed, with new members coming to the city council since the 2004 decision, Price said.

Available in Nevada County While no dispensaries are allowed in Nevada County, resident Charles Day has started a medical marijuana co-op called Harmony Holistic Health.

The co-op fits California Attorney General Jerry Brown's idea of medical marijuana availability: A collective of growers and patients is established for distribution among members, and no storefront is used for the general public.

Day could not be reached for comment; the co-op's Web site is HarmonyHolisticHealth.org.

Nevada City placed a year-long moratorium on medical pot dispensaries until Aug. 11, 2010, the same day as Nevada County's moratorium expires. Grass Valley has a moratorium in effect until

April 28, 2010, but is working on an ordinance.

Three people have expressed interest in opening another medical marijuana dispensary in western Nevada County in recent months.

Carole Chapman of Nevada County remains interested in opening a dispensary in Grass Valley and is awaiting word from the city about when its medical pot ordinance will be available for public scrutiny.

The Union could not locate Harry Bennett or Jim Henry of the Colfax dispensary for comment, or to see whether they were still interested.

The medical marijuana situation may become moot soon anyway, Chapman said.

"Legalization ( of marijuana ) will be on the 2010 ballot" in California, Chapman. "It's going to pass."

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n981/a07.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Fri, 30 Oct 2009
Source: Union, The (Grass Valley, CA)
Copyright: 2009 The Union
Contact: http://apps.theunion.com/utils/forms/lettertoeditor/
Website: http://www.theunion.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/957
Author: Dave Moller, Staff Writer

COURT UPHOLDS POT GROWER'S CONVICTION

2009-10-30T07:49:00.000-07:00

Longmont Provider Plans To Appeal To State Supreme Court

DENVER - The state appeals court upheld the conviction of a medical marijuana grower Thursday in a ruling that did little to clarify the legal situation for marijuana dispensaries.

Stacy Clendenin of Longmont had appealed her 2006 conviction for marijuana growing, arguing that a Boulder County judge never let her present evidence that she qualified as a "primary caregiver" under the medical marijuana law Colorado voters adopted in 2000.

The Colorado Court of Appeals rejected that argument Thursday.

The decision defines "primary caregiver" for the first time in Colorado case law since medical marijuana became legal, and it specifically excludes people who grow or supply marijuana only for patients. Clendenin was a grower and had never met some of her clients.

The new definition will cause problems for medical marijuana suppliers, Judge Alan Loeb wrote in a concurring opinion.

The 2000 constitutional amendment "has created a system by which qualifying patients and their primary caregivers can legally use medical marijuana ( which includes the act of acquiring it ) but they still have to acquire it from someone who will violate the law by selling or providing the marijuana to them," Loeb wrote.

Loeb agreed with Clendenin's conviction, but the caregiver definition "cries out for legislative action," he wrote.

Dispensary owners breathed easier in August, when the state Board of Health revised medical marijuana rules to include people who provide patients with medical marijuana as primary caregivers.

Thursday's appeals court opinion stands at odds with the Board of Health's new rule.

"We conclude that to qualify as a 'primary care giver' a person must do more than merely supply a patient who has a debilitating medical condition with marijuana," Appeals Judge Robert Hawthorne wrote in Thursday's opinion.

Since Clendenin was convicted before the Board of Health rule took effect, the three-judge appeals panel did not consider how the rule applied to her case. The appeals court also did not take a stand on whether the Board of Health's caregiver definition complies with the state constitution.

Clendenin will appeal to the Supreme Court, said her lawyer, Robert Corry. The district court sentenced her to unsupervised probation, and she is fighting the case as a matter of principle.

Corry represents many of Colorado's medical marijuana suppliers and users, and he's not advising his clients to do much different in light of Thursday's ruling, other than making sure patients and growers meet each other personally.

"I'm not advising anyone to cease operations," he said.

Marijuana dispensaries began cropping up around the state this year, with four in Durango and one in Cortez. The Durango City Council and Mancos Town Board have imposed moratoriums to let city planners figure out how to deal with marijuana stores.

Attorney General John Suthers was happy with Thursday's ruling, and he agreed with Loeb that the Legislature needs to clarify the situation.

"I could not agree more. I hope the Legislature will act and create a regulatory framework that gives substance to the Court of Appeals' findings," Suthers said in a news release.

Corry called the attorney general's statement "desperate," because the case applies only to convictions before the Board of Health rule took effect Aug. 30.

"He's trying to embrace this decision as far-reaching, when it isn't," Corry said.

Corry hopes the Legislature will leave the Board of Health's ruling alone.

Nevertheless, other medical marijuana advocates are working with legislators, said Brian Vicente of Sensible Colorado.

"We've been in talks with numerous legislators about a bill to regulate dispensaries. I think there's a good chance of a bill coming forward," Vicente said.

As of July 31, more than 11,000 Coloradans had joined the registry that lets them legally use medical marijuana, including 111 in La Plata County and 31 in Montezuma County.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n981/a09.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Fri, 30 Oct 2009
Source: Durango Herald, The (CO)
Copyright: 2009 The Durango Herald
Contact: http://durangoherald.com/write_the_editor/
Website: http://durangoherald.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/866
Author: Joe Hanel, Staff Writer
Referenced: The Court of Appeals decision http://drugsense.org/url/Tmf2GEC7

POT DISPENSARIES THRIVING AS STIFFER REGULATION LOOMS

2009-10-29T07:48:00.000-07:00

By all appearances, the people lined up at the handsome oak counter with frosted-glass dividers could be in a quiet suburban post office.

Clerks with scales are answering customers' questions; credit cards are being swiped.

But look closer at the merchandise and the brand names emblazoned on the glass display jars: AK-47, Flying Monkey, Purple Haze, Jack Flash, Kali Mist.

The shop is Patients Choice at 2251 S. Broadway. It is one of dozens of medical-marijuana dispensaries that have sprouted in metro Denver since Colorado legalized the use of pot by patients who hold doctor-approved state permits.

Cannabis clinics are providing relief for clients and serious profits for caregivers, the people authorized by the state to distribute marijuana to patients. Green isn't just the color of the high-end pot that can sell for $350 an ounce. The scent of money in the air is as strong as the herb.

"We're here for the long haul, not to fill our pockets and run," said Jim Bent, co-owner of Patients Choice. "We want to make this a sustainable business."

State and city governments likely will have something to say about that. Colorado legislators have announced plans to more tightly regulate the budding businesses. Court rulings are already tightening the rules for selling legal weed.

While dispensers anticipate stiffer laws -- even in the wake of the federal government banning the prosecution of medical-marijuana users - -- the shops are thriving. And despite the media swirl and pot's longtime status as cultural and legal whipping boy, business at the dispensaries is mellow.

A Wii Set-Up and Bongs

Colin Gordon co-owns Nature's Kiss at 4332 S. Broadway in Englewood. His shop, in a former feed store, has a smoking area that would be at home in a frat house: It has sofas, a piano, a pool table, a big-screen TV with Wii hookup, and bongs. A juice bar is in the works.

Nature's Kiss customers can buy Colorado-grown pot or a pre-rolled $7 cigarette. Card-carrying caregivers and patients can buy plants. Hash brownies and lollipops are also sold.

"We're trying to make this a comfortable environment for everyone," said Gordon, a former professional poker player whose dispensary opened a month ago. "It's quite an interesting dynamic. We have everyone from classic stoners to elderly chemo patients."

Dispensary business is brisk.

Bent said Patients Choice grosses $8,000 to $10,000 a day. Gordon reckons that dispensaries similar to Nature's Kiss can pull in $40,000 a week. Given the revenue, many dispensaries buzz people in through locked doors after mandatory ID checks, under the watch of security cameras.

Start-up costs aren't cheap. Bent estimates that opening a shop -- a nice one with computers, website and quality product -- runs $30,000 to $50,000.

Gordon of Nature's Kiss plans to open another dispensary, Grasshopper, near East 17th Avenue and Williams Street. It will be a walk-up, "fast-food-style" operation, he said.

While their business model is straight out of a textbook, the shops often reflect their origins in the shadow economy.

Rite-Aid It's Not

Names of commercial marijuana strains are a departure from anything found on a Walgreen's or Rite Aid shelf. Varieties such as Black Widow and Trainwreck don't sound like Johnson & Johnson products.

And the industry's marketing can evoke car dealerships more than medical clinics. Skim the seven pages of ads in this week's Westword newspaper, and you find some Barnum-esque pitches: You've tried the rest, now try the BEST ... Sale! Sale! Sale!

By contrast, Patients Choice feels as staid as a bank.

Patrons show their state licenses at the door. At the counter, clerks in polo shirts with the dispensary's logo fetch the glass pot canisters, answer questions, label the product in wallet-sized plastic bags and log sales on computers.

The shop serves 1,500 patients from around the state.

Erica Casperson of Aurora is a client. She has used cannabis for 2 1/2 years to combat abdominal pain from hepatitis C.

Tuesday, Casperson stopped by for a small bag of marijuana. "It provides pain relief that's more comprehensive than over-the-counter or prescription drugs I've taken," she said. "It's not as hard on my body."

Different marijuana strains, many of them grower-engineered hybrids, are touted for different maladies: AK-47 for nausea and depression, Apollo 13 for back pain, Dynamite for Crohn's disease and asthma, Green Queen for epilepsy, and Jack Herer -- named after a legendary West Coast grower -- for anxiety and fibromyalgia.

While hundreds of marijuana strains exist, they can be divided into two major types, sativa and indica, which are the basis of the many hybrids. Sativa is viewed as a lighter strain that allows users more functionality. Indica is a heavier-duty variety for severe pain, the sort of sleep-inducing high where you partake and turn off the phone.

Dosages vary. Most people buy one-eighth of an ounce, which costs $30 to $60 depending on the potency. That is enough to last up to 10 days.

Jeremy Lanouette is a Nature's Kiss client. He uses marijuana "edibles," brownies and the like, to relieve the pain of MRSA staph, a flesh-eating virus that ravaged his torso.

"It's horrible, but the edibles help me deal with it," said Lanouette, who doses daily. "Otherwise I'd have real problems sleeping at night."

"This is a business"

Mainstream doctors question the efficacy of medical marijuana. Their argument: The newest pharmaceuticals offer more effective pain relief minus the mental fog.

But caregivers say that for chronic pain, pot is safer than pharmaceuticals. "How long can you take Percocet and Vicodin before you get ulcers and become a pillhead?" said Nature's Kiss' Gordon, who is licensed to use pot for his back spasms.

Lincoln Herbal at 424 Lincoln St. opened a month ago. The shop offers traditional Korean medicine along with marijuana. A tastefully decorated waiting area leads into the shop proper, where about three dozen jars packed with pot buds the size of jalapeno peppers are displayed. On-site consumption is not permitted.

"If someone's going to be firing up, we want them far away from here," said Brian Reed, a holistic therapist at the shop who wears medical scrubs. "This is a business, not a club."

Reed has used medical marijuana since being diagnosed with multiple sclerosis six years ago. "It seems to have done wonders," he said. "Doctors were wondering whether I'd be walking by this point."

Reed believes in regulation. "You don't want another Los Angeles, with a thousand dispensaries," he said.

Reed is also skeptical about the medical needs of some licensed clients. His 80-year-old patient with terminal cancer is one thing, he said. "But an 18-year-old kid complaining about back problems? I've got to wonder about that."

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n979/a01.html
Newshawk: Horrible Headlines http://drugsense.org/url/FeK8vLLu
Votes: 0
Webpage: http://www.denverpost.com/headlines/ci_13673556
Pubdate: Fri, 30 Oct 2009
Source: Denver Post (CO)
Copyright: 2009 The Denver Post Corp
Contact: openforum@denverpost.com
Website: http://www.denverpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/122
Author: William Porter, The Denver Post
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topic/dispensaries
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?253 (Cannabis - Medicinal - United States)

MARIJUANA GROWERS TURN NASTY

2009-10-28T07:47:00.000-07:00

Crop Protection; Booby Traps, Armed Guards Getting Common

Marijuana growers in Ontario are resorting to an increasing array of brutal tactics to protect their outdoor crops, including bear traps, spike boards and armed guards, warn provincial police.

The alarming security measures were a common discovery during the OPP's annual marijuana eradication program that wrapped up earlier this month. Newly released figures show the eight-week operation, scheduled to coincide with the end of growing season, yielded 118,443 marijuana plants -- 10,000 more than last year -- that police estimate would have amounted to a street value of about $118-million. More than 200 grow-ops were discovered, resulting in 110 charges against 56 people.

"Marijuana grow-ops pose a real threat to both public and police safety. The cultivation of marijuana in Ontario has reached epidemic proportions," OPP Commissioner Julian Fantino said.

Police found grow-ops in the Brockville, Bancroft and Owen Sound areas, some fields with as many as 9,000 plants. At one grow-op near Smiths Falls, a barn was found to contain more than 1,500 kilograms of processed bud ready for sale.

"Since 2002, we've seen a steady increase in outdoor marijuana growth," said Inspector Bryan Martin of the OPP's drug enforcement section. "It's economics. It makes sense to have one large plantation with a single harvest than to have several indoor grow operations to get the same number of plants."

One grow-op discovered by police near Renfrew last summer contained 40,000 plants, with an estimated street value of more than $40-million.

With more tracts of rural Ontario land being taken over by marijuana plantations comes a growing need for organized crime to ward off police, other criminal groups intent on stealing crops and the public.

Insp. Martin said police are encountering an alarming increase in the number of booby traps, cameras, armed guards and other security devices surrounding grow-ops. Common booby traps include hidden animal traps with metal claws and spike boards suspended from trees designed to impale trespassers when they step on trip wires. Armed guards, usually illegal immigrants hired by organized crime, are also becoming increasingly common, Insp. Martin said.

This summer, police discovered an armed guard and several pitbulls at a grow-op in Apsley, near Bancroft. The guard was found with a diary that contained instructions to shoot trespassers.

In another case, two people driving ATVs near Minden last summer stumbled across a grow-op and were pistol-whipped by armed guards. When they managed to escape, the guards opened fire, but no one was injured.

"This isn't a couple of good ole' boys growing a couple of plants in their backyard. This is a criminal operation and they want to protect it at any cost," said Insp. Martin, noting his department spends about 60% of its workload dealing with marijuana grow-ops.

The growth of marijuana production in Ontario has also made for a lucrative trade business with organized crime in the United States, he said. In a criminal operation known as "brown south, white north," marijuana is shipped south in exchange for crystal meth and crack cocaine, which are then imported to this country.

The U.S. Department of Justice now calls Canada a "source country" for marijuana. Police also say gangs are trading Ontario-produced marijuana for cash and guns.

"It's not just grow-op locations that are a public safety threat because if the marijuana makes it south, drugs and guns come back to our local communities," Insp. Martin said. "It's a reciprocal effect."

BY THE NUMBERS

118,443 Number of marijuana plants seized by OPP during this year's eradication program

$1,000 Estimated street value of one marijuana plant

500 Average number of grow-ops discovered by OPP each year

422 Number of grow-ops discovered by the OPP this year to date

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n979/a04.html
Newshawk: CMAP http://www.mapinc.org/cmap
Votes: 0
Webpage: http://www.nationalpost.com/story.html?id=2161970
Pubdate: Fri, 30 Oct 2009
Source: National Post (Canada)
Copyright: 2009 Canwest Publishing Inc.
Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/O3vnWIvC
Website: http://www.nationalpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/286
Author: Kenyon Wallace, National Post
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada)

SUMMIT COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE WASTES ITS RESOURCES ON MEDICAL POT BUSTS

2009-10-27T09:50:00.000-07:00

SUMMIT COUNTY - Sheriff's deputies recently searched a Summit County home where nearly 200 marijuana plants are under cultivation, but the investigation and tax dollars were wasted because the grow operation was legal.

The medical marijuana caregiver has medical records and state-issued registry cards for about 400 people, allowing him to grow up to 2,400 plants.

"The problem with caregivers is the state doesn't tell us who is a caregiver and who is not," Summit County Sheriff John Minor said.

More than 60 man-hours totaling about $3,000 were put into the investigation, which began after someone turned in a misplaced camera containing images of the operation, he said.

And it wasn't the first time.

In the past six months, seven of 10 search warrants served at local marijuana growing operations were for people following the law, said Derek Woodman, undersheriff and Summit County Drug Task Force director.

The caregiver in the recent failed bust, who requested anonymity for security reasons, said officers with guns approached his home the evening of Oct. 16. They "pulled us outside" for their protection, he said.

"Once the police have a warrant, they have a right to take the place apart," he said.

But the caregiver showed them the patients' medical files and cards, and the seven officers were gone an hour later. The plants were left unharmed and the house wasn't dismantled.

Minor said a "low-key search warrant" was issued because of the frequency of legal growers.

"We go there, check to make sure the paperwork's in order and leave," he said.

Woodman said that while law enforcement elsewhere in the state has taken less tolerant approaches, local deputies aim to avoid wasting time on grow operations compliant with state law.

"If you're legal, you're legal," he said.

Verification issues have cops watering pot plants The caregiver said that if he had it to do over, he would've just gone down to the sheriff's office and explained his operation when it began a month and a half ago.

Minor said some have come forward but that others "have that old mindset that they're fearful."

Not all the caregivers are in full compliance; Woodman said some legal growers have been busted for selling marijuana to undercover officers without registration.

Meanwhile there's no way for them to confirm a caregiver's authenticity without serving warrants. The state doesn't track the caregivers, who are named in the patients' documents.

Once law enforcement officers procure a caregiver's patient information, confirmation is made through records available at the Colorado Department of Health in Denver, which is open 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday.

And short staffing for the marijuana registry further stalls efforts, Woodman said.

In Colorado it takes a physician's referral to apply for a card through the registry, but the patient may begin using the drug immediately.

In one instance, sheriff's deputies responded to a call regarding a man growing a few plants ( patients may grow up to six, with half flowering at a time ). The man hadn't received final approval but had submitted an application.

The plants were taken to the sheriff's office where they were watered and kept alive until the man's status was confirmed.

"This is kind of embarrassing, but it's a fact of life," Minor said. "We didn't want to get sued."

He said marijuana plants have been valued as much as $5,000 each in civil court, so the plants were preserved to prevent a potential lawsuit.

Minor said the strange situation had his department probably violating federal law.

"So that's the mess that we're in, and we need some clear guidance," he said.

He said that while he's "not a guy who believes in a lot of regulations," the recent issues with medical marijuana could certainly use them.

State not likely to pass regulations in 2010 While law enforcers grapple with the lack of regulations for caregivers, municipal governments are taxed with developing rules for medical marijuana dispensary businesses.

Local leaders decide whether to regulate the dispensaries like pharmacies, liquor stores or even adult cabarets - as suggested by a Denver councilman in the Denver Post.

Breckenridge dispensary regulations became active earlier this month. They specify location, signage, hours and security measures - including surveillance cameras and permanent, locking safes.

Other communities have banned marijuana dispensaries, and some have allowed them to flourish similar to most businesses.

While some state legislators want to pass regulations in the 2010 session, it appears unlikely anything will happen.

State Rep. Christine Scanlan of Summit County said the state has no money to support the "regulatory framework" and other components to drafting such a bill.

She said Minor's concerns with identifying legal grow operations make sense.

"I understand his frustration with that, and I think there needs to be clarity," she said. "But drafting a new set of regulations is going to be tough in this economic climate."

Minor isn't very hopeful, either.

"I don't even know if ( the legislature ) will touch this in 2010 simply because it's an election year, and politics has a strange way" of affecting such matters, he said.

Medical marijuana has proliferated in Colorado since President Obama's administration announced it wouldn't go after people in compliance with state laws. The local caregiver in the recent incident said he decided to start growing because of that announcement and the Colorado Board of Health's decision not to limit caregivers' patient numbers.

Mark Salley, spokesman for the Colorado Department of Health and Environment, said his office receives an average of 400 applications for marijuana licenses per day. As of July 31, Colorado had 11,094 registered medical marijuana patients, with 149 in Summit County.

Salley said that while today's numbers are "a lot higher," the CDPHE is "dealing with trying to process the backlog" before more accurate statistics are available.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n967/a01.html
Newshawk: The GCW
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Mon, 26 Oct 2009
Source: Summit Daily News (CO)
Copyright: 2009 Summit Daily News
Contact: http://apps.summitdaily.com/forms/letter/index.php
Website: http://www.summitdaily.com/home.php
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/587
Author: Robert Allen

GROWTH OF MEDICAL-MARIJUANA DEMAND FUELS COLORADO LAND RUSH

2009-10-26T07:48:00.001-07:00

Real estate brokers say that Colorado's medical-marijuana law has sparked a land rush, as entrepreneurs lured by a growing number of licensed users search for properties for growing or selling pot.

In a down real estate market, landlords who might otherwise wait for more conventional tenants are snapping at the opportunity presented by medical-marijuana dispensaries, said Darrin Revious, a broker with Shames Makovsky Realty.

"I am working a couple of these deals right now," he said. "It is absolutely crazy how many of these deals are in the market. I can't believe it."

Since voters approved Amendment 20 in 2000 allowing the use of medical marijuana to treat eight specific conditions, the number of people legally allowed to buy the herb has steadily climbed. In 2007, 1,955 people held medical marijuana cards; the following year, there were 4,720 people on the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment's Medical Marijuana Registry. The number has grown to about 13,000, health department spokesman Mark Salley said.

On an average day, the department receives 400 requests for medical-marijuana cards, and some days applications are as high as 600, Salley said.

Revious said he receives at least one request per day from brokers representing people seeking property suitable for grow operations or dispensaries, where medical pot is sold to card-carrying patients. Over the past three or four months, he said, demand for the properties has soared.

"I need ( 5,000 square feet in ) LoDo, or there about . . . retail," says one e-mail he received from a broker. "Wellness center -- yes, medical marijuana. A group expanding out of California -- a real one."

Warren Edson, an attorney who handles medical-marijuana cases and advises people trying to set up cannabis collectives and cooperatives, said he believes the rise in demand is related to the increasing number of patients approved to buy the drug.

"My share of stoners"

Many people became more aware that pot was legal for those with medical conditions this summer, when the state Board of Health rejected a move to cap at five the number of people a medical-marijuana caregiver can supply, he added.

"It was publicity," Edson said. "It meant the average Joe was seeing it discussed on the news, and saying maybe I should go to my doctor about this; it isn't just for crazy people."

Six months ago, Edson said, many of those seeking the cards were terribly sick, or were "hippies" looking to get high. "Now we are seeing a greater cross section of individuals."

Laurel Alterman opened AlterMeds at the Colony Square Shopping Center in Louisville earlier this month, just before the City Council approved a moratorium on new dispensaries.

Alterman abandoned her real estate business, which has done poorly recently, to open the dispensary. "When the Board of Health expanded the roll of caregivers this summer, the opportunity to open became very attractive, and my son was working in a dispensary in Denver and knew the business," she said. "I just jumped off a building without a parachute."

Paul Tamburello, a broker's associate with Distinctive Properties, said he gets three calls a week from business people who want to lease a building he owns at West 32nd Avenue and Zuni Street to use as a dispensary.

"Some are really legitimate businesspeople, but I certainly run into my share of stoners," he said.

There are four dispensaries within a mile of the building, he said. "There certainly seems to be a plethora of dispensaries trying to open. I call it the new gold rush. A lot of these guys are seeing dollar signs. I don't know how lucrative it will be if the velocity of growth continues on the path it is on."

Alterman said she expects to earn twice as much as she made annually in real estate by selling medical marijuana.

One businessman said he has been approached a number of times by people who wanted to rent space for a dispensary in his Colfax Avenue business. He refused. "We don't rent space," said the man, who asked that his name and business not be published because marijuana has negative connotations for many.

Some Californians who wanted to open a dispensary in the area asked him what he thought his building is worth. When he said it was appraised at $850,000 they offered $750,000 in cash at closing.

Tighter regulations loom

Concern over the mushrooming number of dispensaries is growing, and some cities and towns are studying regulations to limit them, while others have passed outright bans.

State Sen. Chris Romer, D-Denver, plans to introduce a bill next year that would clarify regulations involving pot-using patients.

Alterman said she wouldn't object to some regulation in the industry that could make the shops operate more like licensed pharmacies. And she sees a need for properly zoning the establishments.

Tight security measures are necessary to operate the shops and grow operations, which are natural targets for thieves, she said. "Zoning laws are important," she said. "This is a business that is inappropriate for a residential area because, yes, it is dangerous."

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n964/a07.html
Newshawk: DrugNews Advanced Search, http://www.mapinc.org/find
Webpage: http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_13636549
Pubdate: Sun, 25 Oct 2009
Source: Denver Post (CO)
Copyright: 2009 The Denver Post Corp
Contact: openforum@denverpost.com
Website: http://www.denverpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/122
Author: Tom McGhee, The Denver Post
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Cannabis - Medicinal)

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HEROIN DEATHS ON RISE IN '09

2009-10-25T07:47:00.000-07:00

Across Charlotte, 'in every neighborhood,' gangs linked to Mexican drug traffickers target teens, officials warn.

Heroin overdoses and deaths in Charlotte have more than tripled since last year, a concern to authorities who want to prevent a repeat of the city's drug battles of the early 1990s.

Local officials are particularly concerned that gangs, most of which are connected to Mexican drug organizations, are aggressively targeting teenagers

"We're talking at the Arboretum. We're talking at Northlake mall. We're talking in downtown Charlotte," Mayor Pat McCrory said Tuesday, when the new statistics were released. "We're talking in every neighborhood. Both private and public schools. This is a serious issue."

In 2008, there were eight heroin overdoses in Charlotte and three deaths from heroin, according to police statistics. This year, with two months to go, there are already 33 overdoses and 10 deaths. And seizures of heroin have quadrupled from 1,075 grams to 4,989 grams.

McCrory and Sheriff Chipp Bailey said they have discussed more drug testing in the county jail to better understand the extent of drug use.

McCrory said authorities need the public's help to keep the city from a repeat of 1993, when a crack cocaine epidemic help push the city's homicide total to a record 129 people.

Officials say they have yet to see an increase in drug-related violence this year, but they fear that could change as drug violence along the border spills over into the United States.

The U.S. Department of Justice's 2009 National Drug Threat Assessment identified Charlotte as one of 230 cities where Mexican traffickers "maintain drug distribution networks" to sell cocaine, marijuana, methamphetamines and heroin.

Capt. Mike Adams of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department's vice and narcotics unit said he could not estimate how many heroin gangs, or drug cells, operate in Charlotte, but said police have shut down seven cells since June.

"The majority are Mexican," he said. "All the black-tar heroin is from Mexico."

Black-tar heroin, made from poppies in western Mexico, gets its name from its color and texture. Police attribute its rise to its cheaper price and the well-run distribution networks developed by Mexican cartels.

In an investigation dubbed "Operation Dirty Girl 3," police and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration arrested four men on July 30 and seized more than a pound of black-tar heroin.

From his bar less than a half mile from Starmount Elementary School, Carlos Roman Villanueva sold black-tar heroin to clients throughout South Charlotte, including in Ballantyne, according to court records.

Police say they caught Roman after he purchased $22,560 worth of heroin from a supplier.

After arresting the supplier with the money, police visited Roman. They asked for the drugs.

"He went behind the bar, entered the kitchen and returned to provide 557 grams of black-tar heroin," James Long, of the CMPD vice and narcotics unit, said in an affidavit.

Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Chief Rodney Monroe said the traffickers are selling to all demographics, but increasingly are promoting the drug to teenagers who are less fearful of harder drugs.

"Young kids, 17-, 18-year-olds ... are a part of their whole marketing strategy," Monroe said.

Addicts say black tar is easy to find in Charlotte. At $12.50 a dose, it's about half the price of other available forms.

Adams said the drug operations are set up better than some legitimate businesses. They have clear divisions of labor, sales goals and contingency plans to keep the operation running if one of the distributors is arrested.

"I, and many others, had considered heroin to be a drug of the past," McCrory said. "It has now returned to the streets, and homes throughout Charlotte: North, South, East and West."

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n964/a06.html
Newshawk: chip
Pubdate: Wed, 21 Oct 2009
Source: Charlotte Observer (NC)
Copyright: 2009 The Charlotte Observer
Contact: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/newsroom/index.html?action=letters
Website: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/78
Author: Franco Ordoaez

OBAMA TAKES THE PATH OF REEFER SANITY

2009-10-24T10:33:00.001-07:00

In an act of merciful sanity, the Obama administration has made good on its promise to stop interfering with states that allow the medical use of marijuana. Clink-clink, hear-hear, salud, cheers, et cetera, et cetera.

The announcement from Attorney General Eric Holder surely comes as a relief to the many who rely on cannabis to ease suffering from various ailments. This new, relaxed approach doesn't let drug traffickers off the hook. It merely means that 14 states that now provide for some medical marijuana uses no longer need fear federal raids on dispensaries and users operating under state law.

It's a good move, long overdue. But is it enough? Not quite.

The debate over whether Americans ought to have the right to be stupid - - or to make other people seem more interesting - continues apace after 40 years of the ( failed ) "war on drugs."

Arguments for and against decriminalization of some or all drugs are familiar by now. Distilled to the basics, the drug war has empowered criminals while criminalizing otherwise law-abiding citizens and wasted billions that could have been better spent on education and rehabilitation.

By ever-greater numbers, Americans support decriminalizing at least marijuana, which millions admit to using, including a couple of presidents and a Supreme Court justice. A recent Gallup poll found that 44 percent of Americans favor legalization for any purpose, not just medical, up from 31 percent in 2000.

The highest level of support, not surprisingly, is in the Western states and among self-described liberals, with 78 percent of liberals favoring decriminalization. But the shift toward a more-sensible national policy is no longer confined to the left. Nor is the long-haired stoner the face of the pro-pot lobby. Today's activist, more likely, doesn't have facial hair, but she does have kids.

Lately to the smallish conservative crowd, notably once led by anti-prohibitionist William F. Buckley, is Jessica Corry of Colorado, a married, pro-life Republican mom, soon to be "freedom fighter of the month" in High Times magazine.

Recent partakers undoubtedly will have to rub their eyes for a double-take when they spot Corry, who spoke last month at a National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws conference in San Francisco, wearing an American flag lapel pin, a triple strand of pearls and a gold marijuana leaf pin.

Another day, another stereotype in the dust bin.

In addition to writing and speaking to end marijuana prohibition, Corry, who does not smoke pot, is trying to organize Republican women around the cause. So far, she has commitments from 20 fellow Coloradoans, most of them lawyers, like Corry. Her husband, also an attorney, represents medical marijuana users.

Corry's arguments focus not only on the inhumanity of further punishing sick people who seek relief through pot, but also on protecting her own children should they decide to try marijuana someday. There's nothing like imagining one's own children as "criminals" to put irrational laws in perspective.

Corry is hardly alone and, in fact, may be part of a "toking point" ( Is there a drug yet for "Tipping Point Fatigue?" ). In its October issue, Marie Claire magazine featured "Stiletto Stoners" about accomplished career women who prefer to relax with pot. A September Fortune cover story, "Is Pot Already Legal?" examined the issue. In April, former ( 2006 ) Miss New Jersey, Georgine DiMaria, outed herself as a stealth marijuana user to treat her asthma.

States' rights and conservatism are old friends - except when they're not. While many Republicans nurse a libertarian streak, the party has been selective in its support of federalist principles. The George W. Bush administration refused to honor states authorizing medical uses of cannabis, for instance, but aimed to return abortion and marriage issues to state jurisdictions.

In a column for the Colorado Daily, Corry argued that conservative principles of smaller government are in direct conflict with laws that try to control what we put into our bodies. Alcohol and cigarettes - not to mention 700-calorie cheeseburgers - are inarguably more harmful than a little reefer, she wrote.

The decision not to raid dispensaries or punish people who benefit from marijuana use, though commendable, falls short of what's needed. At the very least, when jobs and cash are in short supply, legalizing marijuana would seem both prudent and profitable.

In 1929, the Women's Organization for National Prohibition Reform led the movement to end alcohol prohibition. Might women lead the next revolution in personal autonomy?

Keep those flutes and snifters ( and bongs? ) handy.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n959/a06.html
Newshawk: Jim
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Fri, 23 Oct 2009
Source: Gwinnett Daily Post, The (GA)
Copyright: 2009 Post-Citizen Media Inc.
Contact: letters@gwinnettdailypost.com
Website: http://www.gwinnettdailypost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2480
Note: Letters can run as long as 400 words.
Author: Kathleen Parker
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Cannabis - Medicinal)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization)

RAID TURNS UP 174 POUNDS OF METH AT LAWRENCEVILLE HOME

2009-10-23T10:32:00.000-07:00

Raid Turns Up 174 Pounds Of Meth At Lawrenceville Home

LAWRENCEVILLE - Elena Rostas paid little attention to the white, two-story house a few doors down on Lawrenceville's La Maison Drive.

Some nights she caught a "weird" smell wafting from the home's direction, something pungent like gasoline. And it seemed odd that a red semitrailer was parked outside the home for several days recently, she said.

Other than that, nothing fishy, she said.

Situated around a bend in the Royal Terrace subdivision, the unassuming abode housed one of the largest, most complex methamphetamine conversion laboratories federal authorizes have uncovered in the United States, officials said Thursday.

The only thing missing from the docile front, said Gwinnett District Attorney Danny Porter, "was a white picket fence."

Gwinnett became ground zero this week in the largest takedown operation targeting a Mexican drug cartel in the history of the Drug Enforcement Administration. The Lawrenceville home - where a reported 174 pounds of meth were found Wednesday - was the national epicenter, providing links to operations in cities as far as Los Angeles.

Rostas, a mother of 12, found news of the raid disconcerting.

"To me, it's pretty scary," she said, a fussy child at her side. "It's a quiet neighborhood. Maybe that's why they chose it."

Bingo, authorities said at a press conference.

The bust and others like it nationwide were the result of an initiative called Project Coronado, leading to 31 arrests of suspect traffickers in Gwinnett alone Wednesday. Along with the meth haul, hundreds of local police pulled 17 kilos of cocaine, 13 firearms and $54,000 in dirty money off Gwinnett streets, officials said.

Officials made 303 arrests nationwide.

The takedown is a crippling blow to "La Familia Michoacana," a ruthless drug organization based in southwestern Mexico, said Rodney Benson, a special agent with the DEA in Atlanta.

La Familia, for short, operates nationwide but has strongholds in metro Atlanta, Dallas and greater Los Angeles. A La Familia leader is believed to be responsible for the murder of 12 federal agents in Mexico in July, Benson said.

Locally, authorities rescued a Dominican man from New York who'd been kidnapped and slated for execution, Benson said.

Benson warned that the organization may try to regroup and re-establish their financiers.

"Frankly, we have to keep the pressure on," he said, "and that's what we're going to do."

Gwinnett police Chief Charles Walters called the case indicative of the large-scale drug operations his officers must routinely fight.

"Complexity is the norm now - it's not a simple mom-and-pop drug organization," Walters said. "We have taken a lot of dangerous people out of this community."

La Familia operatives were attracted to Gwinnett - as are many traffickers to metro Atlanta - by the area's booming Hispanic population and plentiful homes for rent on quiet streets. Both are a means to camouflage themselves, Porter said.

Porter said authorities were led to the meth lab through tipsters in the community.

"People need to report suspicious smells and suspicious comings-and-goings," he said.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n959/a05.html
Newshawk: Jim
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Fri, 23 Oct 2009
Source: Gwinnett Daily Post, The (GA)
Copyright: 2009 Post-Citizen Media Inc.
Contact: letters@gwinnettdailypost.com
Website: http://www.gwinnettdailypost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2480
Note: Letters can run as long as 400 words.
Author: Josh Green, Staff Writer
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine)

ROSS REBAGLIATI TO PURSUE OKANAGAN FEDERAL LIBERAL NOMINATION

2009-10-22T10:28:00.000-07:00

Incumbent Okanagan-Coquihalla MP Stockwell Day may have ridden into the pages of Canadian political history on a jet-ski, but in the next federal election he will likely be challenged by the guy who won the first-ever Olympic snowboarding gold medal for Canada.

Ross Rebagliati has announced he will seek the federal Liberal nomination in Okanagan-Coquihalla riding, and it appears he will be the only candidate running at Monday's nomination meeting.

"It's not as strange as it might appear," said the 38-year-old of his move from 1998 Olympic snowboarding champion to aspiring federal politician.

"I have been involved with helping the Liberal Party for many years, mainly when I lived in Whistler."

Rebagliati moved to Kelowna with his wife Alexandra in 2007 to help promote the Kelowna Mountain recreation development project.

But he said he "stepped away" from it last November because of difficulties with the economy.

Earlier this year, he told the Capital News the reason for his departure was because the relationship with the owners of the development "just wasn't working out."

Since then, Rebagliati has written a book, Off The Chain, a history of snowboarding in Canada, which is due out next month.

He will also be involved with next February's winter Olympic Games in Vancouver and Whistler.

Rebagliati said his "flexible schedule," will allow him the time to run for the MP's job and he plans to appeal mainly to disaffected younger voters.

And to do that he intends to use technology, such as social media, to as great an extent as possible.

Refusing to concede that unseating Day-the politically popular Conservative incumbent who is also Canada's international trade minister and who has represented the riding since 2000, will be an uphill battle as Day took more than 50 per cent of the vote in three of the last four elections and just under 50 per cent in 2004, Rebagliati views the task as "more of an opportunity."

"( Day ) may have won a majority of the votes ( cast ) in the last election but when you look closer at the numbers, he didn't take a lot of the potential vote," said Rebagliati.

"I'm going to go after the people who may not have voted before."

The bilingual former international athlete said he has close ties to the riding, given that his family has had a cottage in Naramata since the 1950s.

He said some of his strongest memories of growing up are from the Okanagan, such as learning to swim in Okanagan Lake off Naramata and making his first wake board there before wakeboarding became as popular as it is today.

Day is also no stranger to the Okanagan Lake, having made a splash when he left Alberta provincial politics to lead the former Canadian Alliance party.

After winning a by-election in 2000 following the decision by former MP Jim Hart to step down and let Day run in the riding, Day showed up for his first national press conference on a jet ski.

The wetsuit-clad Day's publicity stunt drew mixed reactions from the media and the public.

Controversy also dogged Rebagliati in the days after he won his gold medal in Nagano, Japan.

Three days after his surprise win, it was announced marijuana was found in his system during a drug test.

Rebagliati, 26 at the time, had his gold medal revoked.

In Japan, police interrogated him for a day and Rebagliati claimed trace amount got into his system as secondhand smoke at a pre-Olympics party in Whistler.

In his appeal, the Court of Arbitration for Sport ruled marijuana was not banned in the agreement between the International Olympic Committee and snowboard's governing body and his medal was returned.

Rebagliati said that the controversy will likely help him with young voters because they will be able to relate to him.

"They will see a guy who had some controversy but who has also had some success. Regular guys and girls can relate to that."

As for issues facing the riding, Rebagliati said he is concerned about the unique challenges facing the agriculture industry and the number of jobs that have been lost in the riding in recent months, as well as the state of health care.

And, as a new father-his son Ryan was born five months ago-he said he is also concerned about the lack of affordable child care.

Rebagliati and his family currently live in Kelowna, but are house-hunting in the Penticton area.

"Coming to Kelowna was a first step to get back to the Okanagan for me," he said.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n959/a04.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Fri, 23 Oct 2009
Source: Kelowna Capital News (CN BC)
Copyright: 2009, West Partners Publishing Ltd.
Contact: edit@kelownacapnews.com
Website: http://www.kelownacapnews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1294
Author: Alistair Waters
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/testing.htm (Drug Test)

LA’S TOP PROSECUTOR TO TARGET POT SHOPS

2009-10-21T09:19:00.000-07:00

LOS ANGELES – Clay Tepel knew there were risks to setting up a medical marijuana shop: it could lose money, be robbed or be raided by authorities.

Still, he wasn’t expecting the phone call one August day when a voice said the police were outside and he needed to open up or they would bust down the door. His first thought, that it was a joke, turned to terror when he opened the door.

Heavily armed officers in helmets, bulletproof vests and, oddly enough, Bermuda shorts stormed his store, handcuffed him, disabled security cameras and seized his drugs before taking him to jail. When he asked why his shop was invaded, an officer responded, “We’re closing them all down.”

Those words could prove prescient after Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley said last week that he wanted to shutter clinics that sold pot for profit. Cooley’s plan is the latest salvo in a prolonged conflict in California over whether medical marijuana is having its intended effect or is being abused by the larger population.

Until recently, raids on clinics typically led to federal prosecutions, but Cooley’s remarks and similar ones from Attorney General Jerry Brown signal a new approach to clear the haze left by Proposition 215, the 1996 state ballot measure that allowed sick people with referrals from doctors and an identification card to smoke pot.

“Everybody is scared,” said Tepel, who has spoken with other pot store operators. “Why are voters’ rights being stepped all over? This kind of blind justice has to stop.”

The crackdown is a crushing blow for dispensary owners who were relieved in March when U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said federal agents would go after marijuana distributors who violated both federal and state laws.

A new policy memo issued Monday by the Justice Department told prosecutors that pot-smoking patients or their sanctioned suppliers should not be targeted for federal prosecution in states that allow medical marijuana. The guidelines do, however, make it clear that federal agents will go after people whose distribution goes beyond what is permitted under state law or use medical marijuana as a cover for other crimes.

The comments that Holder made this year appear to have emboldened entrepreneurs as marijuana shops cropped up across California. In Los Angeles alone, there are an estimated 800 dispensaries, more than any other city in the nation. In 2005, there were only four, authorities said.

Cooley contends a vast majority of several hundred outlets his office investigated aren’t following state law. Initially, the law allowed authorized marijuana users to grow their own plants, but lawmakers revised the law in 2003 to allow collectives to provide pot grown by members.

Cooley said he would target stores who were profiting and selling to people who don’t qualify for medicinal marijuana.

“All those who are operating illegally, our advice to them is to shut down voluntarily and they won’t be subject to prosecution,” Cooley told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

At the same time, advocates are gathering signatures to get as many as three pot-legalization measures on next year’s ballot in California. One poll shows voters would support legalizing marijuana outright. Thirteen states, including California, allow medical marijuana.

Cooley said his office had been assessing the rush of marijuana dispensaries for the past two years and had provided training for his staff during the past several months in anticipation of filing cases.

“Holder’s statement probably created the impression that there wasn’t going to be any federal investigation or prosecution of these entities,” Cooley said. “There has to be some clarification.”

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n947/a06.html
Newshawk: http://www.illinoisNORML.org
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Tue, 20 Oct 2009
Source: Northwest Herald (IL)
Copyright: 2009 The Associated Press
Contact: letters@nwherald.com
Website: http://www.nwherald.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2762
Author: Greg Risling, Staff Writer

STREET PROSTITUTION - A SCOURGE THAT MUST END

2009-10-20T13:14:00.000-07:00

It's Spread From Skid Row And Is Now Found In The 'Burbs

It was around 11:30 a.m. on Thanksgiving, and Maple Ridge resident Michelle Rainey was going to her local gym when she saw a woman in her 40s she knows as Elaine soliciting on 225th Street.

Elaine looked haggard, Rainey told me. Her hair was a mess, she was wearing a filthy white tracksuit and needed $25 to pay a crack debt.

Rainey went over to talk to her and gave her $75, on condition she took the day off and gave herself and the community a break.

"I made her promise that she wouldn't be on that walk for that day," said Rainey, 38, who herself suffers from Crohn's disease.

"I made her promise me that she would get a meal and a bath and wash her clothes."

Yes, despite what many of us who live in the 'burbs want to believe, the Downtown Eastside is far from the only Metro Vancouver neighbourhood plagued by homelessness, drug addiction and street prostitution.

Rainey knows this first-hand. Three years ago, she and her husband left Gastown, where they lived in an apartment opposite a soup kitchen, and bought a home in Haney in the heart of Maple Ridge. It was a world away from offices of the Downtown Eastside where Rainey -- the Marc Emery associate who in July was sentenced in Seattle to two years' probation for conspiracy to manufacture marijuana -- worked as vice-president of the B.C. Marijuana Party.

Or so they thought.

They left downtown Vancouver because they wanted a quiet, safe and affordable place to live, Rainey said. But a year-and-a-half ago, conditions in Haney started to deteriorate as marginalized people moved in. And now, when Rainey goes for her daily workout, hookers openly ply their trade on her street, and johns slow their vehicles to leer at her.

"It's an uncomfortable feeling," she says.

Seniors and others in the area are also concerned. And recently the police responded by arresting 15 sex-trade workers. The police crackdown, however, was criticized by a Maple Ridge News opinion piece, which said "arresting sex-trade workers only pushes them into hiding, making it more difficult to help them, and putting them at greater risk of harm."

Rainey wrote a letter to the newspaper, saying that "victimizing and jailing addicted sex-trade workers is not a compassionate solution."

Indeed, she told me, it saddens her deeply that with the Salvation Army and various churches close by, no one seems to be reaching out to addicted and abandoned women such as Elaine.

Rainey also said she agrees with three Ontario women who have gone to court to challenge provisions in Canada's prostitution laws, arguing they contribute to the violence sex-trade workers face.

Myself, I think street prostitution is a scourge and it's one that requires a carrot-and-stick approach. Sure, we need to show compassion by helping vulnerable women such as Elaine kick the drug addiction that's destroying them. But we also must come down hard on those drug-dealers, johns and prostitutes who destroy an entire community.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n946/a04.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 1
Webpage: http://www.theprovince.com/health/Street+prostitution+scourge+that+must/2118802/story.html
Pubdate: Sun, 18 Oct 2009
Source: Province, The (CN BC)
Copyright: 2009 Canwest Publishing Inc.
Contact: http://www.canada.com/theprovince/letters.html
Website: http://www.canada.com/theprovince/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/476
Author: Jon Ferry

THE COMING PRISON BOOM

2009-10-19T13:13:00.000-07:00

If the federal government gets its way, Canadians will witness a boom in prison construction coinciding with the longest steady decline in crime rates in Canadian history. That's the consequence of the various pieces of "get tough" legislation recently passed or currently working their way through Parliament.

Consider this: the introduction of mandatory minimum sentences for "serious drug crimes" in the National Anti-Drug Strategy, plus the limiting of judicial discretion in regard to credit for time served in pre-trial detention is projected by Statistics Canada to increase the rate of incarceration by as much as 10 per cent.

The government claims that ending two-for-one credit for pre-trial detention will alleviate the overcrowding crisis in provincial detention centres by encouraging more guilty pleas and introducing "truth in sentencing."

The resulting surge in Canada's rate of incarceration, currently hovering around 149 per 100,000 population, would require roughly 3,000 new beds for men and about 10 to 15 per cent of that number for women.

So what? Bad people go to jail, right? It should be that simple, but it's not. Here's why: when governments "crack down," the American evidence shows that they quickly catch the worst of the worst before reaching into the pool of the non-violent: people who might represent a threat to themselves, but little risk to their communities.

The worst crime for most of these people is either that they are racial minorities ( aboriginals will be particularly hard hit ) or that they started falling through the cracks in elementary school and carry the burden of various learning and cognitive challenges, including ADD, acquired brain disorders, ADHD, fetal alcohol syndrome, depression, trauma and a whole alphabet soup of psychiatric and psychological syndromes.

The result is prisons swollen with greater numbers of the non-violent, mentally ill and poor, and racial minorities.

Approximately 10 per cent of the federal prison population is now double-bunked. Prison crowding undermines the success of treatment and degrades the working conditions of staff, encouraging higher rates of staff turnover and poorer treatment outcomes for prisoners.

Most non-violent prisoners can be more effectively, humanely and economically treated in the community than they can in prison, and the government has the research to prove this. Community supervision costs roughly $23,500 per year per person compared with approximately $101,000 per year per person on average across all security levels to keep a man in prison, and $185,000 per year per woman.

Then there's the issue of where to put them.

Current infrastructure is at or over capacity. The passage of Bill C-25 will require temporary housing in the short term, but it's the long term that ought to concern Canadians -- for the only land that the federal government can start building on quickly is the prison farms.

Some of the best farmland in Canada could be swallowed up by super-max prisons based on the American model. That is the vision endorsed by the "independent panel" commissioned by the government and chaired by the former minister of corrections for the province of Ontario, Rob Sampson.

So let's connect the dots. The crime rate has been declining for 26 years -- those are the government's numbers -- but the same government wants to build more prisons at a cost to taxpayers of billions of dollars.

Who benefits? In the U.S. case, private prison contractors and correctional officer unions. Everyone else loses: education, social assistance and health care.

Does prison building buy safer communities? Not in the U.S. Money spent on increased imprisonment and longer, harsher sentences is money wasted, because more prisons do not increase community safety -- and there is ample evidence that prisons create and reinforce criminal attitudes and pre-dispositions.

If more prisons resulted in less crime, the U.S. would be the safest place in the world. Canada does not need to increase its rate of incarceration, particularly in a context of declining crime rates.

We do not need to "get tough," but we do need to "get smart."

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n946/a03.html
Newshawk: CMAP http://www.mapinc.org/cmap
Votes: 0
Webpage: http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/todays-paper/coming+prison+boom/2118720/story.html
Pubdate: Sun, 18 Oct 2009
Source: Ottawa Citizen (CN ON)
Copyright: 2009 The Ottawa Citizen
Contact: http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/letters.html
Website: http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/326
Author: Craig Jones and Kim Pate
Note: Craig Jones is executive director of the John Howard Society of Canada. Kim Pate
is executive director of the Canadian Association of Elizabeth Fry Societies.

PIPES NO SUBSTITUTE FOR TREATMENT

2009-10-18T13:11:00.000-07:00

When it comes to drug addiction, supporting harm reduction programs does not preclude supporting treatment.

That is the message Courtenay council would like to send to the provincial government.

Coun. Ronna-Rae Leonard proposed Tuesday that council write to the provincial government to support more funding for drug addiction treatment and express council's opinion that the harm reduction program is not in lieu of treatment.

Last month, council heard about a crack cocaine pipe education and harm reduction program from the Vancouver Island Health Authority ( VIHA ) and AIDS Vancouver Island and voted to write to VIHA supporting the expansion of the program to include the distribution of safe mouthpieces and pushsticks.

Following the presentation, Leonard received some communication suggesting there were misinterpretations in the community about why council was supporting the program and about council's responsibility, she noted.

"I thought this was a good opportunity in view of some of the things I was hearing that we could certainly clarify to senior government that by approving the distribution of the mouthpieces that we were not suggesting in any way that was in lieu of treatment," she said.

Council voted, not unanimously, to send a letter.

Coun. Jon Ambler, who voted against sending the letter, was concerned whether this issue falls within council's power.

"I'm kind of on the horns of dilemma on this on whether we are actually doing any good here," he said. "It's a good debate, but I'm not sure this actually falls within our remit."

Coun. Manno Theos did not support sending the letter either. He felt Leonard's motion was too vague, as it did not specify what the treatment would be and about which drugs they were speaking.

"I feel Coun. Leonard is coming with the right heart; my concern would be it appears to be a bit vague," he said. "I really don't know exactly what that would mean. There are so many different drug addiction treatments."

The resolution is meant to articulate the need to deal with the issue of harm reduction, noted Leonard.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n946/a02.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Fri, 16 Oct 2009
Source: Comox Valley Record (CN BC)
Copyright: 2009 Comox Valley Record
Contact: editor@comoxvalleyrecord.com
Website: http://www.comoxvalleyrecord.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/784
Author: Lindsay Chung

FREE CRACK PIPES PART OF HARM REDUCTION

2009-10-17T13:10:00.000-07:00

Dear editor,

I am not surprised that people are voicing their discomfort and concerns in relation to the distribution of free crack pipes, as I understand the devastating effects that drug use can have on families and the community.

However, as a fourth-year nursing student, I am disheartened to read such disturbing answers for "dealing" with people suffering with drug addictions.

"Incarcerating people and forcing them into sobriety" is not the answer to the issues associated with illicit drug use, and it is certainly not moral. Drug dependence is a medical problem, an illness that requires treatment, not imprisonment. Incarceration just puts people into another high-risk environment that can result in increased drug use, infections, or withdrawal.

Reports documented in the Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics inform that inadequate treatment of drug withdrawal in jails is common. People who are dependent on drugs require treatment, such as detoxification, to avoid the pain and suffering associated with acute withdrawal. When this is not provided, individuals experience symptoms such as discomfort, severe pain, nausea, vomiting, fever, psychosis or even death ( 2004 ). This is certainly not humane, nor does it respect the dignity, autonomy or justice that all individuals have a right to and deserve.

Although law enforcement is part of the public health strategy to reducing the harms associated with drug use, "forcing" incarceration and abstinence does not work.

In fact, there is strong evidence from the Correctional Service Canada that reports an increase in HIV/AIDS and hepatitis C infections in Canadian prisons in relation to addictions. Illicit drug use is widespread and is perpetuated, not reduced, by correctional policies.

As a result, harm reduction measures are now being recommended in Canadian jails to reduce the spread of disease ( 2005 ).

Understandably, there are a lot of concerns with alternative approaches to reducing the damaging effects caused by drug use, but providing free crack pipes does not encourage illegal drug use or enable individuals.

Harm reduction has proven to result in reduced infections, deaths, use of shared substance-use equipment, reduced crime rates, and increased referrals to treatment programs.

Furthermore, distributing supplies such as crack pipe mouthpieces provides opportunities to health-care workers to engage with vulnerable populations, offer services, advice and support around safe practices ( BCCDC, 2009 ).

To help understand the harm reduction philosophy and why it came about, I recommend reading the BCCDC's Harm Reduction of BC Community Guide at www.housing.gov.bc.ca/ptf/hrcommunityguide.pdf .

Jayne Fisher, Courtenay

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n946/a01.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Fri, 16 Oct 2009
Source: Comox Valley Record (CN BC)
Copyright: 2009 Comox Valley Record
Contact: editor@comoxvalleyrecord.com
Website: http://www.comoxvalleyrecord.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/784
Author: Jayne Fisher

RED RIBBON WEEK HONORS FALLEN OFFICER IN DRUG FIGHT

2009-10-16T13:09:00.000-07:00

Red Ribbon Week, which the Ledger-Enquirer is observing with this weeklong series, was started in memory of Enrique "Kiki" S. Camarena.

Camarena was born in Mexico in 1947, graduated from high school in California, and served in the U.S. Marine Corps for two years. After working for a police department as a criminal investigator and narcotics investigator, Camarena joined the Drug Enforcement Administration as a special agent in 1974. He worked in California for seven years, then was transferred to Mexico.

For 4 1/2 years, Camarena was hot on the trail of the country's biggest marijuana and cocaine traffickers. In early 1985, on the verge of unlocking a multibillion-dollar drug pipeline, Camarena was heading to a lunch date with his wife, Mika. He was surrounded by five armed men who threw him into a car and sped away.

That was the last time anyone but his kidnappers would see him alive. It is believed that Special Agent Camarena's death actually occurred two days later, but his body was not discovered for almost a month.

He was 37 years old and was survived by his wife and their three children, Enrique, Daniel and Erik.

Shortly after Camarena's death, Congressman Duncan Hunter and high school friend Henry Lozano launched Camarena Clubs in the special agent's hometown of Calexico, Calif. Members pledged to lead drug-free lives to honor the sacrifices made by the law enforcement officer and others on behalf of all Americans. Later in 1985, the club met with first lady Nancy Reagan, bringing it national attention. That same year, parent groups in California, Illinois and Virginia began promoting the wearing of red ribbons nationwide during late October.

The campaign was formalized in 1988 with President Ronald Reagan and Nancy Reagan serving as honorary chairpersons. Today, the eight-day observance is sponsored by the National Family Partnership and has become the annual catalyst to show intolerance for drugs in our schools, workplaces and communities

- -- Source: http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/ongoing/red_ribbon/redribbon_factsheet.html

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n946/a10.html
Newshawk: Jim
Votes: 1
Pubdate: Sun, 18 Oct 2009
Source: Ledger-Enquirer (Columbus,GA)
Copyright: 2009 Ledger-Enquirer
Contact: letters@ledger-enquirer.com
Website: http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/mld/enquirer/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/237
Note: From staff reports - Red Ribbon Week, which the Ledger-Enquirer is
observing with this weeklong series, was started in memory of Enrique
"Kiki" S. Camarena.

HIGH TIME TO LEGALIZE POT, PROPONENTS SAY

2009-10-15T14:29:00.001-07:00

Even as the battle rages over medical marijuana in Orange County, activists and advocates in California are busy gathering signatures to get as many as three different pot-legalization initiatives on the 2010 ballot.

If one of these initiatives passes, California would become the first state to legalize marijuana and impose a tax on it, a move proponents say could help get the state out of an unprecedented budget crisis.

So far, there are three known initiatives that propose legalizing marijuana. One is the California Cannabis Hemp and Health Initiative, which would make use of all cannabis hemp legal for industrial, nutritional, medicinal, religious and recreational purposes.

The other is the California Cannabis Initiative, which would make marijuana legal for medicinal and recreational purposes.

And yet another initiative – the Regulate, Control and Tax Cannabis Act – would allow adults 21 and older in California to possess up to one ounce of cannabis and give local governments the ability to tax and regulate the sale of cannabis to adults 21 and older – just like alcohol.

Proponents of these initiatives hope that at least one will get on the 2010 ballot. They say the time is ripe for change as Sacramento battles budget problems and an increasing number of Californians and Americans are showing support to legalize pot.

Supporters say sales tax from marijuana would rake in at least $1 billion in revenue for the state.

A Zogby poll earlier this year indicated that 52 percent of Americans support legalizing marijuana. The same poll indicated that six out of 10 people in California favored pot legalization.

Support to legalize marijuana has been finding steady support among Americans over the years.

A USA Today/CNN/Gallup poll in August 2001 indicated 34 percent favored legalizing marijuana use. That was the most support for legalization since pollsters began asking the question in 1969.

According to the USA Today report, the support for legalization had been constant at about 25percent for 20 years before the USA Today poll recorded an increase to 31 percent in August 2000 and 34 percent in August 2001.

Joseph Rogoway, a San Francisco criminal defense lawyer who formerly practiced in Orange County, is one of the key proponents of the California Cannabis Initiative. He contends the people of California are ready to vote on the matter, given the growing support over the years.

I can tell simply from the overwhelmingly positive support we've been getting not only from San Francisco, but across the state," he said. "Recent polling shows that the people of this state support legalization of marijuana."

Rogoway also cites a State Board of Equalization report, which estimates that taxing marijuana sales in California could rake in $1 billion a year in sales tax revenue.

Along with fellow defense lawyers James Clark and Omar Figueroa, Rogoway believes that making pot legal is the solution to preventing crimes involving the drug.

Our initiative is the best way to keep marijuana away from children because you treat it like alcohol," he said. "You regulate the distribution and sale of marijuana. Right now, this market is unregulated and completely ruled by the drug cartels."

Also, as a defense attorney, Rogoway said he wants to stop defending those accused of possessing marijuana.

It's a waste of precious resources," he said. "This initiative, if passed, is going to save the state millions in criminal justice expenditure."

But a majority of law enforcement officials have a different viewpoint. Garden Grove police Chief Joseph Polisar says that legalizing marijuana would create a problem for local law enforcement members, who would be caught between state law and a federal law that says it's illegal. Polisar strongly recommended to the Garden Grove City Council that it pass an ordinance banning all medical marijuana clinics, saying they are a breeding ground for crime.

Under federal law, marijuana is illegal, period. The U.S. Supreme Court has also ruled that federal law enforcement agents have the right to crack down even on marijuana users and distributors who are in compliance with California's medical marijuana law. Law enforcement officials such as Polisar fear that if marijuana is legalized in California, it could set the stage for a groundbreaking clash with the federal government over U.S. drug policy.

Polisar says legalizing marijuana is going to make his job of interpreting the law harder. And it won't solve anything, he says.

It's the same as if you try to legalize prostitution," he said. "Even if it's made legal, there will still be a stigma attached to it. People are still going to seek out drug dealers in street corners instead of going to a pharmacy and purchasing marijuana with their credit cards."

Besides, marijuana is a gateway drug, Polisar says.

Activists are merely using the budgetary crisis as an excuse to legally use narcotics," he said.

Federal officials have consistently tightened marijuana regulations over the years. That did not change until several states, with California leading the way in 1996, passed initiatives legalizing the use of marijuana for medical purposes.

The use of marijuana was regulated in every state through the Uniform State Narcotic Act in the mid-1930s. The Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 made possession or transfer of cannabis illegal throughout the United States under federal law, excluding medical and industrial uses, in which an expensive excise tax was mandated.

The Narcotics Control Act of 1956 made first-time cannabis possession an offense with a minimum of two to 10 years' imprisonment and fines of up to $20,000. However, Congress repealed mandatory penalties for marijuana-related offenses in 1970.

The Controlled Substances Act of 1970 regulated the prescribing and dispensing of psychoactive drugs including stimulants, depressants and hallucinogens. This act lists five categories of restricted drugs. This law classified cannabis as having a high potential for abuse, no medical use and not safe to use under medical supervision.

On Nov. 5, 1996, California residents passed Proposition 215, also known as the Compassionate Use Act of 1996, which legalized the medical use of marijuana in the state.

Despite Prop. 215, the law is still murky. Individual cities still have the power to decide whether they want marijuana dispensaries in their communities.

Garden Grove has imposed bans on medical marijuana dispensaries. Laguna Woods has allowed dispensaries to open and operate in the city. The Lake Forest City Council recently initiated action to shut down 14 dispensaries in the interest of public safety.

Still, many Southern California activists believe that the solution lies in legalizing not just marijuana, but the entire cannabis plant, which has a wide variety of uses. Industrial hemp, which comes from the cannabis plant, is used to make a wide range of products, from diapers to handbags.

Buddy Duzy, a Simi Valley resident who is raising money for the California Cannabis Hemp and Health Initiative, says the proposal will make use of all cannabis hemp legal for industrial, nutritional, medicinal, religious and recreational purposes.

I think the timing is good for this type of an initiative because Californians now understand the true value of the plant," he said. "We believe the time is ripe to bring this issue to voters."

While other initiatives would limit the cultivation and use of cannabis, this initiative would make the cannabis plant completely legal and a "nonissue," Duzy said.

It'll be no different than any other crop like corn or wheat," he said.

La Habra resident and activist Jason Andrews says he is ready to become the local hemp farmer in a heartbeat. Andrews cultivates marijuana in his home as part of a medical marijuana cooperative.

As a patient, I felt that the prices being charged at medical marijuana clinics were atrocious," he said. "So I started growing my own and it's legal in California, thanks to Proposition 215."

Andrews says he started using and cultivating marijuana for medical purposes after he was injured in a car accident five years ago.

I got strung out on prescription pills," he said. "With marijuana, there are no side effects, just relief."

However, marijuana cooperatives are treated as nonprofits and therefore exempt from tax, Andrews says.

That's ridiculous," he says. "Marijuana should be taxed, and that could provide valuable revenue for the state."

Still, legislators balk at the idea of making what's listed as a narcotic on the federal schedule of drugs legal just so it can be taxed, although marijuana advocates maintain that taxing pot can solve the state's budgetary problems.

Assemblyman Van Tran said he will not support legalizing marijuana.

First, I'm against taxing products and services as a means to raise revenue," he said.

Secondly, I'm against legalizing marijuana because I believe it's a gateway drug and will lead to serious public safety issues at the local level."

The best way to solve the budget crisis is by streamlining government and reducing waste, not raising taxes, Tran said.

We need a fundamental change in California," he said. "We definitely do not need to legalize marijuana to solve our money problems."

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n931/a06.html
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Votes: 0
Webpage: http://headlines.ocregister.com/news/-46177--.html
Pubdate: Sun, 11 Oct 2009
Source: Orange County Register, The (CA)
Copyright: 2009 The Orange County Register
Contact: letters@ocregister.com
Website: http://www.ocregister.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/321
Author: Deepa Bharath, The Associated Press Contributed To This Report

ECSTASY SUSPECTED IN RAVE PARTY DEATH

2009-10-14T14:30:00.000-07:00

19-Year-Old Man Collapses At West Edmonton Mall Event

Ecstasy is believed to be behind the death of a 19-year-old rave patron who collapsed early Monday during an all-night party at West Edmonton Mall.

The male victim, a partier at the Frost 2009 rave at the Edmonton Event Centre, was taken to hospital by paramedics about 4 a. m. He died a couple of hours later, police information officer Dean Parthenis said.

The man is suspected to have taken ecstasy. Three friends of the victim -- two men and a woman, all in their 20s--were also treated for suspected ecstasy ingestion and later released.

Kalum Giroux, who was at the party, said there were nearly 3,000 people at the rave. "It was one big party. Everyone was dancing and partying to the world's No. 1 DJs."

Giroux said he didn't know there had been a death until hours after the rave ended.

While he doesn't touch ecstasy "because I know what it can do to you," the drug is typically part of the rave scene, Giroux said.

"I know it keeps you up all night and it makes you hyper," he said.

Frost 2009 was a licensed, all-night party that started at 9 p. m. Sunday and went until 6 a. m. Monday. It featured more than a dozen DJs and required all patrons to wear white clothing as part of the "frost" theme. No one under 18 was admitted to the event, which was promoted by Boodang Music Canada out of Calgary.

Peter Boodang declined to comment Monday, saying his company was only paid as a street promoter and had nothing to do with organizing the event.

While the man's death is not considered criminal at this point, investigators are looking for the person or persons who supplied the drug, Parthenis said.

Earlier this year, West Edmonton Mall suspended the popular Rock 'n' Ride Dance Party event at Galaxyland after the death of a 14-year-old girl. Cassandra Williams and a friend overdosed after taking six pills of ecstasy each during an April 25 event. The friend survived, but Williams died the next day after being taken off life support.

A 16-year-old was later charged in the case.

Two girls died

In March, Leah House, 14, and Trinity Bird, 15, died from ecstasy overdoses on the Paul Band reserve. They were among a group of nine girls who took the drug while at a round dance on the reserve west of Edmonton.

Police charged a 16-year-old boy in connection with their deaths.

An overdose of ecstasy can kill in at least three ways. Because the amphetamine-type drugs stimulate the heart, they can increase blood pressure until a blood vessel bursts. This usually occurs in the brain, where bleeding can be fatal.

The drug can also cause hyperthermia, or an increase in body temperature, to the point of death. Another danger is fluid retention, which causes the brain to swell and leads to brain damage.

Ecstasy pills are usually homemade and have all sorts of drugs in them, with some ecstasy tablets containing no ecstasy at all. Some batches are stronger than others and each individual reacts differently. A dose that would be harmless to one user can kill the next, experts say.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n931/a02.html
Newshawk: CMAP http://www.mapinc.org/cmap
Votes: 0
Webpage: http://www.edmontonjournal.com/news/todays-paper/Ecstasy+suspected+rave+party+death/209487
Pubdate: Tue, 13 Oct 2009
Source: Edmonton Journal (CN AB)
Copyright: 2009 The Edmonton Journal
Contact: http://www2.canada.com/edmontonjournal/letters.html
Website: http://www.edmontonjournal.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/134
Author: Jennifer Fong and Florence Loyie, Staff Writers

MEXICAN DRUG WAR EXPANDS BEYOND FIGHT OVER U.S. ROUTES

2009-10-13T09:08:00.001-07:00

Rising Violence Complicates Government Crackdown

Mexico's violent drug gangs are fighting over homegrown addicts in the dingy back streets of northern border cities, creating new turf wars that will further stretch the country's security forces.

Hooded gunmen have stormed at least seven rehabilitation clinics in Ciudad Juarez on the U.S. border since early last year in deadly attacks that target rival drug dealers. Two strikes last month killed 28 people.

Hitmen have burst into bars and house parties in Tijuana to murder dealers, dragged others to car junk-yards to torture and kill them and dumped bodies of scrawny teenage addicts in piles outside slums notorious for drug dealing.

The army, border officials and social workers say top drug lord Joaquin "Shorty" Guzman has diversified from his battle for smuggling routes into the United States to seek control of a growing pool of Mexican addicts along the border.

"This is a new dynamic in the cartel war," said a senior Mexican police chief on the border who declined to be named because of the sensitivity of the issue.

"Guzman is trying to dominate the local market but other cells also want control, so the conflict is intensifying."

As social norms have loosened, a growing middle class has become more prosperous and tighter border controls make moving drugs into the United States more difficult, leading gangs have sought to increase consumption in Mexico.

Cartels prey on the huge transitory workforce in factories on the Mexican side of the border, eager to create addicts of the 56,500 people who lost their factory jobs in Ciudad Juarez over the past two years as recession hit the economy.

From Tijuana to Reynosa on the Texan border, Guzman's hit men are trying to eliminate rival small-time smugglers and dealers--mostly jobless addicts and high school dropouts -- in a new test for President Felipe Calderon's efforts to crush the cartels.

CLINIC SLAUGHTER

Just metre s from the U.S. border in Ciudad Juarez, a group of gunmen burst into a rehab clinic last month, lined up 17 patients and murdered them. Blood flowed out onto the sidewalk.

"We never received any threats, they just came in and started shooting," said a survivor of the clinic attack who declined to give his name for fear of reprisals.

"We never hid anyone from any gang, we didn't have anything to hide."

Until now Mexican and U.S. antidrug officials have focused on the cartels' fight over transit routes for South American cocaine into the United States. Guzman's smugglers, from the Pacific state of Sinaloa, battle the northeastern Gulf cartel for the$40 billion US-a-year business.

More than 14,000 people, mostly smugglers and police, have died in drug violence since Calderon launched his crackdown in late 2006.

Deploying some 10,000 troops and federal police in Ciudad Juarez has failed to stop the killings. Nationwide the military is stretched between Caribbean smuggling routes, remote marijuana-producing mountains and the border area.

Some investors and officials in Washington worry spiralling drug violence could overwhelm security forces in Mexico, a major exporter of oil, minerals and manufactured goods.

The fight over the local market complicates the drug war because the violence is so anarchic. It can be unclear who works for whom and which groups are doing the killing, especially in the infamously violent city of Ciudad Juarez.

"Dealers used to tell me they were working for ( Guzman ) and others would say La Linea," former gang member and longtime social worker Antonio Briones said, referring to the city's main cartel, known both as the Juarez cartel and The Line.

"Now, we are seeing a new phenomenon because some don't have any idea who they're working for," he added.

The number of Mexicans addicted to illegal drugs jumped 50 per cent to around 500,000 people between 2002 and 2008, according to a government study last year.

Drug trade experts say the real figure is much higher, with an estimated 200,000 addicts in Ciudad Juarez alone.

"Now you make a phone call and they bring you drugs as if it was pizza," said Jose Antonio Rivera, the director of a youth support centre in Ciudad Juarez.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n929/a01.html
Newshawk: CMAP http://www.mapinc.org/cmap
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Sat, 10 Oct 2009
Source: Edmonton Journal (CN AB)
Copyright: 2009 Reuters
Contact: http://www2.canada.com/edmontonjournal/letters.html
Website: http://www.edmontonjournal.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/134
Author: Julian Cardona, Reuters

IT STARTED... TO GET WORSE

2009-10-12T07:35:00.000-07:00

On Sept. 27, 2008, 700 concerned citizens gathered on Third Ave. in support of the "Let's get Started" rally. We were there to show concern for downtown Prince George and its deteriorating condition.

The keynote speaker was former B.C. premier Mike Harcourt, who had spent a good part of his working life dealing with urban-core problems.

Coincidentally, we were also in the run up to a municipal election. An election that would see four new city councillors and a new mayor elected. Three of those elected to council would a have vested, working interest in the health of the downtown retail community.

Sept. 25 and 28, 2009, one year later, we read two Citizen editorials about our deteriorating downtown. The editorials tell us aggressive panhandlers are hassling shoppers and driving away legitimate retail trade. Plus, city hall is considering a downtown one-stop shopping site for those in serious need of social services. It would be a consolidation of the needle exchange facility, the Native Health Society and the Fire Pit, a drop-in centre for addicts.

Has anything changed since the "Let's get Started" rally? Well yes, the situation is getting worse.

Have we learned anything in the last year? Not according to local business people.

What's wrong with this picture?

According to those interviewed, everything.

Downtown is circling the drain and we have yet to see any real direction from city hall.

So what should we have learned in the last year? Well, the answer is - a lot.

First, I was struck by an interview Citizen reporter Bernice Trick had with Bill Baker following the 2008 rally. On the needle exchange program, Baker said, "I'm a native street person and I see a business - - the Needle Exchange - catering to drug addicts. There's needles and pipes around making it dangerous for children, and sharing of needles and pipes." Baker noted that shoplifting and people doing drugs happens right in front of the exchange.

On open drug dealing, Baker said, "The police are not holding them accountable."

Second, on the way to looking something else up, I came across a recent comment from Vancouver City councillor Andrea Reimer, who said Vancouver has experienced a drop in aggressive panhandling and street disorder. Reimer says the provision of homeless shelters may be the reason for better-behaved streets, but I would also suggest the provincial Safe Streets Act may have had a lot to do with cleaning up the Vancouver street scene.

You may remember this act was introduced in 2004 with some controversy as it dealt with aggressive panhandling and squeegee kids. Controversy aside, it worked.

For the benefit of downtown business people who have had it with aggressive panhandling, here are two of the operative sections.

"A person commits an offence if the person solicits in a manner that would cause a reasonable person to be concerned for the solicited person's safety or security, including threatening the person solicited with physical harm, by word, gesture or other means."

The next sub-section contains the same offence provisions, but includes the actions of ( a ) obstructing the path of the solicited person; and ( b ) using abusive language.

According to the Act, aggressive panhandling is against the law. According to editorials in The Citizen, not too many people - including the local RCMP - know this.

When it comes to our downtown, there is no question city hall is dealing with a difficult problem. But there are answers. Enforcing the Safe Streets Act is one. The city can also enact its own panhandling bylaw. This is not uncommon.

Planning for a social services facility is a good idea, but this facility cannot be situated in the midst of a retail area, not if that retail sector is to prosper. The two do not mix. Mike Harcourt made that point last year, with a number of current city councilors in attendance.

For the most part, our downtown merchants are doing their best. They keep their premises attractive, they continue to invest and they want to provide good products and services to their customers.

But to date they've been ignored by city hall.

A year ago, I thought we saw a glimmer of hope. A sincere and genuine interest in making our downtown a better place to live, work and do business.

I should have paid more attention to the words of Bill Baker.

On the plight of downtown, Bill concluded his Sept. 2008 interview with Bernice Trick, saying, "It's not going to change."

Bill was right.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n924/a02.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Thu, 8 Oct 2009
Source: Prince George Citizen (CN BC)
Copyright: 2009 Prince George Citizen
Contact: letters@princegeorgecitizen.com
Website: http://www.princegeorgecitizen.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/350
Author: Bruce Strachan
Note: Bruce Strachan is a former B.C. cabinet minister and Prince
George city councillor. His column appears Thursdays.
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/opinion.htm (Opinion)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?137 (Needle Exchange)

ACTIVISTS HOPE TO GET POT LEGALIZED IN 2010

2009-10-11T07:36:00.000-07:00

Proponents Say Support for Legalization Is at an All-Time High. Opponents Say It Will Only Strengthen Drug Cartels and Increase Crime.

Even as the battle rages over medical marijuana in Orange County, activists and advocates in California are busy gathering signatures to get as many as three different pot-legalization initiatives on the 2010 ballot.

If one of these initiatives passes, California would become the first state to legalize marijuana and impose a tax on it, a move proponents say could help get the state out of an unprecedented budget crisis.

So far, there are three known initiatives that propose legalizing marijuana. One is the California Cannabis Hemp and Health Initiative, which would make use of all cannabis hemp legal for industrial, nutritional, medicinal, religious and recreational purposes.

The other is the California Cannabis Initiative, which would make marijuana legal for medicinal and recreational purposes.

And yet another initiative, the Regulate, Control and Tax Cannabis Act, would allow adults 21 and older in California to possess up to one ounce of cannabis and give local governments the ability to tax and regulate the sale of cannabis to adults 21 and older - just like alcohol.

Proponents of these initiatives hope that at least one will get on the 2010 ballot. They say the time is ripe for change as Sacramento battles budgetary woes and an increasing number of Californians and Americans are showing support to legalize pot. Supporters say sales tax from marijuana would rake in at least $1 billion in revenue for the state.

A Zogby Poll earlier this year found that 52 percent of Americans support legalizing marijuana. The same poll found that six out of 10 people in California favored pot legalization.

Support to legalize marijuana has been finding steady support among Americans over the years. A USA Today/CNN/Gallup poll in August 2001 found 34 percent favored legalizing marijuana use. That was the most support for legalization since pollsters began asking the question in 1969. According to the USA Today report, the support for legalization had been constant at about 25 percent for 20 years before the USA Today poll recorded an increase to 31 percent in August 2000 and 34 percent in August 2001.

Joseph Rogoway, a San Francisco criminal defense lawyer who formerly practiced in Orange County, is one of the key proponents of the California Cannabis Initiative. He contends the people of California are ready to vote on this controversial matter, given the snowballing support over the years.

"I can tell simply from the overwhelmingly positive support we've been getting not only from San Francisco, but across the state," he said. "Recent polling shows that the people of this state support legalization of marijuana."

Rogoway also cites a State Board of Equalization report, which estimates that taxing marijuana sales in California could rake in $1 billion a year in sales tax revenue.

Along with fellow defense attorneys James Clark and Omar Figueroa, Rogoway believes that making pot legal is the solution to preventing crimes involving the drug.

"Our initiative is the best way to keep marijuana away from children because you treat it like alcohol," he said. "You regulate the distribution and sale of marijuana. Right now this market is unregulated and completely ruled by the drug cartels."

Also, as a defense attorney, Rogoway said he wants to stop defending those accused of possessing marijuana.

"It's a waste of precious resources," he said. "This initiative, if passed, is going to save the state millions in criminal justice expenditure."

But a majority of law enforcement officials have a different viewpoint. Garden Grove police Chief Joseph Polisar says that legalizing marijuana would become a problem for local law enforcement members, who would be caught between state law and a federal law that says it's illegal. Polisar strongly recommended to the Garden Grove City Council that they pass an ordinance banning all medical marijuana clinics, saying they are a breeding ground for crime.

Under federal law, marijuana is illegal, period. The U.S. Supreme Court has also ruled that federal law enforcement agents have the right to crack down even on marijuana users and distributors who are in compliance with California's medical marijuana law. Law enforcement officials such as Polisar fear that if marijuana is legalized in California, it could set the stage for a groundbreaking clash with the federal government over U.S. drug policy.

Polisar says legalizing marijuana is going to make his job of interpreting the law harder. And it won't solve anything, he says.

"It's the same as if you try to legalize prostitution," he said. "Even if it's made legal, there will still be a stigma attached to it. People are still going to seek out drug dealers in street corners instead of going to a pharmacy and purchasing marijuana with their credit cards."

Besides, marijuana is a "gateway drug," Polisar says.

"Activists are merely using the budgetary crisis as an excuse to legally use narcotics," he said.

Federal officials have consistently tightened marijuana regulations over the years. That did not change until several states, with California leading the way in 1996, passed initiatives legalizing the use of marijuana for medical purposes.

The use of marijuana was regulated in every state through The Uniform State Narcotic Act in the mid 1930s. The Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 made possession or transfer of cannabis illegal throughout the United States under federal law, excluding medical and industrial uses, in which an expensive excise tax was mandated.

The Narcotics Control Act of 1956 made first-time cannabis possession an offense with a minimum of two to 10 years imprisonment and fines of up to $20,000. However, the U.S. Congress repealed mandatory penalties for marijuana-related offenses in 1970.

The Controlled Substances Act of 1970 regulated the prescribing and dispensing of psychoactive drugs including stimulants, depressants and hallucinogens. This act lists five categories of restricted drugs. This law classified cannabis as having a high potential for abuse, no medical use and not safe to use under medical supervision.

On Nov. 5, 1996, California residents passed Proposition 215, also known as the Compassionate Use Act of 1996, which legalized the medical use of marijuana in the state.

Despite Prop. 215, the law is still murky. Individual cities still have the power to decide whether they want these dispensaries in their communities. Orange County cities such as Garden Grove have imposed bans on medical marijuana dispensaries. Some others such as Laguna Woods have allowed dispensaries to open and operate in their cities. The Lake Forest City Council recently initiated action to shut down 14 dispensaries in the interest of public safety.

Still, many Southern California activists believe that the solution lies in legalizing not just marijuana, but the entire cannabis plant, which has a wide variety of uses. Industrial hemp, which comes from the cannabis plant, is used to make a wide range of products, from diapers to handbags.

Buddy Duzy, a Simi Valley resident who is raising money for the California Cannabis Hemp and Health Initiative, says their proposal will make use of all cannabis hemp legal for industrial, nutritional, medicinal, religious and recreational purposes.

"I think the timing is good for this type of an initiative because Californians now understand the true value of the plant," he said. "We believe the time is ripe to bring this issue to voters."

.While other initiatives would limit the cultivation and use of cannabis, this initiative would make the cannabis plant completely legal and "a non-issue," Duzy said.

"It'll be no different than any other crop like corn or wheat," he said.

La Habra resident and activist Jason Andrews says he is ready to become the local hemp farmer in a heartbeat. Andrews cultivates marijuana in his home as part of a medical marijuana cooperative.

"As a patient, I felt that the prices being charged at medical marijuana clinics were atrocious," he said. "So I started growing my own and it's legal in California, thanks to Proposition 215."

Andrews says he started using and cultivating marijuana for medical purposes after he was injured in a car accident five years ago.

"I got strung out on prescription pills," he said. "With marijuana, there are no side effects, just relief."

However, marijuana cooperatives are treated as nonprofits and therefore exempt from tax, Andrews says.

"That's ridiculous," he says. "Marijuana should be taxed and that could provide valuable revenue for the state."

Still, legislators balk at the idea of making what's listed as a "narcotic" on the federal schedule of drugs legal just so it can be taxed, although marijuana advocates maintain that taxing pot can solve the state's budgetary problems.

Assemblyman Van Tran said he will not support legalizing marijuana.

"First, I'm against taxing products and services as a means to raise revenue," he said. "Secondly, I'm against legalizing marijuana because I believe it's a gateway drug and will lead to serious public safety issues at the local level."

The best way to solve the budget crisis is by streamlining government and reducing waste, not raising taxes, Tran said.

"We need a fundamental change in California," he said. "We definitely do not need to legalize marijuana to solve our money problems."

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n922/a04.html
Newshawk: Poll currently at http://drugsense.org/url/TLYICByi Please Vote
Votes: 0
Webpage: http://drugsense.org/url/TLYICByi
Pubdate: Fri, 9 Oct 2009
Source: Orange County Register, The (CA)
Copyright: 2009 The Orange County Register
Contact: letters@ocregister.com
Website: http://www.ocregister.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/321
Author: Deepa Bharath, The Orange County Register
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?115 (Marijuana - California)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topic/dispensaries
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topic/Proposition+215

BOARD HEARS MEDICINAL MARIJUANA PROPONENTS

2009-10-10T07:36:00.000-07:00

Larry Quigley said he has tried all manner of treatment since suffering a spinal cord injury 28 years ago without success, which has meant a life in a wheelchair.

It wasn't until his birthday this past April, however, that he smoked marijuana and first discovered its medicinal effects. While other prescribed drugs had clouded his mind, he said, marijuana quelled the pain and spasms without the side effects.

Quigley called on officials from the Iowa Board of Pharmacy to take steps toward the legalization of medical marijuana Wednesday at a public hearing at the University of Iowa's Bowen Science Building.

"It's time that Iowa really looked at this seriously," Quigley said. "I've thought about going to other states. I would have to leave my 11-year-old here, and I'm not willing to do that."

The hearing was the third of four public forums around the state hosted by the Iowa Board of Pharmacy, which is collecting evidence and testimony from doctors, scientists and the general public before it makes a recommendation regarding medical marijuana to the Legislature.

Quigley was one of several people suffering from medical conditions who implored the board to allow Iowa to join 13 other states in legalizing marijuana for medical purposes.

Board of Pharmacy Director Lloyd Jessen and board member Peggy Whitworth were among the officials on hand collecting testimonies and information.

Sen. Joe Bolkcom, D-Iowa City, introduced a bill earlier this year to allow a person with a debilitating condition and a physician's prescription to legally obtain marijuana for medicinal use. Although the bill did not make it out of subcommittee, Bolkcom said Wednesday that he has since received dozens of e-mails, the vast majority of which are in favor of his efforts.

"I've heard from chronically ill people who have been prescribed all of the most powerful narcotics available at any pharmacy with little positive effect," Bolkcom said. "Drugs like morphine, Oxycontin, Percocet, codeine -- drugs by the way, that have powerful side effects."

Local ophthalmologist John Stamler touted the benefits of marijuana in treating glaucoma, which he said is the leading cause of blindness in the U.S.

Stamler said marijuana has great potential to help glaucoma patients, but because the drug is illegal, scientists are doing little research on its effects.

"So without being licensable for use with patients, these potentially very useful drugs will never be investigated and never be studied," Stamler said.

However, Ron Herman, the director of Iowa Drug Information Network at UI's College of Pharmacy, cautioned that the adverse effects of smoking marijuana cannot be overlooked. With glaucoma patients, for instance, marijuana might reduce the pressure on the eye, but at the same time potentially raise blood pressure.

Herman presented the board with a summarized collection of 91 studies involving medical marijuana that he and his students prepared. Herman said the studies show a benefit from marijuana in many uses, and it fared better than a placebo in the preponderance of cases.

"You can't say, yes, it works," Herman said. "You have to look at it in the context in which it's working and the potential consequences and adverse effects that are associated with it."

Lisa Jackson of Crawfordsville said she has lived with fibromyalgia, a neurological disorder, for seven years and was bed-ridden and considering suicide before beginning to use marijuana two years ago. Although she has to purchase the drug illegally, she says it is the only drug that has allowed her to function.

"Is it worth going to jail? For me, it is," she said. "I can either go back to bed, or I can smoke marijuana. And I'm not going back to bed. I don't have any other options."

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n924/a08.html
Newshawk: Studies on Marijuana http://medicalmarijuana.procon.org/
Votes: 0
Webpage: http://drugsense.org/url/98jWcBcK
Pubdate: Thu, 8 Oct 2009
Source: Iowa City Press-Citizen (IA)
Copyright: 2009 Iowa City Press-Citizen
Contact: opinion@press-citizen.com
Website: http://www.press-citizen.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1330
Author: Josh O'Leary, Iowa City Press-Citizen
Cited: Iowa Board of Pharmacy Medical Marijuana Hearings
http://www.iowa.gov/ibpe/marijuana_hearings.html
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topic/Iowa+Board+of+Pharmacy
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Marijuana - Medicinal)

SENATE TAKES AIM AT SECOND TORY CRIME BILL

2009-10-09T13:57:00.000-07:00

Committee Grills Minister Over Minimum Sentence Exceptions

The Liberal-dominated Senate, a day after rewriting a Harper government crime bill, signalled that it will alter another piece of law-and-order legislation that would automatically jail drug dealers and marijuana growers for the first time in Canada.

A Senate committee grilled Justice Minister Rob Nicholson on his proposed legislation Thursday -- particularly an element allowing drug pushers in six Canadian cities to escape jail time if they go through drug treatment courts -- an option that is not available elsewhere because drug courts exist only in those cities.

"How can you bring in all of these minimum sentences and say, if there are drug treatment courts in your area, you won't have to go to jail for the minimum sentence?" Liberal Senator George Baker said after the hearing.

"I think definitely amendments will be put forth by Liberal members and by Conservative members."

Judges would have leeway to exempt certain offenders from jail, provided they enter treatment programs imposed through drug courts that exist in Vancouver, Edmonton, Regina, Winnipeg, Toronto and Ottawa.

Conservative Senator Pierre Claude Nolin, an expert in drug policy, warned Nicholson that the Senate legal and constitutional affairs committee intends to put his bill -- a centrepiece of the government's law-and-order agenda -- through "rigorous" scrutiny.

The committee's signal that it will not rubber-stamp the contentious legislation came only a day after Nicholson blasted the upper chamber for "gutting" another bill that would eliminate a judicial practice, when sentencing offenders, to credit them on a two-for-one basis for each day already spent in detention.

The bill has the support of the opposition parties in the Commons, including the Liberals.

The Senate actions have become a political football in the House of Commons, where Prime Minister Stephen Harper accused the Liberals on Thursday of pretending they support crime bills, only to stand by while they are stymied by their unelected counterparts.

"What the Liberal party should do ... is go down to the Senate and, instead of playing this two-faced game where they pretend to support tough-on-crime legislation but block it in the Senate, they should tell their own senators to be honest with the Canadian people, to pass that legislation and stop letting criminals get away," said Harper.

Liberal MP David McGuinty countered that the Conservatives are revelling in the Senate scrutiny because they can use it as a springboard to reinforce their tough-on-crime message and take aim at their Liberal opponents.

The drug bill sailed through the House of Commons earlier this year after the Liberals teamed up with the Conservatives, despite grumbling within Grit ranks that they were being told to support a bad bill so they wouldn't be accused of being soft on crime.

The bill would also strip judges of their discretion on whether to incarcerate drug traffickers, including offenders who grow and then sell as few as five marijuana plants.

The proposed legislation was lambasted by 13 of 16 witnesses who appeared before the House of Commons justice committee during public hearings last spring.

Critics have warned the legislation would flood jails and imprison drug addicts and young people rather than drug kingpins, who will continue to thrive, while small-time dealers are knocked out of commission.

The bill would impose one-year mandatory jail terms for marijuana-dealing when it's linked to organized crime or a weapon is involved.

Minimum sentences would be increased to two years for dealing drugs, such as cocaine, heroin or methamphetamine, to young people, or pushing drugs near a school or other places frequented by youths.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n919/a01.html
Newshawk: CMAP http://www.mapinc.org/cmap
Votes: 0
Webpage: http://drugsense.org/url/9C9NKABI
Pubdate: Fri, 9 Oct 2009
Source: Ottawa Citizen (CN ON)
Copyright: 2009 The Ottawa Citizen
Contact: http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/letters.html
Website: http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/326
Author: Janice Tibbetts, Canwest News Service
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Marijuana - Canada)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?199 (Mandatory Minimum Sentencing)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?159 (Drug Courts)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/rehab.htm (Treatment)

POT LEGALIZATION GAINS MOMENTUM IN CALIFORNIA

2009-10-08T17:31:00.000-07:00

SAN FRANCISCO - Marijuana advocates are gathering signatures to get as many as three pot-legalization measures on the ballot in 2010 in California, setting up what could be a groundbreaking clash with the federal government over U.S. drug policy.

At least one poll shows voters would support lifting the pot prohibition, which would make the state of more than 38 million the first in the nation to legalize marijuana.

Such action would also send the state into a headlong conflict with the U.S. government while raising questions about how federal law enforcement could enforce its drug laws in the face of a massive government-sanctioned pot industry.

The state already has a thriving marijuana trade, thanks to a first-of-its-kind 1996 ballot measure that allowed people to smoke pot for medical purposes. But full legalization could turn medical marijuana dispensaries into all-purpose pot stores, and the open sale of joints could become commonplace on mom-and-pop liquor store counters in liberal locales like Oakland and Santa Cruz.

Under federal law, marijuana is illegal, period. After overseeing a series of raids that destroyed more than 300,000 marijuana plants in California's Sierra Nevada foothills this summer, federal drug czar Gil Kerlikowske proclaimed, "Legalization is not in the president's vocabulary, and it's not in mine."

The U.S. Supreme Court also has ruled that federal law enforcement agents have the right to crack down even on marijuana users and distributors who are in compliance with California's medical marijuana law.

But some legal scholars and policy analysts say the government will not be able to require California to help in enforcing the federal marijuana ban if the state legalizes the drug.

Without assistance from the state's legions of narcotics officers, they say, federal agents could do little to curb marijuana in California.

"Even though that federal ban is still in place and the federal government can enforce it, it doesn't mean the states have to follow suit," said Robert Mikos, a Vanderbilt University law professor who recently published a paper about the issue.

Nothing can stop federal anti-drug agents from making marijuana arrests, even if Californians legalize pot, he said. However, the U.S. government cannot pass a law requiring local and state police, sheriff's departments or state narcotics enforcers to help.

That is significant, because nearly all arrests for marijuana crimes are made at the state level. Of more than 847,000 marijuana-related arrests in 2008, for example, just over 6,300 suspects were booked by federal law enforcement, or fewer than 1 percent.

State marijuana bans have allowed the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration to focus on big cases, said Rosalie Pacula, director of drug policy research at the Rand Corp.

"It's only something the feds are going to be concerned about if you're growing tons of pot," Pacula said. For anything less, she said, "they don't have the resources to waste on it."

In a typical recent prosecution, 29-year-old Luke Scarmazzo was sentenced to nearly 22 years and co-defendant Ricardo Ruiz Montes to 20 years in federal prison for drug trafficking through a medical marijuana dispensary in Modesto.

At his bond hearing, prosecutors showed a rap video in which Scarmazzo boasts about his successful marijuana business, taunts federal authorities and carries cardboard boxes filled with cash. The DEA said the pair made more than $4.5 million in marijuana sales in less than two years.

The DEA would not speculate on the effects of any decision by California to legalize pot. "Marijuana is illegal under federal law and DEA will continue to attack large-scale drug trafficking organizations at every level," spokeswoman Dawn Dearden said.

The most conservative of the three ballot measures would only legalize possession of up to one ounce of pot for personal use by adults 21 and older - an amount that already under state law can only result at most in a $100 fine.

The proposal would also allow anyone to grow a plot of marijuana up to 5 feet-by-5 feet on their private property. The size, Pacula said, seems specifically designed to keep the total number of plants grown below 100, the threshold for DEA attention.

The greatest potential for conflict with the U.S. government would likely come from the provision that would give local governments the power to decide city-by-city whether to allow pot sales.

Hundreds of medical marijuana dispensaries across the state already operate openly with only modest federal interference. If recreational marijuana became legal, these businesses could operate without requiring their customers to qualify as patients.

Any business that grew bigger than the already typical storefront shops, however, would probably be too tempting a target for federal prosecution, experts said.

Even if Washington could no longer count on California to keep pot off its own streets, Congress or the Obama administration could try to coerce cooperation by withholding federal funds.

But with U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder's announcement earlier this year that the Justice Department would defer to state laws on marijuana, the federal response to possible legalization remains unclear.

Doug Richardson, a spokesman for the White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy, said the office is in the process of re-evaluating its policies on marijuana and other drugs.

Richardson said the office under Obama was pursuing a "more comprehensive" approach than the previous administration, with emphasis on prevention and treatment as well as law enforcement.

"We're trying to base stuff on the facts, the evidence and the science," he said, "not some particular prejudice somebody brings to the table."

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n916/a06.html
Newshawk: chip
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Wed, 7 Oct 2009
Source: Charlotte Observer (NC)
Copyright: 2009 The Associated Press
Contact: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/newsroom/index.html?action=letters
Website: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/78
Author: Marcus Wohlsen, Associated Press Writer
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?115 (Marijuana - California)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?420 (Maijuana - Popular)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Marijuana - Medicinal)

B.C. CHOPPER PILOT GETS NEARLY 4 YEARS

2009-10-07T06:27:00.001-07:00

80 Kilograms Of Pot Seized In Idaho Bust

A B.C. helicopter pilot has been handed a 46-month sentence by the U.S. District Court for smuggling nearly 80 kilograms of marijuana into the United States earlier this year.

Jeremy Snow, 29, of Kelowna, was sentenced in Seattle on Friday.

In addition, Snow will also be subject to three years of supervised release.

Police found the drugs after Snow landed his helicopter in northern Idaho on March 5, 2009.

Snow was arrested as part of Operation Blade Runner, a U.S.-Canada sting operation targeting cross-border drug smuggling. He eventually pleaded guilty.

Another helicopter pilot, Samuel Lindsay-Brown of Revelstoke was arrested on drug charges in the same operation. The 24-year-old committed suicide in a Washington state jail a few days following his arrest.

Lindsay-Brown was facing charges related to the discovery of nearly 200 kilograms of marijuana in the Colville National Forest in Washington state on Feb. 23.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n913/a02.html
Newshawk: CMAP http://www.mapinc.org/cmap
Votes: 0
Webpage: http://www.vancouversun.com/news/todays-paper/chopper+pilot+gets+nearly+years/2070598/stor
Pubdate: Tue, 06 Oct 2009
Source: Vancouver Sun (CN BC)
Copyright: 2009 The Vancouver Sun
Contact: http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/letters.html
Website: http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/477
Note: from Canwest News Service
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/pot.htm (Cannabis)

We Must Fight The Cartels

2009-07-03T06:33:00.000-07:00

WE MUST FIGHT THE CARTELS

We the people of the USA have been invaded by the Mexican drug cartels. Our citizens cannot use public land for fear of armed pot growers. It's time that wimpy editors and our political airheads know we are not ready to give up our country. Let's help out our law enforcement, call in the National Guard and run these folks out of the country. The drug laws were made for the protection of our citizens, not for illegals to profit on.

Dave Shiplet

Burney

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n671/a09.html
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Thu, 02 Jul 2009
Source: Record Searchlight (Redding, CA)
Copyright: 2009 Record Searchlight
Contact: letters@redding.com
Website: http://www.redding.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/360
Author: Dave Shiplet

LEGALIZATION IS EASY FIX

2009-07-02T06:29:00.000-07:00

Your editorial Sunday, "Marijuana vs. Gunslinging," hit the nail square on the head. I've never smoked marijuana in my life and hopefully will never have a reason to, but if the time should ever come when perhaps because of medical reasons I should need it, I'd much prefer to be able to buy it legally, by prescription from my doctor, from a safe reliable source.

Some people apparently enjoy smoking marijuana socially to relax in their own homes with friends. What would be so bad about growing a few plants in their gardens along with the lettuce and tomatoes?

If those folks were able to buy their marijuana legally in a shop, or grow enough for their own use at home, would that not be better than spending $25 million on law enforcement to hunt down criminals and destroy the untold thousands of plants grown illegally in the woods?

Tobacco is legal, yet by now we all know the danger of breathing that poison into our lungs. I've lost several dear friends to the ravages of lung cancer.

My first marriage was destroyed by alcohol abuse. I've seen firsthand the damage alcohol can do to a family, not to mention the innocent lives lost each year because of multiple-offence drunken drivers.

But I've yet to hear of a single case where a fatal accident was caused by a marijuana smoker. Legalization sounds like a simple solution to me.

Pat Waldron

Redding

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n671/a08.html
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Thu, 02 Jul 2009
Source: Record Searchlight (Redding, CA)
Copyright: 2009 Record Searchlight
Contact: letters@redding.com
Website: http://www.redding.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/360
Author: Pat Waldron
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n662/a02.html

Reality Bites in Drug Debate

2009-07-01T15:15:00.001-07:00

It looked like the first drop of rain in the desert of drugs policy. Last week, the executive director of the United Nations office on drugs and crime, Antonio Maria Costa, said what millions of liberal-minded people have been waiting to hear. "Law enforcement should shift its focus from drug users to drug traffickers ... people who take drugs need medical help, not criminal retribution."

Drug production should remain illegal, possession and use should be decriminalised. Many will have toasted him with bumpers of peppermint tea, and, perhaps, a celebratory spliff. I didn't.

I believe that informed adults should be allowed to inflict whatever suffering they wish on themselves but we are not entitled to harm other people. I know people who drink fair-trade tea and coffee, shop locally and take cocaine at parties. They are revolting hypocrites.

Every year cocaine causes about 20,000 deaths in Colombia and displaces several hundred thousand people from their homes. Children are blown up by landmines, indigenous people are enslaved, villagers are tortured and killed, and rainforests are razed. You'd cause less human suffering if instead of discreetly retiring to the toilet at a party, you went into the street and mugged someone.

But the counter-cultural association appears to insulate people from ethical questions. If commissioning murder, torture, slavery, civil war, corruption and deforestation is not a crime, what is?

I am talking about elective drug use, not addiction. In the United States, casual users of cocaine outnumber addicts by about 12 to one. I agree that addicts should be helped, not prosecuted. I would like to see a revival of the British program that was killed by a tabloid witch-hunt in 1971: until then all heroin addicts were entitled to clean, legal supplies administered by doctors. Cocaine addicts should be offered residential detox.

But, at the risk of alienating many, I maintain that while cocaine remains illegal, casual users should remain subject to criminal law. Decriminalisation of the products of crime expands the market for this criminal trade. We have a choice of two consistent policies. The first is to sustain global prohibition, while helping addicts and prosecuting casual users. This means that the drugs trade will remain the preserve of criminal gangs. It will keep spreading crime and instability around the world, and ensure that narcotics are still cut with contaminants.

As journalist Nick Davies argued during an investigation of drugs policy, major seizures raise the price of drugs. Demand among addicts is inelastic, so higher prices mean they must find more money to buy them. The more drugs the police capture and destroy, the more robberies and muggings addicts will commit.

The other possible policy is to legalise and regulate the global trade. This would undercut the criminal networks and guarantee unadulterated supplies to consumers. There might even be a market for certified fair-trade cocaine.

Costa's new report begins by rejecting this option. If it did otherwise, he would no longer be executive director of the UN office on drugs and crime. The report argues that "any reduction in the cost of drug control ... will be offset by much higher expenditure on public health ( due to the surge of drug consumption )". It admits that tobacco and alcohol kill more people than illegal drugs, but claims that this is only because fewer illegal drugs are consumed.

Strangely, however, it fails to supply any evidence to support the claim that narcotics are dangerous. Nor does it distinguish between the effects of drugs themselves and the effects of the adulteration and disease caused by their prohibition.

Why not? Perhaps because the evidence would torpedo the rest of the report. A couple of weeks ago, Ben Goldacre drew attention to the largest study on cocaine ever undertaken, conducted by the World Health Organisation in 1995. I've just read it, and this is what it says. "Health problems from the use of legal substances, particularly alcohol and tobacco, are greater than health problems from cocaine use. Few experts describe cocaine as invariably harmful to health. Cocaine-related problems are widely perceived to be more common and more severe for intensive, high-dosage users and very rare and much less severe for occasional, low-dosage users ... occasional cocaine use does not typically lead to severe or even minor physical or social problems."

This study was suppressed by the WHO after threats of an economic embargo by the Clinton government. Drugs policy in most nations is a matter of religion, not science.

The same goes for heroin. The biggest study of opiate use ever conducted ( at Philadelphia General Hospital ) found that addicts suffered no physical harm, even though some of them had been taking heroin for 20 years. The devastating health effects of heroin use are caused by adulterants and the lifestyles of people forced to live outside the law. Like cocaine, heroin is addictive, but unlike cocaine, the only consequence of its addiction appears to be ... addiction.

Costa's half-measure, in other words, gives us the worst of both worlds: more murder, more destruction, more muggings, more adulteration. Another way of putting it is this: you will, if Costa's proposal is adopted, be permitted without fear of prosecution to inject yourself with heroin cut with drain cleaner and brick dust, sold illegally and soaked in blood; but not with clean and legal supplies.

However, his report does raise one good argument. At present the trade in class A drugs is concentrated in rich nations. If it was legalised, we could cope. The use of drugs is likely to rise, but governments could use the extra taxes to help people tackle addiction. But because the wholesale price would collapse with legalisation, these drugs would for the first time become widely available in poorer nations, which are easier to exploit ( as tobacco and alcohol firms have found ) and which are less able to regulate, raise taxes or pick up the pieces.

The widespread use of cocaine or heroin in the poor world could cause serious social problems: I've seen, for example, how a weaker drug khat seems to dominate life in Somali-speaking regions of Africa. "The universal ban on illicit drugs," the UN argues, "provides a great deal of protection to developing countries."

So Costa's office has produced a study comparing the global costs of prohibition with the global costs of legalisation, allowing us to see whether the current policy ( murder, corruption, war, adulteration ) causes less misery than the alternative ( widespread addiction in poorer nations ). The hell it has.

Even to raise the possibility of such research would be to invite moves by the Congress to shut off the UN's funding. Drug charity Transform has addressed this question, but only for Britain, and the results are clear-cut: prohibition is the worse option.

As far as I can discover, no one has attempted a global study. Until that happens, Costa's opinions on this issue are worth as much as mine or anyone else's: nothing at all.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n667/a12.html
Newshawk: Media Contact On Demand! www.mapinc.org/mcod/
Votes: 1
Pubdate: Tue, 30 Jun 2009
Source: Canberra Times (Australia)
Copyright: 2009 Canberra Times
Contact: letters.editor@canberratimes.com.au
Website: http://www.canberratimes.com.au/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/71
Author: George Monbiot
Note: Also printed in The Guardian (UK) http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09.n668.a05.html
Referenced: World Drug Report 2009 http://drugsense.org/url/dhSmEL2y
Referenced: The WHO report http://www.tdpf.org.uk/WHOleaked.pdf
Referenced: A Comparison of the Cost - effectiveness of the Prohibition and Regulation of Drugs http://drugsense.org/url/l4lH1McU
Referenced: Ben Goldacre's column http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n627/a07.html
Cited: Transform http://www.tdpf.org.uk/

Supreme Court Says School Strip Search of Student Wrong

2009-06-30T18:49:00.000-07:00

Safford Middle School officials violated the constitutional rights of Savana Redding when they strip-searched her Oct. 8, 2003, while looking for ibuprofen pills, the United States Supreme Court decided June 25.

"It was a big relief," Redding said in a phone interview. "I'm really happy about the fact that it's less likely to happen to anyone else ( because of the Supreme Court decision )."

At issue was the right of school officials to strip-search a student in an attempt to find contraband. Redding alleged her constitutional rights were violated and sued the school district. The Safford School District contended it had a right to strip-search students.

Redding, then a 13-year-old student, was taken to the school office and subjected to the strip search after a classmate told Assistant Principal Kerry Wilson that she obtained a prescription-strength ibuprofen pill from Redding.

Ibuprofen is a non-narcotic pain reliever that comes in prescription and over-the-counter doses. It is sold under the the brand names of Advil and Motrin.

In an 8-1 decision, the high court determined that SMS Assistant Principal Kerry Wilson had no reason to suspect Redding concealed drugs in her undergarments when he ordered the school nurse and an administrative assistant -- both women -- to conduct the search.

Justice Clarence Thomas was the lone dissenting justice of the court's nine-member panel.

"The Supreme Court saw this exactly as the public did," said Adam Wolf, the American Civil Liberties Union attorney who argued Redding's case before the Supreme Court. "Eight of the nine justices had no problem coming to the same conclusion as the public."

Wolf added that the court's decision "will protect the well-being and constitutional rights of schoolchildren."

He added that children who find themselves in a situation similar to Redding's -- being forced to comply with a strip search -- will have legal recourse.

The Supreme Court also ruled that Wilson, the nurse and the administrative assistant were immune from liability because there was no clear legal precedent established that a strip search of a child, based on little evidence, was wrong.

"It should have been set six years ago. The Supreme Court decision makes it wrong," Wolf said.

Still at issue is the school district's liability. The Supreme Court remanded that determination to a lower court.

Safford School District Superintendent Mark Tregaskes said he could not comment because part of the Supreme Court decision was remanded. As for the remainder, Tregaskes said he could not comment because he had not read the entire decision.

Safford Middle School Principal Clay Emery, who was not the principal at the time of the Redding incident, said he hopes the school can begin to heal.

"In the interest of our school and community, I hope this can be put behind us," Emery said. "I feel for everyone involved in this issue. There are so many good things happening at Safford Middle School -- I hope this doesn't leave a scar."

The decision, however, does not erase the trauma of the search. Redding says she suffered several long-term repercussions from the incident, including stomach ulcers and a tendency to become ill at school.

"I didn't want to go to school at all," Redding said. "It's something that's pretty hard not to think about."

Although her family was supportive, Redding had to receive counseling. When she learned that the nurse who participated in the search was assigned to her high school, she left school to go home when she became ill instead of going to the nurse's office.

Eventually, Redding dropped out of school and took a placement test at Eastern Arizona College, where she is working on her general education diploma.

As Redding struggled to complete her education, her complaint against the School District slowly wound its way through the federal court system.

In a July 11, 2008, ruling, an 11-judge panel of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco said Safford Middle School officials violated Red-ding's Fourth Amendment rights when they forced her to strip to her underwear in search of ibuprofen tablets. This ruling came nine months after a Sept. 21, 2007, decision by the appellate court's three-judge panel that ruled in favor of the School District. The 2007 ruling upheld a federal district court's summary judgement that Wilson, the nurse and the administrative assistant did not violate the girl's Fourth Amendment rights.

The Safford School District appealed the appellate court's 2008 decision in Redding's favor to the U.S. Supreme Court. The high court heard the appeal in April.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n664/a04.html
Newshawk: Reform Conference! http://www.reformconference.org/
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Sun, 28 Jun 2009
Source: Eastern Arizona Courier (AZ)
Copyright: 2009 Eastern Arizona Courier
Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/3qxecMIL
Website: http://www.eacourier.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1674
Author: Diane Saunders, Staff Writer
Photo: Savana Redding's name will go down in history as the one behind the Supreme Court ruling that will better protect students from being forced to submit to strip searches. [Contributed photo] http://www.mapinc.org/images/SavanaRedding.jpg
Referenced: The ruling http://drugsense.org/url/ewgAsKhd
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/people/Savana+Redding
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?225 (Students - United States)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topic/strip+searches

Editorial: Reform Justice System

2009-06-29T20:28:00.000-07:00

REFORM JUSTICE SYSTEM

Criminal-justice reform has long been a cause championed by civil libertarians. Now that business leaders, taxpayer watchdogs and law-enforcement veterans in Florida have joined in, Gov. Charlie Crist and legislators have no good excuse for ignoring this imperative.

A group calling itself the Coalition for Smart Justice addressed an open letter last week to Mr. Crist and legislators calling for comprehensive reform in the state prison system and corrections policies. The coalition is made up of business, academic, religious, government, law-enforcement and social-service leaders.

As the coalition argues, Florida spends too much to put nonviolent offenders in prison. By diverting them to cheaper and better alternatives, the state could free more dollars to invest in programs to rehabilitate violent offenders behind bars before their release. Taxpayers and public safety both would benefit.

Signatories on the letter include Barney Bishop of Associated Industries of Florida, Dominic Calabro of Florida TaxWatch, three former state attorneys general, a former corrections commissioner and the head of the state's police benevolent association.

Florida does a bang-up job of putting away convicted criminals. Its current prison population of almost 101,000 has jumped nearly a quarter in the past five years. Rising crime explains part of the increase, but so do tougher state sentencing laws.

With the average cost of keeping an inmate in prison more than $20,000 a year, the bill for running the system tops $2 billion annually. And if the inmate population keeps growing at its current pace, the cost of building and operating new prisons will siphon billions more from taxpayers. Meanwhile, basic services like education, health care and environmental protection have been on the chopping block in Tallahassee.

Many people would argue that public safety is worth almost any price But Florida's prison system doesn't do a very good job of protecting citizens once inmates get out. Of those released, a third commit crimes again within three years. Within five years, 65 percent do.

The state's juvenile-justice system, another target for reform from the coalition, turns out to be an apprenticeship for the big house. About half the kids incarcerated in the system wind up in prison as adults.

Given the growing drain on tax dollars from the prison system and its shortcomings in keeping ex-cons from re-offending, it's no wonder business and law-enforcement leaders have joined the call for reform.

Currently, about half the inmates packing Florida's prisons were convicted for nonviolent crimes. Steering them ""especially the ones whose crimes stem from drug addiction or mental-health problems "" to less expensive but more effective alternatives would diminish the need to build new prisons at $100 million a pop.

State legislators got a good start on this goal this year when they directed circuit judges to avoid sending nonviolent criminals to prison and bolstered the state's drug courts. After taking these steps, lawmakers put off $300 million worth of prison construction.

More efforts to divert nonviolent offenders from prison could make more money available to beef up programs like education, drug treatment and mental-health counseling for those violent offenders who belong behind bars "" services that would make them more likely to be law-abiding, productive members of society when they are released. Over time, that also would bring down the prison population.

For years, Florida legislators have been more interested in being tough than smart on crime. As a state senator, "Chain-gang Charlie" Crist cultivated a reputation for cracking down on criminals.

But Florida has long since run out of money to pump into a prison system that burdens taxpayers yet falls short on protecting public safety.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n663/a06.html
Newshawk: http://www.novembercoalition.org
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Fri, 26 Jun 2009
Source: Orlando Sentinel (FL)
Copyright: 2009 Orlando Sentinel
Contact: insight@orlandosentinel.com
Website: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/325
Note: Rarely prints out-of-state LTEs.

San Bernardino County Supervisors OK Medical Marijuana

2009-06-28T06:53:00.000-07:00

Final Score: Medical Marijuana 5, San Bernardino County Supervisors 0.

But despite their victory Tuesday, the medical marijuana proponents are still angry because it will be almost two months or perhaps longer before the county begins issuing identification cards to people with doctors' prescriptions.

"Our concern is seeing that the medicine gets out to our patients," said Ron Downey, a proponent who spoke at Tuesday's board meeting. A half-dozen others also spoke.

That's how the years-long duel ended, with the supervisors voting unanimously to implement a medical marijuana identification card program.

The proposed ordinance authorizing the program will go before the board again on July 14 for adoption, and the program should be in full swing 30 days after that, on Aug. 14.

If all goes according to plan, that's when patients can start submitting applications for identification cards, said Lynne Fischer, county spokeswoman.

The board also imposed a temporary ban on dispensaries until the county's development code can be updated to include provisions and design standards for them.

"That doesn't prohibit them ( patients ) from the other options they have under the law," Fischer said.

For further information, contact the San Bernardino County Public Health Department at ( 800 ) 782-4264. Applications will be distributed by appointment only.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n651/a01.html
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Wed, 24 Jun 2009
Source: Contra Costa Times (CA)
Copyright: 2009 Knight Ridder
Contact: letters@cctimes.com
Website: http://www.contracostatimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/96
Author: Joe Nelson
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?115 (Cannabis - California)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Cannabis - Medicinal)

Heroin: A Curse or a Source of Meaning?

2009-06-28T06:52:00.000-07:00

FOR a substance that started out as a family-friendly cough suppressant and non-addictive morphine substitute, heroin has certainly gained a fearsome reputation since the late 1890s, when Germany's Bayer Company first marketed it.

There are still some elderly retired midwives around who fondly recall heroin ( available legally here until the mid-1950s ) as a near-perfect sedative for labour pains.

From pain-free birth to painful death, heroin has become one of our most reviled and misunderstood substances.

I continue to meet people who assure me that heroin isn't just a drug, it's an open invitation to crime and degeneracy, a squirt of anarchy concentrate in a hypodermic.

Despite the fact that it is other substances such as alcohol and speed that tend to fuel violent behaviour, it is heroin that has acquired the sinister status.

And this is why many people become edgy when it is suggested ( as it is every year or two ) that heroin is making a comeback.

In the late 1990s, as many as 80 per cent of the people we met sleeping rough on the streets were heroin-dependent. Their homelessness was often a byproduct of their addiction and these were the days when the drug flowed so freely that the heroin overdose toll was printed alongside the road toll in the local tabloid.

Collingwood's Smith Street was dubbed Smack Street, many young women took to street sex work to support their dependency, and middle-class families made a concerted effort to avoid the corner of Russell and Bourke streets, then Melbourne's epicentre of drug dealing.

Are those days returning? Did we learn anything from the last heroin crisis?

This decade, heroin has had more putative comebacks than John Farnham, but open street dealing has never quite returned with the same vigour. Until now.

Many community workers are reporting a notable increase in heroin use among clients of housing and health services.

Evidently, the poppy fields of Burma and Afghanistan are fertile with product and the road of supply is open again. Some commentators believe that in recent weeks the purity of the drug has risen from 30 per cent to 70 per cent.

Heroin is stupidly expensive: five kilograms of it has a street value of $9 million ( although according to one drug educator I know, the substance would cost about as much to manufacture commercially as sugar ).

For the user, a single hit or "point" usually costs about $50. Because the purity varies, they never know what they've got until it's inside them. Sometimes they overdose, sometimes they die. A regular user may need to raise somewhere between $800 to $2000 a week to support their addiction. Hence the rise in prostitution, petty crime and dealing during heroin's ascendancy.

It's this expense that creates many of the drug's social problems. Scoring and paying for heroin becomes the user's entire focus. Finding money for food, clothing or housing may no longer be a priority. Homelessness and malnutrition are frequent side-effects for long-term users.

But all this has been said before. What isn't understood often enough is why some people find heroin so seductive. Heroin may have been conceived as a painkiller, but it is also extremely effective in killing emotional pain. Users I know have described the drug, not as a curse, but as a source of meaning. "Without it, I would have topped myself years ago," one 26-year-old woman told me.

Society is fragmented and it's painful to acknowledge that many people experience sexual, physical and emotional abuse. Overcoming such trauma may be a lifetime's journey. Some never manage it. I have no doubt that the stoned serenity heroin promises is seen as a solution, a tangible pathway out of despair. When he was director of Jesuit Social Services, Peter Norden memorably observed that young people use drugs in response to pain, suffering and isolation -- not because they are aiming to be villainous.

In other words, heroin addiction may be best understood as the consequence of profound social dislocation, rather than an individual's weakness. Children do not ask to be traumatised and they do what they can to survive the despair. This is why we've got to reach out to users and offer more constructive therapies to address their psychological injuries.

Ten years ago, widespread heroin use created pervasive outrage in Melbourne and many people were contented with the short-sighted premise that all problems begin and end with the drug user. Heroin users I knew were bashed, spat on and called names such as "junkie" and "dero". Ironically, the perpetrators were often young intoxicated males.

It might help if we abolished words like "drug addict" and "junkie" from the lexicon of social comment. Pejoratives do nothing but efface the humanity from a situation where compassion, not condemnation, would better suit the debate.

If heroin is back to stay, we need to be prepared to look past the substance itself and recognise that this addiction is really a symbol for more formidable problems. Heroin use isn't just the product of crime, it's also the product of family breakdown, neglect and intense feelings of hopelessness.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n651/a07.html
Newshawk: MAP's News by email www.mapinc.org/lists/#news
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Mon, 22 Jun 2009
Source: Age, The (Australia)
Copyright: 2009 The Age Company Ltd
Contact: letters@theage.com.au
Website: http://www.theage.com.au/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/5
Author: Chris Middendorp
Note: Chris Middendorp is a program co-ordinator at Sacred Heart Mission.
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin)

Pot 'Consultant' Reports Plant Theft

2009-06-28T06:49:00.000-07:00

Someone Stole His Marijuana And He Wants Police To Get It Back.

So, an officer found himself in the unusual position yesterday of taking a report for the stolen weed. Weed worth anywhere from $850 to $17,000. Depending on who you ask.

Usually when someone's stash is ripped off, the last person they think of calling is a cop. But Derek Pedro figures his legal property was taken and he deserves the assistance of police, just like anybody else.

First, let's get a few things straight about Pedro.

He calls it his "medicine." Not his pot.

He refers to himself a "gardener." Not a cultivator.

He says he is a "consultant." Not a dealer.

And he doesn't have customers. They're his "patients."

Since 2003, Pedro, 37, has had a licence through Health Canada that allows him to use and grow marijuana for medicinal purposes.

Since childhood, Pedro has been plagued by excruciating migraines, he says. He also has Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, an incurable problem with his collagen production, which causes severe joint pain.

At 16, Pedro discovered smoking dope made him feel better.

These days, "I need to medicate at least once an hour," he says. He does it with the government's blessing.

He also grows his own with the federal government's approval.

In the back yard of his east Mountain home, Pedro has a small greenhouse. In there he grows his "mother plants," the cannabis genetically designed to meet his specific medical needs. From those, he takes cuttings to grow the crop that thrives in his basement.

Pedro is not just gardening for himself. It would be against the law for Pedro to grow cannabis for someone else. Or sell to them. So he doesn't do that.

What he does is rent space in his house for others to grow. He charges them for hydro. And his consultation fee.

"I have a great following of people who need help," he says.

Pedro says he has eight patients, but hopes to expand to 80.

His fee and overhead works out to about $50 a plant, which he says is the dollar value Health Canada sets for a pot plant.

Cops go by a different calculation. Street value for weed in Hamilton is usually set at about $1,000 for a mature plant.

Early yesterday morning, someone cut the lock on Pedro's greenhouse and stole 11 mother plants. Then they broke into a basement window and stole seven more plants. They went up to the first floor and stole a computer and a bag of marijuana.

All the while, Pedro was asleep on the second floor.

Health Canada says medicinal pot growers must have security. Pedro has a security camera, but the images from the break-in are so grainy they are useless. He says he has a security company, but the alarm didn't go off and the company didn't respond. He has a guard dog. Abby is a 13-year-old boxer who expects strangers to pet her.

This is the second time Pedro's marijuana has been stolen. Two years ago he reported a break-in at his home and wound up being arrested for running a grow-op. He spent two days in jail before the charges were dropped. Now he has a $4.3-million lawsuit filed against Hamilton police, claiming unlawful arrest and mental anguish.

His wife -- also a licensed medical marijuana user -- left him soon after that. They share custody of their children, aged four and 13.

Lego blocks and toy dinosaurs are scattered between a few young pot plants that remain in the back yard. The precious branch of a mother plant floats in a child's wading pool, in the hopes of rehydrating it.

The children, says Pedro, "know it as my medicine."

Yesterday, it took much of the day for police to get to Pedro's house. He says it's because of the lawsuit and the pot. Police say Pedro's break-in was just one in a long list after a busy weekend.

Pedro says he will use every bit of marijuana he has left to ensure his patients are taken care of. That will mean his own doses will be jeopardized.

Unless, of course, police are able to recover his stolen pot and hand it back.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n652/a04.html
Newshawk: CMAP http://www.mapinc.org/cmap
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Tue, 23 Jun 2009
Source: Hamilton Spectator (CN ON)
Copyright: 2009 The Hamilton Spectator
Contact: letters@thespec.com
Website: http://www.thespec.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/181
Author: Susan Clairmont
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmjcn.htm (Cannabis - Medicinal - Canada)

Lynden Resident Grows Marijuana - Legally

2009-06-28T06:48:00.000-07:00

LYNDEN - On May 9, officers from the Lynden Police Department visited a house in town and discovered a number of marijuana plants growing under lights in the basement.

The residents of the house did not attempt to hide the plants and the police issued no citations.

No one was arrested - it was all legal.

In 1998, 59 percent of Washington voters approved Initiative 692, which allowed marijuana to be grown and used for certain medical conditions.

For law enforcement agencies, encountering medical marijuana now requires them to step lightly.

"We work very closely with the prosecutor's office," said Lynden Deputy Chief John Billester. "We don't want to cross a line and step on someone's rights."

Even though originally the law outlined only a legal defense for medical growers and users to use in court, law officers aren't likely to make an arrest if they suspect the case will get thrown out of court.

Billester said it can make for an uncomfortable situation when people ask officers why they are taking away someone's medication.

Working closely with the prosecutor's office is the preferred course for most law enforcement agencies in Whatcom County, in order to make sure any case brought forward is clear-cut.

Sumas Police Chief Chris Haugen said his department recently assisted federal customs agents who encountered someone with medical marijuana.

The Sumas Police validated the certificate in that case, but forwarded the information to the prosecutor's office for confirmation, Haugen said.

Everson Police Chief Erik Ramstead said his officers, whose work also covers Nooksack, haven't dealt with medical grow operations in the Nooksack Valley cities, but they would be careful to examine documentation closely.

"It's not an issue we run into a lot," Ramstead said.

That doesn't mean he would be surprised to see cases in the future, Ramstead said, since trends indicate to him that the state legislature will only become more receptive to medical marijuana use.

The four main residents of the Lynden house, contacted in May, will not be named in this article because of their concern over what publicity might bring, such as extra attention from "criminal elements."

Jack ( not his real name ), the 40-year-old primary resident, said he is a grower for a cancer patient who also suffered several car accidents, causing him chronic pain as a result.

The marijuana Jack grows is meant mainly to help his patient cope with the nausea associated with chemotherapy, he said.

Jack said he sees himself as part of an expanding movement of patients, providers and doctors in Whatcom County, and the state in general, who struggle to pave the way for people who could benefit from the unorthodox treatment.

Although he admits he used the drug recreationally in the past, he now insists his usage is limited to his own medical condition. His diagnosis is for chronic pain associated with several car and work accidents.

However, police keep a close eye on the house, Jack said, and officers often pull over visitors after they have left to check for illegal possession.

Most of Jack's visitors are people who are interested in the information he provides to help patients obtain legal status - a task Jack, who is on disability, considers a personal mission.

"There are incredible things it can do," he said, noting that he has personally seen patients suffering from Tourette syndrome, AIDS and chronic pain find relief with the drug.

Jack's documentation is provided through the Washington THCF ( The Hemp and Cannabis Foundation ) Medical Clinic in Bellevue, where annual clinic fees are $200 at the door and $150 in advance.

One of the other residents at the house is a medical marijuana user, with two others working toward their own documentation, a process Jack explains using a stack of several dozen papers containing everything from information on the law to instructions on preparing medical marijuana.

Even though it is not a qualifying condition, Jack said the marijuana has helped him in his struggle with Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, which he faults for his difficulty controlling his temper.

"It's like I'm trying to think 20 thoughts at a time," Jack said of the ADHD. "You don't want me working on your car."

The list of qualifying illnesses includes cancer, HIV or AIDS, epilepsy, glaucoma, intractable pain, and multiple sclerosis.

Over the years, some of the haze regarding the state's rules has been lifted by lawmakers, and some specifics have been laid out in the Washington Administrative Code and Revised Code of Washington.

For example, a 60-day supply was originally listed as the limit of what could legally be grown or possessed for medical purposes.

Now, this has been clarified in the WAC as "no more than 24 ounces of usable marijuana, and no more than 15 plants," between the "designated provider" and a patient.

Jack said the state law, as of November, allows him to be a provider for two others as well as a patient himself, but that he doesn't even approach the plant limit because of space issues. If he grows too much, he wouldn't be able to keep it out of sight as the law requires.

The early difficulty of defining a 60-day supply has hurt the Lynden Police Department in the past.

Billester said a case several years ago involved someone who had a certificate from a physician, but had abused it by growing more than he was allowed.

"I finally just called the doctor on the certificate to get the proper amount," Billester said.

The police then confiscated all but that amount and cited the man for possession of 40 grams or less of marijuana.

"In that case, ( the law ) was abused," Billester said, adding that he believes the abuse is widespread.

"You have documents that are copies of documents and no way to verify them," he said. "It's difficult for law enforcement, doctors and patients alike."

That's made harder by the technical difficulties of avoiding violation of the federal laws that still apply to marijuana.

According to the Washington State Medical Association, doctors still cannot "prescribe" marijuana. They can merely be "advising a qualifying patient about the risks and benefits of the medical use of marijuana and providing a qualifying patient with documentation that the medical use of marijuana might be beneficial."

In addition, marijuana still can't be bought or sold, with most clinics that provide marijuana operating as non-profits, taking donations in order to keep the clinic open, Jack said.

Whatcom County Prosecuting Attorney David McEachran said the county will only press charges when violations of the state law are obvious.

Avoiding prosecution is high on Jack's list of priorities, even though he believes marijuana should be legal and he is a regular attendee of the Seattle Hempfest, an annual gathering of marijuana activists.

Jack said he has become a Christian in recent years and has learned to see marijuana simply as another gift from God. As proof, he quotes Genesis 1:29: "And God said, "See, I have given you every herb that yields seed which is on the face of all the earth, and every tree whose fruit yields seed; to you it shall be for food." ( NKJV )

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n652/a05.html
Newshawk: Just Say Know: http://www.efsdp.org
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Wed, 24 Jun 2009
Source: Lynden Tribune (WA)
Contact: editor@lyndentribune.com
Copyright: 2009 Lynden Tribune
Website: http://www.lyndentribune.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2618
Author: Mark Reimers
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Cannabis - Medicinal)

Police Raid Nets 8,000 Pot Plants

2009-06-28T06:47:00.000-07:00

A massive marijuana grow-operation was raided yesterday morning near Hatzic Lake in Mission.

Close to 8,000 plants were discovered in the outdoor grow-op on a rural property near the end of Eagle Road.

Police monitored the area for nearly a week before executing a search warrant on the farm. They seized the budding crop, along with a cache of firearms.

The majority of the plants were in outdoor "natural" greenhouses, while almost 200 were discovered in the home's basement. Vegetables were planted in and around the greenhouses to disguise the operation.

Eight people were arrested and are facing charges.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n653/a01.html
Newshawk: CMAP http://www.mapinc.org/cmap
Votes: 0
Webpage: http://www.theprovince.com/news/todays-paper/Police+raid+nets+plants/1729961/story.html
Pubdate: Thu, 25 Jun 2009
Source: Province, The (CN BC)
Copyright: 2009 Canwest Publishing Inc.
Contact: http://www.canada.com/theprovince/letters.html
Website: http://www.canada.com/theprovince/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/476

Prosecution Tries to Show Pot Garden Link At Hearing

2009-06-28T06:46:00.000-07:00

OROVILLE - Prosecutors Wednesday tried to show a link between a series of allegedly illegal medical marijuana gardens in Butte County.

A judge is hearing evidence in the complicated case to determine whether 13 accused defendants should stand trial on felony charges of marijuana cultivation and possession of pot for sales.

A Butte County sheriff's investigator testified Wednesday that officers found medicinal marijuana scripts with many of the same patients' names on them posted during raids last September on five indoor and outdoor grows in the foothills near Berry Creek and Concow and a single residence in Chico.

Assistant district attorney Helen Harberts has essentially divided up her case between those gardens and about six others in and around Chico and Forest Ranch.

She has used business records, photos and interviews with witnesses and some of the arrested suspects to try to show a common link between the far-flung grows.

The defense, which is scheduled to resume its cross-examination of the sheriff's investigator today, contends these were lawful medical marijuana collectives or co-ops.

Chico attorney Jesus Rodriguez pointed out Wednesday the 48 plants for which his client is being accused of growing illegally had the requisite number of medical marijuana recommendations posted.

Nor was any evidence found of marijuana sales, such as heavy traffic in an out of the grow-site or pay-owe sheets, scales or packaging material, the defense attorney noted.

The case, which was set to conclude today, now could go into early next week because of the sheer volume of evidence and number of defendants involved.

On Wednesday, Butte County sheriff's anti-marijuana detective Jacob Hancock testified in detail about the raids on five gardens in the eastern foothills surrounding Berry Creek and Concow and a abandoned home in Chico.

He said officers found scripts with many of the same names of medical marijuana patients at several of the grow sites.

Patients with whom he spoke later denied either being part of a collective, or giving permission to have their scripts posted at more than one garden, the detective told the judge.

Hancock also said Chico resident Casey James Wilkins was the listed property owner at two of the sites raided, and that personal papers and other evidence allegedly tied him to at least three of the other grow sites.

The detective quoted one of the arrested men, Arthur Jenkins, as saying that Wilkins hired him to tend a 48-plant medical marijuana garden on a rural property off Danville Circle in Concow.

Initially, Jenkins, who had moved earlier that month into a small camp trailer on the site after being burned out during last summer's wildfires, claimed Wilkins also purchased medical marijuana recommendations for him and his girlfriend, and initially offered to pay him $5,000 to tend the plants and provide security at the grow site, but wound up agreeing to take six plants as compensation instead.

Hancock said two of the patients listed at the Concow site were also posted at a 45-plant outdoor pot garden near a home on George Cameron Drive in Berry Creek.

During a search of that residence, officers came upon a rattlesnake in a bucket containing pot downstairs, which an arrested tenant, Keith Oshea, told them he had placed there to prevent the reptile from harming his animals.

Under questioning by Harberts, the detective said officers also seized a digital camera containing photos showing Wilkins and three others arrested in the case together, along with a spiral notebook in a pickup on the property listing their names and phone numbers.

Wilkins was the listed owner of a home on Castle Rock Road also in Berry Creek, where officers reportedly found an elaborate indoor grow room in addition to a nine-plant medical marijuana garden outside.

Hancock testified records indicated the Chico suspect had purchased the two-story home with the lakeside view for $750,000, paying $40,000 down and agreeing to make monthly $900 payments on the residence.

A total of 29 more pot plants were found at a separate medical marijuana grow off Simpson Ranch Road in Berry Creek.

During questioning, Hancock said that one of two people arrested at that site, Matthew Herrick, initially denied knowing Wilkins. But when confronted with evidence, including photos showing the two men together, he insisted they were "just friends."

The detective testified that officers found records pertaining to businesses reportedly owned by Wilkins during a raid on another medical marijuana garden on nearby Pam Court.

One of the patients whose name was posted at both the Pam Court and Concow grow sites later was quoted by Hancock as claiming she had given her medical marijuana script to the Wilkins in exchange for two ounces of pot.

Sheriff's officers also served another search warrant at a residence on Normal Avenue in Chico, but said any plants that were being grown there had been uprooted prior to the raid.

Hancock quoted a witness whose boyfriend was snared in one of the raids, as claiming the following morning, Wilkins had showed up at her door with two equally "disheveled" men, smelling of marijuana, and saying that "all of his properties had been raided, but adding, "they were all legal and he shouldn't have a problem."

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n653/a04.html
Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Thu, 25 Jun 2009
Source: Chico Enterprise-Record (CA)
Copyright: 2009 Chico Enterprise-Record
Contact: http://www.chicoer.com/feedback
Website: http://www.chicoer.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/861
Note: Letters from newspaper's circulation area receive publishing priority
Author: Terry Vau Dell, Staff Writer
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/pot.htm (Cannabis)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Cannabis - Medicinal)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?115 (Cannabis - California)

CANADA TOP SOURCE FOR 'PARTY' DRUGS

2009-06-28T06:43:00.000-07:00

Canada has become a major producer of illegal "party" drugs, a United Nations report released yesterday says.

Asian gangs and outlaw bikers stepped up their production of methamphetamine -- a very addictive stimulant drug that affects the central nervous system -- from 2003 to 2006, says the 306-page survey.

Asian organized crime groups primarily on the West Coast also focused on ecstasy, a psychoactive drug that is chemically similar to the stimulant methamphetamine and the hallucinogen mescaline.

They had turned "ecstasy" laboratories into "large scale facilities" by 2007, World Drug Report 2009 says.

"Since 2003-2004, Canada has emerged as the primary source of ecstasy-group substances for North American markets," according to the report, produced by the Vienna-based UN Office on Drugs and Crime.

The gangs also "increasingly" exported it to other parts of the world, the report says.

"In 2007, it was estimated that 50 per cent of domestically produced ecstasy was trafficked outside of Canada," the report says. "Most of this was thought to be destined for the United States, Australia and Japan."

In that year, Japan identified Canada as the single biggest source for ecstasy, the researchers say.

Australia said methamphetamine from Canada accounted for 83 per cent of total seized imports.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n653/a09.html
Newshawk: CMAP http://www.mapinc.org/cmap
Votes: 0
Webpage: http://www.timescolonist.com/news/todays-paper/Canada+source+party+drugs/1730652/story.htm
Pubdate: Thu, 25 Jun 2009
Source: Victoria Times-Colonist (CN BC)
Copyright: 2009 Times Colonist
Contact: http://www2.canada.com/victoriatimescolonist/letters.html
Website: http://www.timescolonist.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/481
Author: Steven Edwards, Canwest News Service

South River Grant Will Help Meth Task Force Efforts To Stamp

2009-06-28T06:41:00.000-07:00

Since late 2003, the Sampson County Meth Task Force, Inc. has been working to confront the methamphetamine crisis head-on, providing intervention opportunities designed to prevent or break the cycle of drug abuse caused by those who manufacture, sell or use the highly addictive drug.

The group, that got its initial start with a $500 donation from Star Telephone Membership Corporation, Inc., has grown over the years and has been able to meet the needs of those who suffer from the disease and train those who can help with treatment and recovery.

Thanks to a recent grant from South River EMC, the Sampson County Meth Task Force, Inc. will be able to continue to help save those lives.

Catherine O'Dell, manager of member and public affairs for South River, presented the group with a $5,000 grant at last week's meeting.

"We just thank you, South River, and the members," said Meth Task Force chairman J.W. Simmons. "As you know, this thing called methamphetamine continues to grow in our county. It not only continues to be a menace to us, but it is part of a larger issue of addiction . We are really making a huge push to do the process right and that process starts with not even doing it ( meth ) once. That is the message we are trying to get out. If we can get it out, I think we can take a major step in saving not only lives, but we also hope that it will save some tax dollars in the long run."

The grant came from South River's Community Assistance Corporation, a charitable foundation of the company that has recently awarded over $39,000 in grants to the community through the Operation Round Up program. In the past year, the Community Assistance Program has awarded over $173,000 in grants to organizations and families in the area.

But in actuality, it all comes from South River's members.

Through Operation Round Up, South River EMC members agree to have their bill "rounded up" to the next dollar each month. If their bill is $96.87, the remaining 13 cents will be put into an account managed by the Community Assistance Corporation. Currently, over 77 percent of the Cooperative's members are helping change the lives of their neighbors, friends and fellow-cooperative members through this program.

"Small change makes a big change," said O'Dell.

The funds are then given to organizations that are serving the health, safety, educational or historical needs of the community or to families who have fallen on unusually tough times.

"All applications are reviewed by a board," said O'Dell. "They looked at this application and realized that meth addiction is having a profound impact on our community from children to adults. The work already done by the Meth Task Force has just been phenomenal, and if there was anything that we could do to help them increase the awareness, they wanted to do it."

O'Dell said that she was proud to be part of the presentation.

"We started Operation Round Up because South River wants to give our members an avenue to contribute to the well-being of their community - -- that is exactly what this program does," she said. "We believe in the community. This is where we live, this is where we work, so it is our responsibility to make sure our community remains healthy."

"In these times, when the economy is tightened and you see a lot of corporations pulling back their support, it only compounds the problem. South River is making every effort not to do that because we don't want to make the already difficult times more difficult. We will continue our support of programs like this in the community."

Officials from the group's other major sponsor, Star Telephone, agree.

"I think that the Meth Task Force is a very vital asset to the community," said Jeff Shipp, community relations manager for Star Telephone, who also serves on the group's board. "I think that getting this grant is great, and it is a testament to what the group has been doing in this community."

Shipp said the grant is a great way to help the group help others in need.

"It is really important to try and fight the problems associated with meth addiction," said Shipp. "I am happy to see the Meth Task Force get this grant and it is going to go a long way in helping to start to work as a conduit between addiction, the rehabilitation and the judicial system. I am just proud to be part of the group because it is a tremendous asset to the community."

The Meth Task Force will meet again in the Harrells community on Sept. 15.

For more information on the group, click on to methdeath.org.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n654/a03.html
Newshawk: chip=09
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Wed, 24 Jun 2009
Source: Sampson Independent, The (NC)
Copyright: 2009, The Sampson Independent
Contact: smatthews@intrstar.net
Website: http://www.clintonnc.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1704
Author: Doug Clark

No Rise In Drug Markets

2009-06-28T06:40:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON —- In its annual report on world drug use, the United Nations concludes that global markets for cocaine, opiates and marijuana are holding steady or in decline.

Yet about 28 million people are heavy drug users likely to be physically or psychologically dependent on drugs, the report said.

Opium cultivation in Afghanistan, where 93 percent of the world’s opium is grown, dropped by 19 percent last year, the Vienna-based U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime reported Wednesday. And there was a 28 percent decline —- the report called it staggering —- in production of cocaine in Colombia, which produces half the world’s cocaine, the report said.

Global production of coca hit a five-year low at 845 tons despite some increased cultivation in Peru and Bolivia. Marijuana remained the most widely used and cultivated drug in the world and it is more harmful than commonly believed, the report said.

The estimated cost of the world’s illicit drug market is about $320 billion, said Antonio Maria Costa, executive director of the U.N. office.

“This makes drugs one of the most valuable commodities in the world,” he said.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n654/a09.html
Newshawk: Jim
Votes: 0
Webpage: http://www.ajc.com/none/content/printedition/2009/06/25/drugs0625.html?cxntlid=inform_artr
Pubdate: Thu, 25 Jun 2009
Source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution (GA)
Copyright: 2009 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Contact: http://www.ajc.com/opinion/content/opinion/letters/sendletter.html
Website: http://www.ajc.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/28
Author: Barry Schweid, Associated Press

Second Chance For Methadone Clinic

2009-06-28T06:38:00.002-07:00

Clinic Finds New Location After Being Shunned In Other Spots

Despite fears that Second Chance Recovery, one of Calgary's two methadone clinics, would be forced to close, it has found a new location - in a vacated Medicentre in Braeside.

The clinic's current location on 41 Avenue NE is not zoned for a medical facility, forcing them to move. Dr. Ian Postnikoff, an addiction psychiatrist at the clinic, expects a not-in-my-backyard backlash from the Braeside community. The clinic has been searching for a new location for months but was being shunned by various communities because residents don't want it in their area.

"People's attitudes tend to be quite negative towards treatment of patients with addiction," Postnikoff says. "There is this belief these people are raving mad and out of control, but these are people wanting help, they don't want to be involved in the illegal drug life."

Sherry Morrison, the owner of Shuckaluck's Public Ale House in Braecentre, the mall of the new location, doesn't think there will be an issue with the clinic movies in July 6. "They have to go somewhere," she says. "If they run them out of every neighbourhood, where are they going to go?" adding that with a police station down the street, it is as good a location as any.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n654/a05.html
Newshawk: CMAP http://www.mapinc.org/cmap
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Thu, 25 Jun 2009
Source: FFWD (CN AB)
Copyright: 2009 FFWD
Contact: info@ffwd.greatwest.ca
Website: http://www.ffwdweekly.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1194
Author: Lindsey Wallis

Prison Beds Bill Set To Top $1.75b

2009-06-28T06:38:00.001-07:00

The prison population is growing exponentially and will require 4900 new beds at a cost of $1.75 billion in the coming seven years, Budget documents reveal.

The prisons are virtually full now, but the Treasury's Budget documents show that Corrections forecasts the present population of 8000 to grow to 11,000 by 2016. The documents say the bulk of the $1.7 billion will hit next year's Budget.

Growth in the prison population will require the construction of 3500 new beds and the replacement of 1400 - a total of 4900 beds.

The documents show that as well as the prison being considered for Wiri, there is building at another two sites planned - although details are deleted. The Budget included $385.4 million for double bunking at existed prisons, with Corrections Minister Judith Collins saying without it prisons will be full by February.

The Government is looking at other alternatives, such as adding on converted shipping containers or prefabricated "concrete pods" to existing prisons.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n655/a05.html
Newshawk: http://www.norml.org.nz
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Fri, 26 Jun 2009
Source: New Zealand Herald (New Zealand)
Copyright: 2009 New Zealand Herald
Contact: http://info.nzherald.co.nz/letters/
Website: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/300
Author: Patrick Gower

Wasting Time

2009-06-28T06:37:00.000-07:00

As a retired police detective, I heartily agree with Dr. Fraser that my profession is addicted to the war on drugs. While rape kits are never opened and known possessors of child pornography are not arrested, drug task forces go about the useless exercise of arresting drug dealers who are replaced within a week. Why? With drug dealers we can seize their home, car and cash. With child molesters we get no money, just the satisfaction of saving our children.

Save our children. End Modern Prohibition.

Howard Wooldridge-Founding Member of LEAP Washington, D.C.

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n655/a01.html
Newshawk: Jim
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Thu, 25 Jun 2009
Source: Macon Telegraph (GA)
Copyright: 2009 The Macon Telegraph Publishing Company
Contact: letters@macontel.com
Website: http://www.macontelegraph.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/667
Author: Howard Wooldridge, Founding Member-Leap

Speakers Tackle Medical Marijuana Issue At Forum

2009-06-28T06:35:00.000-07:00

Current drug enforcement laws and a government system for the provision of medical marijuana are failing Canadians, residents heard from an expert panel last week.

Rielle Capler, of the Centre for Addiction Research B.C., and Tony Smith, from Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, presented information about medical marijuana, regulations governing it, and problems within the current legal system to the crowd of over 40 people ranging in age from 20 through 80 at the Thursday, June 18 meeting. The forum was hosted by the city at a cost $1,100. Capler spoke about the use of medical marijuana in treatment of symptoms related to specific conditions, methods of use and possible harms before delving into the current regulatory process for legal access to medical marijuana and the development of compassion clubs as a response to gaps in the current system.

" The regulations are unconstitutional, and there are too many barriers," said Capler. "The ( marijuana available through the government program ) is marked up 1,500 per cent, they mark it up after paying for it to be grown, and people who are sick have to pay for it. Some people pay up to $500 a month for their medicine."

Smith stayed focused on the overall lack of success in the existing drug enforcement programs. Smith retired after 28 years on the police force, spending much of his time working in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside. He says that 90 per cent of crime is done by addicts while only one to three per cent of the population is addicted. With a cost of over $2.5 billion annually, drug enforcement is still not winning, said Smith. City Councillor Joy Davies, who initiated the forum says the fight for change must come from the local level. Davies called on the community to make their support for change heard at city council prior to their next meeting, on June 29 where the vote to move a motion forward to the provincial municipalities meeting in the fall.

"If you, the local population, are sincere that you want the local politicians - and I believe it has to be the grassroots politicians up to the provincial and federal - to organize and work together you have to make your voice heard," said Davies. "Council said they want the community to tell them that you want this vote to go down to Vancouver. If you want to get political, this is political."

While people inside continued to ask questions, a Vancouver businessman Sam Mellace, addressed people outside the doors. Mellace says that marijuana helped him as he battled leukemia. As a permitted user, Mellace wants to see legal sources of marijuana which he says compassion clubs are not. "There is a big difference between compassion and the law," said Mellace. My idea and concept is to open up viable medical clinics and also supply the marijuana. If I can get people to grow the supply wouldn't that be an economic boost?"

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n655/a08.html
Newshawk: Herb
Votes: 0
Pubdate: Wed, 24 Jun 2009
Source: Grand Forks Gazette (CN BC)
Copyright: 2009 Sterling Newspapers
Contact: editor@grandforksgazette.ca
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/525
Author: Mona Mattei

US WA: Drug Testing Bill Faces 'Uphill Struggle'

2009-02-10T12:24:00.000-08:00

DRUG TESTING BILL FACES 'UPHILL STRUGGLE'

For the second year in a row, it looks like random drug-testing for police could be a nonstarter in Olympia.

The version of the bill in the state House, sponsored by Naches Republican Charles Ross, isn't dead, but it is stalled.

And the fate of an identical bill in the state Senate, sponsored by Yakima Republican Curtis King, could hinge on support from a Seattle Democrat who signed on as a co-sponsor but now says he's not sure whether he'd vote for it.

"It's turned into kind of an uphill struggle," said bill co-sponsor Rep. Bruce Chandler, R-Granger. "But we still have time to hear the bill and we're still working on it,"

The bill is similar to the one by Ross last year, which never came to a vote.

It would allow residents of cities and counties to vote on whether to randomly test law enforcement personnel. City of Yakima officials asked for the bill after an arbitrator ruled in 2007 that the city couldn't impose random drug testing without negotiating it into the contract with the police guild.

Yakima police believe the matter should have ended there and view the city's push for state legislation as an end-run to avoid bargaining the issue. City officials began pushing for the legislation after losing in arbitration.

"We're just saying that you need to meet us at the table," said Detective Mike Nielsen, president of the Yakima Police Patrolman's Association.

Chandler is the only one of the House bill's six co-sponsors with a seat on the Commerce and Labor Committee, where the bill has been mired since Ross introduced it last month. Whether it gets a hearing largely depends on the chairman of that committee, Steve Conway, D-Tacoma.

It may have faced an easier path in the Public Safety Committee, Ross said. The opposition to it within Commerce and Labor "illustrates the union pressures around here that some people feel," he said. Yakima police Chief Sam Granato, who has pushed for random drug testing since 2004, was more pointed, saying the Washington Council of Police and Sheriff's is applying that pressure.

"Rep. Conway will not move on it because he fears WACOPS," Granato wrote in an e-mail response to the Herald-Republic.

Conway did not respond to a call seeking comment for this story Friday.

WACOPS is working against the Senate version of the bill, too. No Washington cities Yakima's size or larger have random drug testing for police, although a few smaller cities such as Sunnyside do.

"The only place it's been an issue is in Yakima, with the fight between the guild and the chief," said Lee Reaves, director of governmental affairs for the organization. "We're going to fight it."

Reaves said he spoke with Sen. Adam Kline, D-Seattle, on Thursday to try to quash the bill. Kline is chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, where the Senate version of the bill awaits scheduling for a hearing.

"He's always been really good for us to work with," said Reaves.

Talking with Reaves gave Kline new perspective on the whole random-testing issue, leaving him undecided as of Friday.

"I was unaware that drug testing was a bargainable issue within police contracts," Kline said.

That realization left him torn between competing notions. On one hand, he believes police, like pilots or interstate truck drivers, hold a position in which public-safety concerns could override employee-privacy rights and call for random testing.

"Then there's another allegiance," Kline said. "And that is to the right of all people who work for a living -- including police officers -- to bargain with their employers the terms of their employment."

King spoke with Kline about the latter's new concerns on Thursday night and is hopeful he'll be able to keep Kline's support.

"Unless he's changed his mind," King said. "But we'll see."

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US: Web: Obama Is Against Pot Raids, the Public Is Against Pot Raids, and Yet ..

2009-02-06T07:58:00.000-08:00

OBAMA IS AGAINST POT RAIDS, THE PUBLIC IS AGAINST POT RAIDS, AND YET ... THE DRUG COPS' RAIDS CONTINUE

What gives? Let's see Obama be the one who personally rains on the DEA's eight-year parade that has crushed the lives of thousands.

Okay, try and stay with me if you can.

While campaigning for the US presidency, Barack Obama pledged not to "use Justice Department resources to try and circumvent state ( medical marijuana ) laws."

Nearly three-quarters of the American public agrees with this position. According to a new national poll of 1,053 likely voters by Zogby International and commissioned by the NORML Foundation, seventy-two percent of voters say that President Obama should "stop federal raids against medical marijuana providers in the 13 states where medical marijuana has become legal."

But since President Obama took office two weeks ago, the US Drug Enforcement Administration has undertaken at least seven separate raids of state-authorized medical marijuana providers in California and Colorado. Most recently, on Wednesday DEA officials - acting without the cooperation of state or local law enforcement agencies - served federal search warrants on at least four Los Angeles based medical marijuana collectives. Agents seized medicine, cash, financial records, and computers, but did not make any arrests.

Still with me? Good, because things are about to get even more confusing.

Today, in a front page article in The Washington Times White House spokesperson Nick Shapiro said, "The president believes that federal resources should not be used to circumvent state laws, and as he continues to appoint senior leadership to fill out the ranks of the federal government, he expects them to review their policies with that in mind."

Huh?

Okay, maybe I missed something but last time I checked Barack Obama is, in fact, the 44th President of the United States - which means he has the authority to tell both the US Department of Justice and DEA Acting Administrator Michele Leonhart: "No more raids. Period!" ( NORML podcaster Russ Belville has already drafted Obama the requisite memo here. http://stash.norml.org/dea-continues-pot-raids-obama-opposes/ )

Or, if Obama doesn't want to be the one who personally rains on the DEA's eight-year parade, then he can demand his newly sworn in U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to tell Ms. Leonhart and the DEA: "When President Obama says 'no more raids,' he means no more raids! Any more 'smash and grabs' in California - or any other state that's legalized the medical use of cannabis - and you're all out of your jobs. Got it?"

Of course, given the likelihood that President Obama won't be making such demands of his new Attorney General any time soon, why don't you?

Click here ( http://capwiz.com/norml2/issues/alert/?alertid=12591396 ) and tell US Attorney General Eric Holder to uphold the will of the President and the public. It's time for the DEA to stop circumventing state medical marijuana laws. It's time for the raids to come to an end.

http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n134/a03.html?1140

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US: Phelps Image As Hero Hurt By Photos

2009-02-04T07:00:00.000-08:00

PHELPS IMAGE AS HERO HURT BY PHOTOS

During the Beijing Olympics, Michael Phelps's sports agent said the gold medalist could earn $100 million in endorsement deals over his lifetime. Now, with Mr. Phelps photographed smoking marijuana, that figure may have to be adjusted, though for the time being most brands say they are standing by the swimming champion.

Mr. Phelps was caught up in a torrent of bad publicity Sunday when photos of him appeared in a British tabloid.

Although he apologized immediately for the incident, sports-marketing experts expect some fallout.

"There is no arguing that this will definitely impact his future earnings and marketing," says Kevin Adler, chief solutions officer at Engage Marketing, a New York sports-marketing firm. "The guy has been marketed as Captain America, and now this has materially damaged that image." Drew Johnson, a spokesman for Mr. Phelps's agent Octagon, a unit of Interpublic Group of Cos., said the swimmer has spoken with all current sponsors and apologized. "The response we've received has been very positive, and we are encouraged," Mr. Johnson said.

Mr. Phelps earns an estimated $5 million a year by endorsing big name brands such as Visa Inc., Nike Inc., Speedo International Ltd., Kellogg Co., PureSport and Doctor's Associates Inc.'s Subway restaurants. Sports experts point out that marketers have the legal right to terminate their contracts because most endorsement deals contain a "morality clause." Subway is planning to use Mr. Phelps in a high-profile marketing event this summer and is now monitoring the situation to see if the sandwich chain will have to scrap those efforts, according to a person familiar with the matter. A spokeswoman for Subway declined to comment.

Many of the companies whose brands Mr. Phelps endorses have expressed support for him. Watchmaker Omega, owned by Swatch Group AG, said the "story in the press involves Michael Phelps's private life and is, as far as Omega is concerned, a nonissue." But many also remained tight-lipped about whether the incident will affect the contracts they have with the swimmer. "Speedo would like to make it clear that it does not condone such behavior and we know that Michael truly regrets his actions," the swimwear maker said in a statement. "Michael Phelps is a valued member of the Speedo team and a great champion.

We will do all that we can to support him and his family."

Still, a spokeswoman for the company declined to comment on whether its contract with Mr. Phelps, which comes up for renewal at the end of the year, would be affected.

Speedo has been sponsoring Mr. Phelps since he was 16 years old. Speedo gave him a $1 million bonus for his record eight gold medals at the Beijing Olympics.

The photos appeared in News of the World, which is owned by News Corp. News Corp. also owns Dow Jones & Co., publisher of The Wall Street Journal. This isn't the first time the 23-year-old Mr. Phelps's image has been dented. In 2004, he pleaded guilty to drunken driving and was sentenced to 18 months' probation.

But sports experts say this incident could be more damaging because it was caught on camera.

It also broke on Super Bowl Sunday, the biggest sports and advertising day of the calendar.

Some fans have expressed their disappointment on the Web. On Mr. Phelps's site, swimroom.com, one commenter said: "And I look up to u?? As a little 13-year-old girl I'm now very sad." Others expressed their support.

One wrote: "In bad times is when you know your true friends, you are an ordinary human being and as such can make mistakes."

PureSport, a performance-drink brand, said in a statement that it isn't going to discuss the terms of its contract with Mr. Phelps. "Suffice to say, Michael is one of the best performing athletes in the world and we are very proud that he believes strongly in and endorses our product," Chief Executive Mike Humphrey said in the statement. "While we certainly do not condone his recent behavior, he is a key part of our PureSport family, will remain a member of our family and we are supporting him during this difficult time.

ref: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09/n123/a10.html?1119

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Huge Grow-Op About Medicine, Not Money: Accused

2008-02-06T11:04:00.000-08:00

HUGE GROW-OP ABOUT MEDICINE, NOT MONEY: ACCUSED

REGINA ( SNN ) -- Clutching a sacred bundle in his arms, one of the accused at the centre of a history-making grow-op told a jury that he is a traditional tribal chief of Turtle Island and was directed by the Creator to grow the plants for medicine.

"When the Creator tells me to do something, I cannot refuse," Lawrence Hubert Agecoutay testified in his own defence.

The Regina man, who turned 52 on Christmas Day, told the court he is Kitchi O-Stew Ka-Nee-Ka-Na-Go-Shick Ogimow-Wacon Ka-Nee-Ka-Neet, "and also known as Lawrence Agecoutay." He explained that his name, in the Soto language, means grand, biggest, head, spiritual chief, the leader -- "the one who always walks first."

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Ayahuasca: A Strange Brew

2008-02-03T11:28:00.000-08:00

Can a psychotropic jungle potion cure the existential angst of the McMansion set?

In an affluent corner of encinitas, just north of San Diego, a young medicine man named Lobo Siete Truenos sits cross-legged on the polished wood floors of a backyard temple.

Here in this suburban sanctuary, behind the gates of a faux-Spanish villa, just past the manicured lawn and an artificial lagoon, he's carefully unpacking a collection of stones, feathers and oils that he'll use for an all-night spiritual odyssey that will kick off after sunset.

If all goes as planned, Truenos' nine participants--all seeking his psychedelic "doctoring"--will sip a murky, foul-tasting potion and then wait, eyes closed in the dark, for it to take effect.

Wooziness may be followed by nausea, then probably vomiting.

For many, a kaleidoscopic array of geometric patterns could emerge.

Others may be greeted by friendly plant-like creatures, gnomes, elves or even a giant anaconda--known by indigenous tribes as Mother Ayahuasca, omniscient ruler of the plant kingdom--who communicates telepathically. And the really lucky ones may be treated to a cinematic review of their lives, each scene illustrating a moral failing.

"It's a deep process," Truenos says, as he places his precious stones on a tapestry woven with wild serpentine patterns. "It's certainly not a game. It takes a lot of purifying to serve this medicine." Truenos, 34, is precise about his tools because, when they're correctly assembled, they constitute what he calls "the fire altar of the eagle and the condor." But these instruments are just supporting players for the evening's star attraction, an inky fluid that Truenos has stored in three plastic drinking bottles.

This liquid is known variously as hoasca, yage, caapi and daime, but in the U.S. it's most commonly called ayahuasca. ( The word, which comes from the ancient Incan language Quechua, means "vine of the spirits" or "vine of the soul." ) Tribes of Central and South America--Shipibo, Kofan and Tukanos among them--have used the drug for hundreds of years or more in their spiritual practices.

In Ecuador, Brazil and Peru, the drug is legal and attracts many pilgrims to ayahuasca ceremonies every year.

The brew was introduced to pop culture in 1963, when Beat writers Allen Ginsberg and William S. Burroughs published their collected correspondence on their ayahuasca experiences in "The Yage Letters."

In the U.S., ayahuasca remained for years a largely underground phenomenon that, like peyote and psilocybin mushrooms, attracted a following of academics, journalists, psychiatrists and other soul-searching intellectuals. Now, thanks in part to a 2006 Supreme Court ruling, ayahuasca ( pronounced EYE-yah-WAH-skah ) appears to be gaining in popularity. East Coast writers have generated interest among the intelligentsia, and online head shops are selling ingredients for making the ayahuasca brew. At the same time, some scientific studies suggest that ayahuasca has legitimate uses as an alternative psychotropic medicine that can abolish depression, cure addiction and improve brain function.

For ayahuasqueros such as Truenos and the eclectic mix of button-down professionals and New Age acolytes joining him on this night, the potion may be a conduit to higher consciousness. Who exactly are these psychotropic explorers?

Truenos won't reveal much about them, except to say that the owners of the home in which they are meeting are retirees ( young ones, it appears ) and that participants typically include doctors, lawyers, celebrities, New Age healers and academics.

They're working folks, he says. "People from all walks of life."

For them, the vision-inducing elixir made from Amazonian jungle vines and leaves opens doors to parallel realities where mystical creatures reign. Because ayahuasca must be exactingly prepared and administered to achieve the desired benefits, a cadre of itinerant shamans such as Truenos has emerged, roaming the U.S. to host marathon candlelight ceremonies in yoga studios, private homes and remote open spaces, and charging as much as $200 a person for each session.

The concoction itself is said to taste so vile that most people fight their gag reflex to swallow it. Devotees liken the flavor to forest rot and bile, dirty socks and raw sewage.

Vomiting is so common that indigenous shamans often refer to the ceremony as la purga, or the purge. And ayahuasca can severely test the commitment of its followers: The potion often reveals its celebrated wisdoms only after repeat encounters. The payoff, adherents say, can be life-altering. Debilitating illnesses such as chronic depression or addiction may disappear after just one session, some say. Others say they shed their egos for a night, finally seeing their lives with a startling clarity.

With that kind of reputation, ayahuasca has predictably intrigued celebrities known for charting the supra-conscious: Oliver Stone, Sting and Tori Amos have sampled it and openly discussed their experiences. "It's quite an ordeal," Sting told Rolling Stone in 1998. Amos talked on BBC Radio 4 in 2005 about how she envisioned having a love affair with the devil during one ayahuasca encounter.

In Peru, ayahuasca ceremonies are so common that the nation's tourism bureau tracks the number of visitors seeking the sacred brew. But no one needs to travel to Peru to experience ayahuasca in 2008. A community, shepherded by ayahuasca shamans, has begun to emerge in the United States. It initially established itself in New Mexico. And now--in an act of psychedelic entrepreneurship and under the aegis of his spiritual and religious society, Aurora Baha--Truenos is bringing the ayahuasca ceremony to Southern California.

Ayahuasca traditionally is made from the boiled or soaked bark and stems of Banisteriopsis caapi--also known as the ayahuasca vine--in combination with the leaves of Psychotria viridis ( a bush that contains the alkaloids needed to produce ayahuasca's psychoactive compound, dimethyltryptamine, or DMT ).

But ayahuasca is no recreational drug. Unlike a drag on a marijuana joint or a snort of cocaine, even a single encounter with ayahuasca can be life-threatening under some circumstances. It poses serious risks when taken with certain medications, such as SSRI antidepressants; reputable shamans strictly prohibit the use of the beverage by anyone taking these drugs.

Some also demand abstinence from alcohol before a ceremony. A Canadian woman, albeit with advanced diabetes mellitus and cardiovascular disease, died in 2001 after an ayahuasca ceremony.

An autopsy gave the official cause of death as fatal nicotine poisoning due to tobacco mixed with the ayahuasca preparation, an unusual method of brewing the drink.

But ayahuasca's supporters consider the risks associated with the brew easily avoidable with strict adherence to their shamans' orders.

The rewards, they say, are worth the risks.

"It's totally new, unlike LSD, unlike [psychedelic] mushrooms, unlike anything else," says artist Joel Harris, a Santa Clarita native who first heard about the brew from his roommate in the U.S. Marines in 1998 when they were stationed at Camp Lejeune, N.C. A couple of years ago, Harris says, he sold his possessions, decamped to Peru and took up ayahuasca as a quasi-spiritual practice.

"It brings your awareness to a place where it's understood that you are connected to everything on Earth," he says. "If everyone had a chance to do ayahuasca, the entire reality would shift and we would be living in peace."

Journalist Erik Davis, a longtime chronicler of emerging religious practices and author of the 2006 book "Visionary State: A Journey Through California's Spiritual Landscape," gives Harris' comments more context. "For a variety of reasons," Davis says, "with some negative side effects, ayahuasca has been able to enter into Western culture in a way that preserves a ritual format and a spiritual intention and gives it a much more potentially transformative effect.

Psychedelic mushrooms can take you just as far out, but the way they've been adapted by Westerners has been more informal, which means they have the potential to be used in much more erratic ways."

New York writer Daniel Pinchbeck brought ayahuasca to the attention of liberal thinkers, detailing his mind-blowing journeys with the brew ( and numerous other hallucinogens ) in a pair of books: 2002's "Breaking Open the Head: A Psychedelic Journey Into the Heart of Contemporary Shamanism" and 2006's "2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl." "When I published my first book in 2002 and I spoke to audiences, 50% to 80% of the people hadn't heard of ayahuasca," Pinchbeck says. "Now everywhere I go, everyone is familiar with it."

Truenos, a former comparative religion student and computer engineer, is relatively new on the ayahuasca circuit.

And he's unusually candid about his practice compared with other ayahuasqueros. Most established ayahuasqueros operate in secret, speaking in code on the phone for fear of attracting too much scrutiny from the authorities. Federal law classified one of ayahuasca's components, DMT, as a controlled substance in 1970. However, Truenos suggests that he does have the U.S. Supreme Court to fall back on, at least for the moment.

In February 2006, the court ruled ( in Gonzales vs. O Centro Espirita Beneficente Uniao do Vegetal ) that practitioners of the U.S. branch of the Brazil-based Christian spiritist group Uniao do Vegetal--which uses hoasca, the traditional brew that others call ayahuasca, as a sacrament--have the right to legally consume the beverage under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993. That law aims to prevent the federal government from "substantially burdening" a person's free exercise of religion, the court said.

Truenos took the court decision as a green light.

He and his wife, Gabriella, have been leading ceremonies for several years.

They haven't consulted attorneys; instead they take their orders from the "Creator," he says.

"We have been operating completely above the radar because we understood that in this country, if any church is given protection or recognition by the government, that recognition or protection is given uniformly, or it'd be unconstitutional," Truenos says.

And now the couple, who sometimes live in Austin, Texas, have become a pair of jet-setting ayahuasca missionaries. Tonight's ceremony in Encinitas was preceded, Truenos says, by a few days of "doctoring" in the Bahamas. After the gathering they'll be off to minister to wounded souls in Topanga Canyon on the occasion of the winter solstice.

As Truenos sees it, the legal decision by the nation's highest court, the media's percolating interest and his rising profile as a shaman are all part of a grand supernatural plan. The Divine Mother, he says, is laying the groundwork to prepare the developed world for "the great coming of age of humanity."

With his scruffy beard, long white robe and skullcap, Truenos looks a bit like a post-conversion Cat Stevens. He speaks in the colorful, metaphor-rich language of Native American tribal elders.

With just an hour to go before tonight's ritual, he explains his reasons for going public with his practice. "The medicine wants to be properly represented," he says, delicately placing the containers of murky ayahuasca on a sacred mat, a tapestry woven by Peruvian women during an ayahuasca ceremony. "It wants to be known in an integral way."

All this heavy-duty mysticism is more than a little incongruous amid the nouveau wealth of Encinitas. But he deflects any suggestion that by "doctoring" the wealthy he's neglecting the needy.

"We live in different times than our predecessors," Truenos says. "There has been a promise throughout every culture that there would be a moment in humanity's history where we would have social and economic justice. One of the things the fire altar states is that this day that has been promised has arrived, and so with it all of the various hallmarks are sure to be emerging in humanity.

This includes a spiritual solution to humanity's economic problems so there isn't a disparity between the poor and the wealthy."

This sort of response is typical of Truenos, who gives few straight answers about his background but plenty of mystic filigree.

Indeed, over the course of several conversations, his story became increasingly fluid, evolving with every telling.

The covenant of his spiritual society, Aurora Baha, a baroque document posted at www.aurorabaha.org detailing the tenants of his faith, is also ever-changing. Though he established his society's covenant in 2005, he said it "continues to go through revisions." What Truenos will reveal is that he was born in the Dominican Republic, is of Lebanese, Basque and Taino descent and has lived in the northeastern U.S. He prefers to keep his birth name private. He left home at 15, he says, because of "a spiritual crisis." A "personal crisis" followed at 23, after which he returned home to attend engineering school at Clarkson University in upstate New York. His adopted name, Lobo Siete Truenos, means Wolf Seven Thunders; medicine men in northern Mexico gave him the name "Lobo," he says. Truenos was introduced to ayahuasca in 2001, and after a series of ceremonies, he journeyed to Peru to be closer to native ayahuasca culture. Later, by a strange confluence of events he declines to detail, he became a voting systems supervisor for New Mexico during the 2004 election.

In any case, his life as a bureaucrat ended abruptly.

In 2005, he established Aurora Baha, which shares some principles, such as spiritual unity and the unification of mankind, with the Baha'i faith. However, Aurora Baha is independent of the Baha'i organization, which has about 5 million members worldwide.

Now Truenos has devoted his life to holding ayahuasca ceremonies wherever he is called.

"What ayahuasca provided to me, initially, was a sense of connectedness that I didn't even realize I was missing," he said during an interview several weeks before the Encinitas ceremony. "That connectedness to all life, to all things, an opportunity to know myself more deeply as a mirror of my most inner tendencies and motivations and intentions. It's very profound in that way. It also gave me a direct avenue for receiving answers to questions that I couldn't find anywhere else."

He believes that, in addition to carrying out the will of the Divine Mother, he has been tapped to help fulfill a prophecy that has been expressed by all the world's religions.

That prophecy will see the indigenous peoples of North and South America united, he says.

"This could never be a recreational compound," says Dr. Charles Grob, head of adolescent and child psychiatry at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center in Torrance. "It's too unpredictable and dangerous." But Grob, one of a handful of scientists who has studied ayahuasca, thinks there may be some legitimate medical uses for it. In 1993, he led a team of researchers that conducted the first medical study of its long-term effects on 15 members of the Brazilian ayahuasca church Uniao do Vegetal. The team found that some church members experienced remission of their addictions, depression or anxiety disorders without recurrence. In the same study, published in 1996 in the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, pharmacologist J.C. Callaway discovered an increased density of serotonin reuptake sites in the blood platelets of habitual ayahuasca drinkers, suggesting an antidepressant effect similar to what is now achieved by prescription drugs such as Prozac and Zoloft.

"I was suffering from severe depression," says Xthas Hoy, 32, a high school math teacher who says he has taken ayahuasca hundreds of times in the nine years since he has joined PaDeva, an ayahuasca church with Wiccan and pagan influences in New Mexico. "I went through the entire pharmacy, everything from Wellbutrin, Zoloft, Xanax and Prozac," Hoy says. "Within hours of the first time I drank ayahuasca, I've never had a recurrence again. From that moment on, there really was no question that this was my path." ( Hoy is now a priest offering ayahuasca ceremonies for a suggested donation of $75 to $300 per person. )

Michael Shermer, editor of Skeptic magazine, counters that ayahuasca's effectiveness in treating depression isn't exactly groundbreaking. Science shows, he says, that any serious jolt to the system--shock therapy included--can bring the mind out of depression. That doesn't mean ayahuasca treatment is the wave of the future.

Nor are ayahuasca's quasi-religious effects any great revelation, Shermer says. History is rife with strange rituals believed to inspire divine intervention. "In a way, the ayahuasca phenomenon taps into a lot of what religion is. There's the social aspects of religion, and then there's the transcendent, spiritual aspects to it." There's no reason, he says, that ayahuasca wouldn't trigger feelings of transcendence any more than deep meditative prayer. "The monks used to self-flagellate to change their brain chemistry."

But all the medical skepticism in the world may not counteract the upsurge in grass-roots interest in ayahuasca that the Internet has propelled in the last five years.

The Burning Man-friendly social networking website Tribe has its own ayahuasca subgroup.

Erowid, a sort of Wikipedia of psychedelics, tells visitors everything they need to know about the brew. And aspiring ayahuasqueros can order Banisteriopsis caapi and Psychotria viridis directly from the online head shop Azarius for about $22 to $30 per 50 grams.

Among the more outspoken academic ayahuasca converts is British journalist and author Graham Hancock, who was researching a book on human origins ( "Supernatural: Meetings With the Ancient Teachers of Mankind," published in 2006 ) when he stumbled on what he perceived to be uniform patterns in the cave drawings of primitive man. He came to the conclusion that the phenomenon was inspired by the sudden discovery of hallucinogenic plants.

This led Hancock to ayahuasca, which he says he has taken 26 times since 2003; he credits it with improving his life.

Still, Hancock tempers this praise with a warning. "It is extremely powerful," he says. "Its effects can be deeply disturbing, and there may be some short-term trauma, almost like a post-traumatic shock disorder, with coming to terms with very disturbing insights about yourself."

So what has it done for him? "I'm a better husband and father," Hancock says. "My behavior is much more examined."

Inside the Encinitas backyard temple, Truenos pulls out two feathers and an eagle's wing. The red-tailed hawk feather represents love and laughter, he says. The pheasant feather stands for mercy.

And the eagle's wing is used to fan ayahuasca drinkers who are "having a hard time" during the ceremony.

He stresses that these feathers aren't artifacts--they're medicine. "It's more than symbolism," he says.

Truenos' ceremonies borrow heavily from indigenous practice.

To prepare for his ayahuasca drinkers, he pulled an all-nighter, clearing the ceremonial space of negative energies with tobacco smoke.

He had already soaked and boiled the plants down to the dark essence of ayahuasca.

Now that the fire altar is ready, he leaves the temple to eat a plate of fish and rice in his guest quarters.

The ceremony participants will arrive soon, and he seems to be psyching himself up. Truenos mentions a recent private ayahuasca session in which a participant experienced "a trust crisis," refusing to believe Truenos could heal him. Mother Ayahuasca admonished the man for such self-delusion, leaving him writhing on the floor, wracked with emotion.

Despite this harrowing episode, Truenos believes ayahuasca's dark reputation is exaggerated. It is transformative and healing, he says, a cure for the "cancer of indifference," a remedy for our "failures in integrity." But it's even more than that. "Some people," he says, "need to be frightened by the way they live their lives."

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FATHER USING DAUGHTER'S DEATH TO SOUND WARNING ABOUT DRUGS

2006-08-17T13:48:00.000-07:00

CALIFORNIA, Pa. - William Brna is trying to make the most out of a grim situation that has forever changed his life.

The Carroll Township resident had been helping his daughter, Gwendolyn Marie Brna Venanzi, battle a heroin addiction for the past three years.

Venanzi, of Pleasant Hills, lost her fight with the drug July 5, when paramedics found her dead at a house party in the Allentown section of Pittsburgh, where evidence of heroin use was found.

While Brna won't know for sure if his daughter's death was drug-related until toxicology tests are completed, he's certain her addiction contributed to her demise.

The loss has left a void in Brna's life - one he has decided to fill by speaking out on the warning signs of heroin addiction.

Brna came to California University of Pennsylvania on Tuesday to share his story as a guest on "Valley Views," an issues-oriented television show sponsored jointly by the university and The Valley Independent and hosted by Bob Burke, managing editor of the newspaper.

At the age of 41, Venanzi left behind her husband, two daughters, a teenage stepdaughter and four siblings.

Brna said he thought his daughter was on the road to recovery not long before her death.

"Up until about two months before she died, she was very interested in getting clean," he said.

"I don't know what happened. She had been living in our house for almost three years. She suddenly decided she wanted to go back ( to the drug scene. ). Two months later, she was dead."

Venanzi spent two weeks in jail and had been on probation for a possession of drug paraphernalia charge and another crime that hit close to home.

Brna said he and his wife turned their daughter in to police after she stole their checkbook in an attempt to get money for drugs.

Brna said his daughter was devoted to turning her life around after she was arrested. But she ultimately could not beat the drug.

"She admitted freely that she was an addict ... and was willing to take any help we would get her," Brna said. "She did go to rehab. When she came out, she was cheerful and happy and I thought we had made headway. But it evidently did not take too long for her to get back to her old habits. About two months before her death, she went back on the streets.

"I kept thinking we would find the magic key that would open it."

Brna said it was difficult finding help for his daughter.

"You cannot find one agency that will recommend other agencies. They all want to do it themselves," he said. "There is help available but, generally speaking, the different organizations are only interested in their point of view. If something doesn't work, they will not refer you to someone else.

"The system is to blame in that nobody really cares. The people or the organizations that can help, they don't care. They want that money, that's all. I'm not mad at the system. I'm just angry that I could not help my daughter because someone out there was working against me."

Venanzi had undergone psychiatric evaluations and spent time in three different drug rehabilitation facilities. She also was given methadone in fighting her addiction.

But nothing seemed to cure her.

"The problem with the methadone clinics is they make no attempt to wean them off the methadone," Brna said.

In one instance, Brna said his daughter was misdiagnosed by a psychologist's nurse as having bipolar disorder.

"I have since found out is that last thing you can do is to diagnose mental problems in a drug addict," he said. " "The symptoms, you can't separate them."

Brna said the penalty for dealing heroin should be more severe.

"It's been my personal feeling that any major dealer of heroin, if he's arrested or picked up, should be automatically killed," he said. " Get rid of him. He's not doing any good for anybody."

With the news of Venanzi's death came some denial on the family's part.

"Following the death, her mother didn't cry at all until about three days ago. It finally hit her what had happened," Brna said.

To honor his daughter, Brna has made it his mission to share her story.

"It's almost a guaranteed death if the addiction is not controlled," he said. "Maybe I can point the way for somebody to go and maybe I can make someone aware of the dangers of heroin addiction.

"I don't even know how much of an outreach I can do, but, if her death will spare one other person, it's worth it."

Brna's appearance on "Valley Views" will air on CUTV six times over the next two weeks - 8 p.m. tonight, Saturday, Monday, Aug. 23, Aug. 26 and Aug. 28

What's The Boon After State's Bust Of Drug-Toting Church Courier?

2006-08-16T13:42:00.000-07:00

WHAT'S THE BOON AFTER STATE'S BUST OF DRUG-TOTING CHURCH COURIER?

On a Monday morning in February, Joseph Butts was headed east on Interstate 44. He was driving a 2001 Chevrolet pickup with Arizona plates. He was stopped by a Missouri Highway Patrol officer in Franklin County.

According to the police report, the officer stopped the truck because of erratic driving. Perhaps so. Then again, I-44 is known as a major thoroughfare for drug traffickers, and it's possible that a pickup with Arizona plates had caught the eye of a veteran cop. Or it could have been a combination of things. The report mentions that the pickup had begun to pass a tractor-trailer when the pickup suddenly decreased its speed and fell in behind the tractor-trailer. Was that erratic or just suspicious? Maybe the driver of the pickup had seen the patrol car. At any rate, the highway patrolman pulled over the pickup.

Butts, who is 48 years old, seemed nervous. He told the officer that he was headed east to look for work. The officer asked to see the vehicle's registration. The registration showed that the truck belonged to Humberto Obezo Parra of Nogales, Ariz. That's a town on the Mexican border.

The officer asked Butts whether he would consent to a search of the vehicle. Butts said he had borrowed the truck from his sister-in-law, and she would not want people climbing over it. That did not satisfy the officer. He called for a drug-sniffing dog.

When the dog arrived, it became excited and that gave police probable cause to search the truck. They found 338 pounds of marijuana.

And that would have been that - just another sad story in the never-ending War on Drugs - except that when the officers announced their intention to put Butts under arrest, he stated that such an arrest would be tantamount to a hate crime. He pulled out an official-looking document that identified him as a Special Courier, whose duties included "the transporting of religious instruments, properties, and sacrament, for and between Member Monasteries of the Church of Cognizance."

That church, which you can look up on the Internet, believes that marijuana is a deity and a sacrament. It is a central part of the members' religious observance.

Unfortunately for Butts, the Missouri Highway Patrol does not recognize the church. Nor does the state. He was treated not as a courier carrying 338 pounds of religious instruments to monasteries, but as a common criminal.

Religious freedom aside, this is the kind of I-44 bust that has always bugged me. What does the state gain? We interrupt a tiny fraction of the dope that is flowing from somewhere west to somewhere east, and we pay the costs of taking some guy to trial and then we pay the costs of incarcerating him for years. Even if you believe in this War on Drugs - and I don't - you have to wonder what's in it for us. A used truck, I suppose.

Happily for Missouri taxpayers, the feds decided to grab jurisdiction in this particular case. So at least the expenses would be spread out among all the states.

And did I just say that all we'd get is a used truck? Forgive me. We'd also get an entertaining trial. The Native American Church is allowed to use peyote in religious ceremonies. Who's to say one offbeat church is more "real" than another? And who's to say what's offbeat, anyway? More folks have attended unofficial ceremonies for the Church of Cognizance than for the Native American Church. All of this would make for a good argument.

But shortly after Butts was arrested, the head of the church, the Enlightened Cogniscenti himself, Danuel Quaintance, was busted in New Mexico. He and his wife and a friend were allegedly transporting 172 pounds of religious instruments to monasteries. So the Butts case was transferred to New Mexico to be part of a conspiracy case.

So now we don't even get a trial. I'm not sure who gets the truck.

One Anti-HIV Tool: Embarrassment

2006-08-15T13:14:00.000-07:00

Unique Tribe of Activists Stands Ready to Shame the Negligent and the Greedy

These are some of the tools AIDS activists like Paul Davis use to fight the lethal virus: fake blood and banners, padlocked lengths of chain, foam sculptures -- and this week, maybe even a few funeral urns.

It's a far cry from the orthodox measures employed in the high-stakes medical battle. While infectious-disease researchers, politicians and aid agencies this week discuss advances in protease inhibitors or safe needle exchange programs, Davis and about 1,000 other activists have flocked to Toronto to protest allegedly greed-fuelled drug companies and idle politicians.

With 22,000 delegates and 8,000 journalists, exhibitors, volunteers and staff at the mammoth International AIDS Conference, there is no better opportunity to spotlight their gripes.

"We're trying to capture the imagination of the public and provoke a response from decision-makers," said Davis, who has worked with the group Act Up Philadelphia for 13 years.

For the past few days, dozens of activists have been stationed at the University of Toronto, formulating plans behind closed doors and conducting informal sessions for nascent protestors on how to interact with reporters.

Yesterday, activists held a small protest at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. But they pledge more to come.

At past conferences, protestors have held mock trials for world leaders and staged "die-ins," zipping themselves into body bags, or "chain-ins," chaining themselves to fixed objects.

"A lot of what we do is street theatre," said Eric Sawyer, a New Yorker who has helped launch three AIDS groups. "We basically won't do anything that might cause physical harm or permanent damage, but anything else goes -- and embarrassment is a big tool."

When it comes to humiliating political or corporate leaders, several activists said Davis, 36, is as gifted as they come. One idea he said he might try this week would be to buy funeral urns to "present" to drug company officials.

"To play off the 'You earn, we urn' angle, you know?" Davis mused.

Matthew Kavanagh, of the Student Global AIDS Campaign, said one prospective target this week is Abbott Laboratories, which has been criticized for not providing broad access in Africa to a new version of its Kaletra medication that needs no refrigeration.

Toronto Police Insp. Donald Campbell, who is overseeing policing at the conference site, said no arrests had been made there as of early last night, perhaps as a result of a meeting he held with activist leaders last week.

"We basically went over Canadian law, talking about what constitutes a criminal act and what they are allowed to do," Campbell said. "We talked about whether putting stickers on a company booth is criminal and things like our release laws." It's possible that a non-Canadian arrested in Toronto would have to post bond as high as $500 to be released, Campbell said.

"I think it's great that we were able to sit down in the same room together," Campbell said of the meeting. "That wouldn't have happened 10 years ago."

Hokey or not, activists have proved deft at grabbing attention since the inaugural AIDS conference in Atlanta in 1985. They've stoked controversy by crumbling a communion wafer at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York; halted trading at the New York Stock Exchange; decorated a float at New York's Gay Pride parade as a concentration camp; draped a huge condom over the home of U.S. Senator Jesse Helms; and dumped the ashes of AIDS victims on the White House lawn.

At the Barcelona AIDS conference in 2002, activists stormed the stage, interrupting a speech by U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson. Screaming "Shame!" they bore signs that accused the U.S. of murder and neglect because it hadn't committed enough to AIDS research and prevention. When they were forced offstage, whistles and jeers drowned out the rest of Thompson's speech.

Two years ago, at the Bangkok conference, it was a new drug trial in Cambodia that raised activists' hackles. They charged that sex workers and other marginalized people had been recruited for the trial because they didn't have the leverage to negotiate insurance or a pledge that they would be cared for if they fell ill during the trial period.

Act Up Paris and some prostitutes stormed a stage during a scientific session and splattered company booths with fake blood. "I don't know what they use, but it's the perfect consistency of real blood," Davis said, enviously. "It's some sugary concoction."

Not every protest goes off as planned.

At the Toronto opening, some protestors held aloft lab coats spray-painted with slogans to highlight a lack of health care workers in Africa.

Waiting beside the stage for his turn to speak, Microsoft's Bill Gates squinted at the offerings before turning to his wife and asking: "What's it say? They should have made the words bigger."

Nevertheless, AIDS activists contend their actions have helped to speed up clinical trials and lower their cost.

"We basically said, 'Look, our people are dying right now and are going to be dead by the time the government makes sure a new drug was safe,'" Sawyer said. "We had nothing to lose by taking it sooner."

Gathering Opens With Focus on AIDS Prevention

2006-08-14T13:01:00.000-07:00

GATHERING OPENS WITH FOCUS ON AIDS PREVENTION

TORONTO - The richest and one of the most powerful men on the planet says the key to stemming the HIV/AIDS pandemic is getting more power - - economic, sexual and legal - into the hands of the world's poorest, most oppressed women.

"We need to put the power to prevent HIV in the hands of women," Bill Gates said last night at the opening of the 16th International AIDS Conference in Toronto.

Mr. Gates, chairman of Microsoft Corp. and co-chair of the $62-billion ( U.S. ) Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, said that in particular, it must be a priority to develop microbicides and oral prevention drugs, medications that women could use to avoid infection without being dependent on their sexual partners.

He said that effective microbicides could revolutionize the battle against AIDS and mark a turning point in the pandemic.

Bill and Melinda Gates wave to the audience as they arrive to deliver a keynote address at the AIDS 2006 conference in Toronto.

And Mr. Gates vowed to invest more charitable dollars into the cause.

( Microbicides are gels or creams used to block the virus; they can be applied vaginally before sex. Oral prevention drugs are antiretroviral drugs that are given to prevent infection rather than as a treatment. ) "We need tools that allow women to protect themselves," Mr. Gates said.

"No matter where she lives, who she is, or what she does, a woman should never need her partner's permission to save her own life," he added.

Melinda French Gates, co-chair of the foundation, said HIV/AIDS is transmitted through activities that society finds difficult to discuss, such as sexual practices and intravenous drug use, and "that stigma has made AIDS much harder to fight."

Ms. Gates noted that fewer than one in five people at risk of HIV/AIDS have access to basic preventive measures such as condoms, clean needles, education and testing, and she called out to political and social leaders to set aside their prejudices and act.

"If you're turning your back on sex workers, you're turning your back on the faithful mother of four," she said. "Let's agree that every life has equal worth and saving lives is the highest ethical act."

Worldwide, an estimated 38.6 million people are living with HIV/AIDS. Globally, half of them are women, but in parts of the developing world, two in every three infections are among women.

The conference has attracted more than 31,000 scientists, advocates, health workers, exhibitors, people with HIV/AIDS and journalists from 170 countries.

The weeklong gathering marks the 25th anniversary of the first reported cases of HIV/AIDS, a bittersweet milestone: While there have been amazing scientific advances, more than 25 million people have died.

Helene Gayle, president of the International AIDS Society and co-chair of the conference, said she hopes that, in 25 years, the world will look back at the 2006 gathering as the turning point in the pandemic, a "moment in history when we saw an opportunity to stem the tide of HIV and act decisively."

She said that while there are substantial challenges in getting treatment and prevention programs to everyone, much progress has been made. Global spending on HIV/AIDS last year reached $8.3-billion, an all-time high, and more people than ever are taking life-extending antiretroviral drugs.

"Momentum is on our side. We cannot afford to squander this opportunity," Dr. Gayle said.

Governor-General Michaelle Jean said affluent countries such as Canada have a "moral responsibility" to tackle the HIV/AIDS pandemic at home and abroad.

Despite the challenges, she said, it would be irresponsible and unforgivable to give up.

"The situation is dire. We must act now," Ms. Jean said.

Her admonition echoed the conference theme, Time to Deliver, which is meant to underscore the urgency in getting effective HIV prevention and treatment programs in place.

Peter Piot, executive director of the United Nations agency UNAIDS, said the first 25 years have been marked by reactive crisis management.

Now, he said, it is time for a long-term, systematic and sustained attack on HIV/AIDS, a recognition that the disease will be around for decades and perhaps generations to come.

"Tragically, the end of AIDS is nowhere in sight," Dr. Piot said, which means prevention offers the greatest hope.

He, too, said funding for microbicides research must be a priority, as the development of an AIDS vaccine is a long way off. Universal access to treatment must be a constant goal, as should the quest for a vaccine.

But Dr. Piot also stressed that the social underpinnings of the pandemic - stigma, gender inequality, poverty and homophobia - must be addressed.

Shelby Crime Rate Drops

2006-08-13T12:54:00.000-07:00

SHELBY CRIME RATE DROPS

Cocaine Busts Said Major Police Victory

SHELBY - When the last of 19 drug traffickers was sentenced Aug. 3, it signaled a major victory for the police department that worked with several state and federal agencies put them behind bars. This week, Shelby police officials released more good news - crime overall is down 19 percent, if you compare the first seven months of 2006 to the same time period in 2005.

The removal of those 19 people made a huge impact in the drug trade in Shelby and is one reason the overall crime rate is down so much, according to Shelby Police Chief Tandy Carter.

Effect on Drug-Related Crime

"It's actually changed drug activity in the city," Carter said, adding that 90 percent of all crime is drug-related.

For 2006, there are 203 fewer "part 1" crimes during the time period compared. Those crimes include murder, rape, robbery and assault, as well as burglary, larceny, auto theft and arson.

Getting repeat offenders - who commit most of the crimes - off the streets makes a big impact, Carter said.

That's one of the focuses of Project Safe Neighborhood, one of many community initiatives. As part of the project, the police will call known gang members and people on probation to remind them they are being watched, Carter said.

Convictions Could Be Deterrent

Those 19 drug traffickers were all sentenced in federal court, which is more likely to offer tougher sentences. Carter wants that to be the deterrent that forces the crime rate down even further.

"If you want to sell drugs, we're going to give you the greatest incentive to move somewhere else," Carter said.

Carter gave credit to the district and U.S. attorneys offices and citizens for the decrease in crime.

The growth in community-based watches has contributed to the shrinking crime rate, according to police Capt. Mark Brooks. Five years ago, there were only two groups. This year, there are 25.

"People are tired of crime and they want to help," Brooks said.

Coke Bust Sends 19 From Area to Prison

These 19 cocaine traffickers were arrested in October 2004 during an investigation code-named "Operation P-G" for Putnam and Gardner Street. All of them have since been convicted in federal court.

Federal agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the Drug Enforcement Administration and officers with the Shelby and Gastonia police departments conducted the investigation.

Here's who was arrested and sentenced:

Thurnel Thomas Williams, 40, of 213 E. Ridge St., Kings Mountain: Sentenced Feb. 27 to 20 years in federal prison followed by 10 years supervised release

James William Boyd, 35, of 1012 Craig Ave., Gastonia: Sentenced Oct. 11, 2005 to 12 years and 2 months in federal prison followed by 10 years supervised release

Monica Nicole Floyd, 35, of 5801 Mallard Dr., Unit 1, Charlotte: Sentenced Jan. 27 to 10 years in federal prison followed by 10 years supervised release

Frederick Lamar Huskey, 32, of 603 Hillcrest Drive, Shelby: Sentenced Feb. 27 to 20 years in federal prison followed by 10 years supervised release

Tracy Lynn Petty, 42, of 341 Preyer St., Shelby: Sentenced March 30 to 20 years in federal prison followed by 10 years supervised release

Jacques Maurice Degree, 32, of 815 Craig Place, Shelby: Sentenced Dec. 19, 2005 to 17.5 years in federal prison followed by 10 years supervised release

Kenneth Lamont Rudisill, 30, of 2309 Ellis Road, Shelby: Sentenced March 30 to 18 years, 4 months in federal prison followed by 10 years supervised release

Mary Frances Finney, 52, of 529 S. Mulberry St., Cherryville: Sentenced Feb. 27 to three years and one month in federal prison followed by three years supervised release

Barry Charles Butler, 45, of 106 Elizabeth Church Road, Shelby: Sentenced Feb. 27 to life imprisonment

Jeffrey Ezekiel Becks, 30, of 111-2 Victoria Road, Cherryville: Sentenced Aug. 3 to seven years and three months in federal prison followed by three years supervised release

Clyde Hoey Jr., 40, of 403 Oakland Drive, Shelby: Sentenced Oct. 31, 2005, to five years and 10 months in federal prison followed by three years supervised release

Eddie Gene Gentry, 54, of 406 Garland Place, Shelby: Sentenced March 30 to 10 years in federal prison followed by eight years supervised release

John Michael McDowell, 31, of 2906 Old Cliffside Road No. 4, Shelby: Sentenced Oct. 18, 2005 to 15 years and eight months in federal prison followed by four years supervised release

Lenny Lee Craig, 47, of 823 Cleveland Ave., Kings Mountain: Sentenced Oct. 17, 2005, to eight months in federal prison followed by five years' supervised release

Quavis Tylon Tate, 23, of 397 Seattle St., Apt. 6-B, Shelby: Sentenced Dec. 19, 2005 to five years in federal prison followed by 4 years supervised release

Justin Obrian Davis, 21, of 341 Preyer St., Shelby: Sentenced March 30 to 10 years in federal prison followed by five years supervised release

Fabion Anton Crosby, 27, of 214 Best St., Shelby: Sentenced Feb. 28 to five years in federal prison followed by five years supervised release

William Lamont Haynes, 32, of 136 Andrew Drive, Grover: Sentenced March 8 to two years and three months in federal prison followed by three years supervised release

Raymond Roger Surratt Jr., 31, of 113 N. Lafayette St., Shelby: Sentenced Oct. 31, 2005 to life imprisonment

Fentanyl-Laced Street Drugs Kill Hundreds

2006-08-12T12:51:00.000-07:00

FENTANYL-LACED STREET DRUGS "KILL HUNDREDS"

With street names such as Drop Dead, Flatline, and Lethal Injection, fentanyl-laced heroin and cocaine are marketed by drug dealers as the ultimate high. But these drugs are so dangerous that hundreds have died. From Chicago, one of the hardest hit US cities, David Boddiger reports.

Mike Wickster, a bald and tattooed 34-year-old, has been brought back from death's door ten times after overdosing on heroin, most recently on heroin he believes was laced with the powerful synthetic opiate fentanyl. He survived and eventually wound up in jail where he had to go "clean". With help, he has stayed off drugs for 7 months and now works in a harm-reduction programme trying to help drug users. But friends from his drug-using past still call when they have found a source for heroin with fentanyl.

"Just yesterday someone said, 'I know where to get fentanyl.' People want it because it's powerful and extreme. Deaths are like an advertisement--for every 10 people that die, 100 more will go looking for it", he says.

Fentanyl is not new to veteran abusers, but in the past it had been obtained by diverting prescriptions. According to Timothy Ogden, Chicago's top Drug Enforcement Administration ( DEA ) official, clandestine fentanyl labs were occasionally discovered in the 1980s and 1990s. But those operations were nowhere near the size and scope of today's fentanyl networks controlled by international drug traffickers.

"In 30 years of law enforcement experience, I haven't seen this much of a threat before", Ogden says. "It's like a game of Russian roulette, only you're putting five bullets in the chamber."

Health workers began to notice a spike in opiate overdoses and overdose deaths late last year. When sophisticated toxicology tests of autopsy material revealed the presence of fentanyl, police started testing the heroin from street dealers finding the synthetic opiate.

By May this year, fentanyl overdoses had spread to cities in eight states, including Chicago, Detroit, St Louis, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Camden, New Jersey. Fentanyl has been linked to 130 deaths in Detroit and 100 in Chicago in only a few months. In New Jersey, the drug cocktail killed three and hospitalised 42 in one weekend alone.

"The May numbers are the highest we've seen yet, and we expect that trend to continue", says Edmund Donoghue, medical examiner for Chicago's Cook County. "This is something we haven't seen in Chicago before. We're really stunned by it. We have had problems where ambulances were called for multiple overdoses, entire groups of people in the same place."

Compounding the problem, the demographics of heroin abuse in the USA are starting to shift. While overall demand for heroin has remained stable in recent years, what once used to be considered an urban drug is now showing up in suburban areas and attracting younger users.

In June, a recent high school graduate and son of a suburban Chicago police officer was found dead in his car from a fatal overdose of fentanyl-laced heroin. In a suburb of Detroit, police arrested a dealer and charged him with the fatal overdose of a 17-year-old female student.

"[Heroin] is no longer considered just an inner city drug. It's out in the suburbs, and that's why it's becoming such a big issue", says Wickster.

A 2005 report by the US Justice Department's National Drug Intelligence Center noted an increase in heroin abuse in Chicago suburbs, "resulting in a rise in the consequences of heroin abuse in Chicago, a primary market area". This increase is attributed particularly to an increase in the number of users under the age of 25 years.

Many health-care workers who help treat substance abusers believe the USA's traditional focus on "supply-side" law enforcement, which emphasises the prosecution over treatment, is futile. The supply-side approach, critics charge, fails to address the root of the problem: demand. Money is poured into enforcement, they say, while effective outreach and addiction treatment programmes go under-funded.

Access to methadone programmes is one of the most pressing problems for heroin users who want help, says Sarz Maxwell, medical director for the Chicago Recovery Alliance ( CRA ), which runs a mobile methadone clinic and needle-exchange programme. The clinic is operated out of a large van that travels around the city distributing methadone for 2 hours a day, 7 days a week.

"Methadone is one of the best researched tools we have. It's incredibly safe and effective, and without it, the relapse rate is 95%. Yet it continues to be unbelievably regulated", she says.

US Congressman Danny Davis, whose Illinois district has been one of the hardest hit by the fentanyl crisis, agrees that regulation of public methadone programmes is far too restrictive. 600 people are on a waiting list for methadone treatment in Chicago's Cook County alone, he says.

According to Jennifer Smith of the John H Stroger Hospital, Chicago's largest public hospital system, between April, 2004, and June, 2006, 906 patients in three Chicago hospitals were forced to wait an average of 17 days for entry into methadone maintenance programmes. Only 18% actually entered the scheme. When methadone treatment was made available the day after hospital discharge, 67% of patients entered treatment.

In 2003, some 10 000 people seeking publicly funded substance-abuse treatment in Illinois were turned away, says Melody Heaps, president of Treatment Alternatives for Safe Communities, an Illinois non-profit group that provides behavioural health services to people with substance abuse and mental-health disorders.

Wickster was one of the statistics. "I'm calling around to get on methadone and they said they were full. I said, 'I'm gonna die' and they told me, 'You're not the only one'," he recalls. Westley Clark, director of the Center for Substance Abuse Treatment at the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration ( SAMHSA ), part of the federal government's Department of Health and Human Services, noted that during the past 3 years, Illinois received $22 million in federal funding for addiction recovery programmes. "We are trying to enhance the availability of treatment and prevention strategies. We hope by the end of the fiscal year to have 40 states with more money", Clark says.

Clark adds that SAMHSA also encourages doctors to use methadone and provide behavioural treatment, as well as educating them about buprenorphine, which helps decrease heroin craving.

But many heroin users who lack health insurance coverage have had difficulty affording buprenorphine, says the CRA's Maxwell.

The epidemic also points to the need to pursue a much more aggressive harm-reduction strategy, including providing drug users with the opiate-antagonist naloxone so they can administer the drug to their friends on the spot, says Maxwell. Since the recent spike in overdose deaths, most emergency responders now carry naloxone. But distributing it freely to users has met some resistance.

Maxwell believes her organisation's naloxone distribution programme has saved 450 lives through "peer revival" since the initiative was started in 2000. Wickster, whose life was saved more than once by naloxone injections, including once when his wife injected the drug, now helps distribute it along with clean needles and information on the same street corners where he once bought and sold drugs.

"People need to be educated about naloxone, especially now with fentanyl everywhere", Wickster says. "Saving someone's life just may motivate them to say, 'that's enough'. That's what happened to me."

Federal drug authorities, however, currently do not support naloxone distribution to drug users. "I'm not sure that's a rational strategy in and of itself. Local jurisdictions should be permitted to use whatever strategies they believe are important...but it is not a federal position", SAMHSA's Clark says.

According to the European Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, trafficking of illegally produced fentanyl is on the rise, noting that seizures of the drug has been reported in a number of countries bordering the Baltic Sea and the Russian Federation. In Estonia, for example, fentanyl appeared on the drug market as a heroin substitute in 2001.

US officials warn that where there is heroin abuse and fentanyl, overdose epidemics like those being seen in US cities are likely to follow. "Other countries should know this can happen and they need to have the resources to address it. If it's not recognised, it's costly", says SAMHSA's Clark.

Donoghue, the Chicago medical examiner, agrees. "We need to warn other countries that if you have a market for heroin and cocaine, you may begin to see this happen."

Panama: Fish Tale Leads To Drug Bust Off Panama's Coast

2006-02-21T10:42:00.000-08:00

The Story Seemed A Bit Fishy. When the USS Ford stopped a 40-foot boat in international waters north of Panama this month, the master of the boat allegedly said he had 300 pounds of fish on board. Then he changed his story, saying he had tossed all the fish, according to the Coast Guard, which had crew members aboard the Navy frigate. As the Navy and Coast Guard investigated, however, they couldn't even find fishing poles or line aboard. Removing a hidden compartment, they said they found the boat's true cargo, about a ton of cocaine, estimated to be worth about $66 million. On Thursday, federal officials announced the arrests of the four men aboard, Abel Pardo Salguedo, the ship's master, and crew members Alberto Cortes, Dionisio Velez Tarquino and Carlos Arturo Moreno. According to an affidavit filed by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent, Salguedo claimed the boat, named Victoria, was Colombian, but the Navy and Coast Guard determined the boat had improper registration numbers and was stateless, giving them jurisdiction to board. The affidavit said the fishing boat also tried to ram the Navy vessel and the Victoria crew tried to sink their boat by pumping in sea water. The men were charged in a federal criminal complaint with possession and conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute five or more kilograms of cocaine.

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MA: Keep Saying 'No'

2006-02-20T10:42:00.000-08:00

Police call marijuana a gateway drug because it can lead to abuse of other substances. And local teenagers contacted by The Sun Chronicle say they see the gate swinging wide open if a bill to decriminalize marijuana passes on Beacon Hill. The possession of less than an ounce of marijuana would become a civil violation subject to a $250 fine under a bill recommended by the Legislature's Mental Health and Substance Abuse Committee. Currently, a marijuana conviction is permanently on a defendant's criminal record. Attleboro High School sophomore Amanda Pelkey said some teens would consider trying marijuana if they knew they only had to pay a fine. `` If it was put in their record, they wouldn't do the drugs because it would follow them,'' Pelkey, 16, said. She was hanging out after school at the Bartek Recreation Center in Attleboro. `` In DARE, they tell you it's bad for you,'' Pelkey said. `` If they tell you that you can pay a fine, you can do it and get it over with, and it will go away.'' Some students call that penalty too harsh for people who try drugs and then quit. `` You can stop and quit -- and if you quit -- it follows you around, and people think you did it all the time,'' one male student said. Supporters in the Legislature say the bill is meant to place the emphasis on preventing drug abuse, rather than punishing abusers. Critics say the bill sends kids the wrong message -- that substance abuse is OK. That contradicts the lessons in DARE, the Drug Abuse Resistance Education program. `` It opens Pandora's Box,'' Attleboro DARE Officer Thomas Wellman said. `` If they know the penalty is less, I believe it would increase the number of kids trying it and thinking they can get away with it, thinking it's no big deal.'' Attleboro seventh-grader Jordan Rodriguez said students are scared most by the threat of a marijuana conviction going on their permanent record. A fine would not deter students from trying marijuana, she said. `` I think they would risk it because it won't get on their record, and they would not get into the trouble they would usually get in,'' said Rodriguez, 13. Attleboro Youth Center Coordinator Tim Killion agrees. `` It might lead to more kids trying marijuana, knowing they won't have to appear in court, just pay a fine,'' Killion said. Killion supports keeping possession of less than an ounce a criminal offense. `` Kids understand that there's rules to live by in society,'' he said. `` I'm a believer in at least in the beginning, being strict with kids. As you gain trust with them, let out the rope a little bit.'' Norfolk DARE Officer Steven Plympton said he doesn't buy supporters' claims that decriminalizing the crime would be a form of drug prevention. `` I think there's a lot of prevention out there. I think we're looking out for the best interests of the kids,'' Plympton said. `` I really believe there needs to be some penalty,'' he said. `` What message are you sending out if you don't have a consequence for your actions?'' The Massachusetts Cannabis Reform Coalition supports the bill. Twelve states have similar laws, coalition spokesman Steven Epstein said. However, the bill is "not good news for teenagers,'' Epstein said. "They will still be handcuffed. They will still be brought to the ( police ) station. They will still have to face the wrath of Mom or Dad or their guardian at the police station,'' he said. "This is not giving teenagers a free ride by any stretch of the imagination. If it was one of my teenagers, the $250 would come out of their hide.''

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FL: School Board Considers Drug Testing For Athletes

2006-02-19T10:41:00.000-08:00

Students who want to participate in football, join the swim team or play basketball for their alma matter better think twice about ingesting illegal substances before the season starts. The Collier County School Board is considering a proposal that would make students who participate in athletic activities, including cheerleading, subject to random drug testing. Dee Whinnery, the district's executive director of student services, presented the board with the results of a Florida Youth Substance Abuse survey, which was given to students in grades six through 12. The survey found that more than 60 percent of Collier County students had used an illegal substance in their lives, and more than 30 percent had used an illegal substance within the past 30 days. The survey determined that Collier County students were abusing alcohol, followed closely by cigarettes and marijuana. The conclusion of the survey determined that random drug testing could be a deterrent to students. Student athletes and their parents would have to agree to the screening as a prerequisite to participate in athletic activities. Student privacy would be kept in accordance with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act ( HIPAA ) and the results of the drug test would be made available only to the student, principal and athletic director, said Ike Isett, the district's coordinator of health services. Isett added the drug tests would follow guidelines similar to the Department of Transportation's guidelines, which allow for a split sample at the time of specimen collection. In the split sample method the urine specimen is divided into two containers. The purpose of the split sample is to allow the employee the opportunity to have the specimen retested at a different certified laboratory. The policy also would provide options for students, including taking another test and participating in a drug/alcohol program, should they fail the random test. Whinnery told the board the drug testing would cost about $115,000. She said testing would be provisional on how much the district could secure in grant funding. She said she also had approached private foundations in the county to help pay for the screenings. Board member Dick Bruce suggested that not only athletes be tested, but also students who drive. Board attorney Richard Withers said current state case law allows school districts to test select groups of students. Although the district could not test all students at every school, he said they could identify a group where substance abuse could create a health issue, including impairing a student's ability to drive. Board member Linda Abbott said she wondered how the testing would affect the district's "zero tolerance" policy on illegal substances. "Testing positive in a drug test is not possession or distribution," said Superintendent Ray Baker. "It would be something we would have to look at."

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Dizzying Rise and Abrupt Fall for a Reservation Drug Dealer

2006-02-18T10:40:00.000-08:00

LUMMI INDIAN RESERVATION, Wash. -- For a time, Room 246 at the Scottish Lodge Motel, 13 miles south of the Canadian border, was a Shangri-La for Eugenia Phair. With its stained carpets, its stench of vomit and stale cigarette smoke, its bathroom sink smudged with burn marks from the crack-cocaine cooks who had used the room before, Room 246 was where her drug smuggling operation began to take off, she said, the first headquarters of what would become a well-organized and lucrative drug ring on and around this reservation. Over the next few years, Ms. Phair, 26, a Lummi Indian, and her family grew flush and dizzy with drug money, as she rocketed to the top in the ripe and cutthroat world of Indian drug trafficking, selling painkillers, she said, to everyone, including tribal officials and jobless strung-out addicts. "It was almost an answer to your prayers," said Ms. Phair, who was released on Feb. 6 after serving 20 months in state prison. "If you came from rags and then you had a chance at riches, wouldn't you choose riches? If you lived your whole life in poverty and then you had a chance to be rich, what would you do? It's almost impossible. I never had anything ever, no new clothes, no school-clothes shopping, no nothing at all. Then you're able to have your kids go to a good school and look nice and fit in. I never fit in." Ms. Phair was among the scores of traffickers who flourished in an exploding drug trade on Indian lands. They are getting rich on their own neighbors' addictions, capitalizing on gripping poverty or new-found casino wealth and on the weakness of law enforcement in Indian country, according to tribal and other officials and to Ms. Phair, who described her life as the leader of a drug trafficking ring in phone calls, letters and interviews over the past year. From the earliest days -- as she lived with a boyfriend in one room of the Scottish Lodge while her three children stayed with her father, Eugene, in another -- Ms. Phair learned how easy smuggling was for the coterie of Indian women who worked as mules for her. The women would cross the border into Canada and buy OxyContin pills on the streets of Vancouver. They hid the pills in condoms inside their vaginas, drove back across the border and delivered them to Ms. Phair, who sold them on and around the reservation for double the buying price. The Lummi Nation of 4,000 people is a stark land of crabbers, clam diggers and salmon fishermen on the shores of Bellingham Bay in Northwest Washington. It is where Ms. Phair grew up, proud to be Lummi, she said, though the white children at school called her Lummi Dummy. As a child, she was surrounded by addiction, death and crime, and as she grew older she broke the law several times, with felony convictions for robbery, burglary and possession of stolen property. In her drug-dealing heyday, OxyContin addiction had already become a scourge across the country, and drugs were beginning to rival alcohol as the vice of choice on many reservations. When Ms. Phair was selling pills, the OxyContin trade was exploding here, worth $1.5 million in 2003 alone, tribal officials said, double the profits that year from the tribe's Silver Reef Casino and far more than the flailing salmon industry, once the backbone of the tribe's economy. She admitted repeatedly that her decision to become a drug dealer victimized her family, as she had to abandon her children when she was sent to prison, and countless others in her own fragile tribe. "I have more victims than anybody in here," she said in an interview from prison. "My victims are the children whose parents were using the drugs I sold." At the peak of her operation, Ms. Phair was running 12 to 15 Lummi women to Canada and back daily, each returning with 60 to 80 pills stuffed inside their bodies. Agents at the border posed few problems, Ms. Phair said. Body cavity searches are rare, the authorities acknowledge, and Ms. Phair said several of her drug runners could talk their way out of the exams by saying that they had been raped or were pregnant and that an exam would be too traumatic. The cross-border runs were so successful, Ms. Phair said, that at the time of her arrest in June 2004 she was selling up to $30,000 worth of pills a day and clearing up to half of that in profits. Ms. Phair, who has a tattoo of a pair of bear claws, a symbol of strength in Lummi culture, across her chest, grew up hungry, eating popcorn and canned meat when it was around. Her lone childhood memory of Christmas was finding a dress -- two sizes too small -- and an old wooden truck hastily left under a scrawny tree by her drunken mother. But by the time she was arrested, two years after investigators began wiretapping her phones at the Scottish Lodge, her children were wearing $200 outfits and playing with expensive dolls -- including one that had its own $100 miniature limousine. Her 4-year-old daughter, Janyha, was enjoying regular manicures and pedicures at a beauty salon. For herself she bought a Ford Expedition and expensive clothes and used drug money to support her gambling habit. "It's a comforting thing to say that you wanted to quit, but in reality it was more that you had to keep doing it in order to keep a lifestyle you had become accustomed to," she said in a call from a pay phone at the Washington State Corrections Center for Women in Gig Harbor. "You play a lot of mind games with yourself." Ms. Phair said she was one of the few in her drug ring, which included her father, Eugene, who did not get sloppy and greedy with drug addiction. She said she did not use the pills, and her relatives said that was true. She was addicted to the cash. Her father and grandmother, both of whom benefited richly from the enterprise, said in interviews that Ms. Phair was always on top of things. She said she practiced "dope dealer instincts." "You don't get high on your own stuff," Ms. Phair said. "You can't sit here and use the drugs you are selling. You will fall." Like Every Mom A typical day as a drug trafficker, Ms. Phair wrote in one letter, was spent like "every mom." "I would greet my babies in the kitchen," she said. "Janyha would have all the bowls set up. They would all choose their cereal. Janyha would pour the milk because she's a big girl and that's what big girls do." Ms. Phair would fix Janyha's hair in curls or in pigtails. Her father would take care of her new infant, Payton, and the twins, Kayani, a girl, and Keonday, a boy. Ms. Phair would take Janyha to day care or preschool. After dropping her off, she would turn on her cellphone and the dealing frenzy would begin, she said, "answering call after call," driving around in her Expedition, or arranging deals from inside the Lummi casino, where the chaos and noise made it easy to slink around unnoticed. Ms. Phair described her decision to become a drug dealer as something that occurred in a flash, although she had considered the possibility before. She had been working at the casino on the swing shift in the cash cage, for $9.50 an hour. But after the twins were born three months premature, she called in sick often and lost her job. Still, she was receiving public assistance. But she saw that all around her, people on the reservation were making money, hand over fist, running painkillers from Canada. A close friend was doing it, and this friend had a new minivan, a big-screen television, and a full refrigerator. "I wanted those things," she said. "I wanted my daughter to have the $500 Barbie truck, the twins to have things that would help them learn to crawl." One day in the summer of 2001, Ms. Phair scraped together $300 and persuaded a friend to drive her over the border and drop her off in a drug-infested neighborhood in downtown Vancouver. There, she saw drug dealers in BMW's, and everyone was selling. All she had to do was ask anybody who came along, "Do you know somebody who has 50 80's?" meaning 80-milligram OxyContin tablets, known as "green monsters," in the illegal drug trade. Someone always did. That first day in Canada, Ms. Phair said, she bought 25 pills and smuggled them back to the reservation in a tattered bra, hand-me-down socks and cheap shoes from the Family Bargain Store. She sold all the pills on the reservation in one afternoon for $750, more than doubling her money. The Mules When she started out at the Scottish Lodge in the fall of 2002, Ms. Phair paid her mules $100 a run, according to court records. But she said that as her operation grew she paid the women, all from a reservation with an unemployment rate hovering around 60 percent at the time, $600 a run. For a few hours of work, they were making double what Ms. Phair had received in monthly welfare checks. But as the authorities began to get wise to the smuggling -- border agents said they noticed that women were walking with a limp or a waddle -- Ms. Phair's mules proposed hiding the drugs in powwow "gear," the sacred spiritual paraphernalia that Indians carry with them across international borders for gatherings. Other smugglers often used that strategy, Ms. Phair said, knowing that border agents had been instructed to treat the religious items delicately. But Ms. Phair said she drew the line at hiding drugs in the gear. She was stern with her small army of smugglers, she said, telling them she refused to insult her Creator by hiding drugs in holy regalia. "That would be like rolling a joint with the Bible," she said. The competition among the Indian organizations smuggling drugs from Canada to the Lummi reservation was feverish, Ms. Phair said. Other drug gangs, she said, would try to lure her mules into their operations by offering them more money or threatening to turn them into border authorities. Some had connections to the tribal government, she contended, and could act on tips from the Lummi police of impending drug raids. So she scrutinized her mules closely. "You have to be able to be in a room of complete strangers and analyze everybody," she said. "You can't be wasted on drugs. You can't sit here and make a drug deal in front of 100 people and make mistakes." As her operation took off, she used drug money to send her three older children to private preschool, karate classes and hairdressers. She filled the refrigerators of her relatives and bought them wood in the winter. "Janyha was always dressed to the nines," Ms. Phair's father said. On the reservation, Ms. Phair was a well-known dealer, according to her, her relatives and court documents. Among her customers, she said, were tribal government officials. The Lummi Nation chairman, Darrel Hillaire, said that although OxyContin and other drugs were ravaging his people, he doubted that Ms. Phair had sold it to any high-level tribal officials. He acknowledged, however, that Ms. Phair might have sold drugs to some of the hundreds of people who work for the tribe. Her buyers, Ms. Phair said, included a couple whose 2-year-old died after eating OxyContin pills off a carpet, a well-publicized death on the reservation that set off an alarm within the tribal government. It vowed to banish drug dealers from the tribe. The couple, Ms. Phair said, later tried to trade her the dead baby's clothes -- a tiny down jacket, socks still on their Kmart plastic hangers and a batch of unused diapers in an open box, all of it stuffed into a black garbage bag -- for OxyContin. She turned them down, she said. "That went back into my spiritual belief," she said. "It's like putting death on your child. Nobody should have those clothes. I almost puked when they talked to me." She added, "That's when I wanted to quit. That made me physically sick. That's sick. I said, 'Your baby just died,' and they didn't care. They didn't even really fathom it; they didn't think anything was wrong." She refused to sell OxyContin to the couple, she said, but she continued selling drugs to others. And she would let her father, a crabber with an appetite for beer and her right-hand man, sell Green Monsters for $80 apiece, $20 more than her price, to support his own habit. "It was a great life," Mr. Phair, 50, said in an interview at his mother's small and cluttered house on the reservation, where he was living after spending a year in the county jail for his part in his daughter's drug ring. "The money -- the kids always had everything they wanted, everybody was happy, nobody was hungry. We weren't out there beating ourselves on the water." Ms. Phair also gave pills to her grandmother, Mavis Revey, 69, who also recently served jail time for selling OxyContin, although she was not working with Ms. Phair. She recalls growing up eating "commodity food" -- noodles and cheese, peanuts, canned peaches and fruit cocktail -- goods provided by the government. But sometimes there was no food, Ms. Phair said, and when she was as young as 7, "in order for me to quit complaining that there was no food, my mother would get me drunk." Her earliest memories include witnessing a drunken altercation between her parents, one of many that led to their breakup. She remembers riding around in an old station wagon during that fight and fixating on the image of a Ranier beer can, one of dozens scattered inside the car, with its curvy big red "R" logo. Her mother would try to placate her with presents, she said, including a kitten. "I loved that kitten," she wrote in one letter, making the kind of spelling and grammatical mistakes she did not make after receiving her high school equivalency diploma in prison. "But one day it scrached me and I killed it. I was just a little girl! And I rember that I was so unimportant to everyone and no one payed any attention to me that I packed that dead cat around for four days before anyone noticed it was dead." As a teenager she got into plenty of trouble. She served two years of juvenile detention beginning when she was 13, for several crimes, including stabbing a man who was trying to rape a relative, she said, and fleeing with his car. At the age of 24, Ms. Phair was arrested for her OxyContin trafficking operation after she sold painkillers to an undercover investigator. Web of Pain Ms. Phair said it herself many times, that her drug operation was like an octopus whose tentacles wrapped around dozens of people: the drug mules willing to do anything for the cash; her troubled father and grandmother; the addicts in her tribe; the Lummi foster mother who cared for Ms. Phair's three oldest children while she was in prison -- themselves victims of the drug epidemic in Indian country. Ms. Phair's husband, Joel DeRusha, 26, whom she married in 2003, is serving the last two years of a four-year prison term for cocaine and weapons possession unrelated to her drug ring. His brother and sister-in-law are caring for Payton, who lives the life Ms. Phair said she wanted, with a stay-at home mother, a family that goes to Disneyland on vacations. Payton, the baby she had with Mr. DeRusha, calls his aunt "Mommy." "I call it dominoes," said the sister-in-law, Carole Foldenhauer. "One person starts off in one direction, and how many dominoes fall based on that?" Payton was only a few months old when his mother was sent to prison. He has just begun to see her again over the last few weeks. Mrs. Foldenhauer said that when she drives by any McDonald's with Payton, where he visited with his mother recently, Payton shouts or sings, "Gena, Gena, Gena!" Ms. Phair's father and grandmother said they believed that Ms. Phair would be easily lured back into drug trade. "When you're doing time," her father said, "it's kind of like a dream. You're under a pink cloud. You got all these things you want to change and then you get out," but "I think she'll probably have to go back to selling drugs." And temptations and struggles have already arisen. A week before she was released, Ms. Phair's husband called from prison and asked her if she would "help out a friend" who was getting out of jail soon by contacting her old connections in the drug world. "He's supposed to be in my camp," she said after the conversation, vowing to divorce him because of it. "This is the last place I expected this to come from. I can't lose focus now." After that, Ms. Phair cut off contact with both her husband and mother-in-law, whom she had called "Mom" and who once symbolized the white, middle-class world she long believed would rescue her from her past. Mr. DeRusha said he only suggested she make the telephone calls to comfort her because she seemed "stressed out" about money. Ms. Phair said the implication was that she could possibly get a small take from drug deals the friend would make. Mr. DeRusha said he was baffled by her reaction. So was his mother, Margaret, who visited Ms. Phair in prison over more than a year, sent clothing, bubble bath and cosmetics to a work release program where she spent the last two months of her sentence and was preparing to order a new bed so Ms. Phair could come live with her. "She turned from sweet Gena to ice cold snake," Mrs. DeRusha said. "I've done nothing but help her. Why would she treat me like this?" Facing Banishment Ms. Phair took a temporary job working for the Lummi Nation. But because she is a convicted drug dealer she faces banishment, which would bar her from working for the tribe, living on the reservation or receiving financial assistance from the Lummi. She is assigned to a grim but sacred task for the tribe: digging up the bones of ancestors, centuries-old skeletons that were discovered several years ago during the construction of a waste-treatment plant. When she found that her three older children were leaving foster care four months early and would be living with her, she applied for food stamps but was denied, she said, because her $10-an-hour salary, in addition to disability payments for her sickly younger daughter, made her ineligible. For now, she is living with the three children at her sister Misty's in Bellingham, on a waiting list for government housing. Payton will continue to live with his aunt and uncle, which is a relief to Ms. Phair, she said. Still, she is essentially back at Square One: earning only 50 cents an hour more than she was making at the casino right before she became a drug dealer. She is living in cramped quarters with her three children, with barely enough money to even think about how to clothe them, let alone in anything fancy, she said. But she insists she has left the life of drug trafficking for good. "I've learned what happiness is and how I confused it with material things," she wrote in her last letter from prison. "I'm not afraid by any means that I will go back to selling drugs because that will never happen." In early January, Ms. Phair saw her father for the first time since she was imprisoned. With Misty along to accompany her on a day pass from work release, she visited him at her grandmother's house, where he was still living, still crabbing and scraping by, still drinking. She and her father did not hug, and she said that was typical. They chatted for a while. She asked him if she looked fat, and he told her he got really fat the last time he was in jail. He found a picture of Janyha in his room, an almost life-size, three-dimensional photograph Ms. Phair bought for $150 when she was trafficking, and gave it to her. Her eyes lit up, a flash of the old life before her, and she clutched the photo tightly, eager to take it back to her sparse room in Bellingham. They smoked a cigarette on the back porch; he was hiding from the tribal authorities and did not want to be seen out front, he said. As she left, her father said, "Call me later, Gena, like around 6?" "I can't, Dad," she said. "I don't have any quarters."

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SADD Brings Abuse Prevention Expert To Town

2006-02-17T09:41:00.000-08:00

SADD BRINGS ABUSE PREVENTION EXPERT TO TOWN As the generation gap between parent and child continues to stretch beyond recognition, many parents begin to view their own children as strangers and are unsure how to open up the lines of communication with out sounding like the enemy. Wednesday, March 1, the Swampscott High School chapter of Students Against Destructive Decisions ( SADD ) and its adviser, guidance counselor Meredith Reardon, will hosting a presentation on "Understanding the Teenage Brain: A Discussion on Drug and Alcohol Use, Risky Behaviors and Prevention Strategies," with lead speaker Michael Nerney, former Director of the Training Institute of Narcotic and Drug Research. During the presentation, which is geared for an adult audience, Nerney will provide extensive, concrete evidence of the effects of alcohol and drug use on an adolescent brain, as well proactive steps towards building a strong line of communication between parent and teen. Nerney is also speaking in Marblehead that same week. In both March and May, Nerney will come back to speak directly to several adolescent groups,50 students at a time in both Marblehead and Swampcott middle and high schools, along with hosting a pre-prom seminar at the high school level. Nerney will also hold special professional development programs with teachers and faculty over the next few months. In Massachusetts, 28 percent of children 13 and under have had a drink, and 12 percent have used marijuana. With the percentages constantly rising, Joyce Alla, marketing chairwoman of TeamUp, which is sponsoring Nerney's appearance in Marblehead, says more needs to be done. "The 'just say no' slogan doesn't work anymore," Alla said. "As parents we really need to work on opening the lines of communication." TeamUp President Susan Hauck added. "We need to increase awareness of the effects of drugs and alcohol as well as promote the tactic of early education." Swampscott guidance counselor Reardon said seeing Nerney last year in Marblehead was the motivation for bringing him to Swampscott, thanks to a grant from the local educational support organization, SUCCESS. For many parents, the thought of talking to their elementary and middle school aged children doesn't seem necessary, but TeamUp advocates feel the sooner the better. "It's better to be talking to your children all along than when it's too late," said Elizabeth Moore, principal of Marblehead Veterans Middle School. "Parents should just cater their talks to the different age levels their children are at." Moore, who has attended presentations by Nerney in the past, thinks children relate to the research Nerney brings to the table, and that they like to have evidence that they can hold in the palm of their hands. "Children like to see concrete evidence showing them what definitively what can happen to them if they do something," Moore said. "Last year [Nerney] showed parents and teachers research he had done on the brain, showing that as they enter adolescence their forebrain is not as developed and they become impulsive." In terms of when to talk with your children, Steve McFadden, guidance counselor at the Village School, also in Marblehead, has also adopted a sooner rather than later view on the situation. "Though a lot of parents may think how does this relate to my young child, they have to realize that these issues come up quicker than you think and it is always best to be prepared," McFadden said. Local counselor Larry Robinson says the main thing most parents need to learn is how not to talk down to their children as if they know everything, yet instead create an equal playing field where the kids feel that they can talk to their parents rather than fight with them. Part of his own method in his Lynn office is making his clients feel comfortable from the moment they step over the threshold, whether it be from the soothing smell of incense of the Native American pictures and artifacts placed around the waiting room. "Children need to gain your trust, otherwise if you criticize them from A to Z they are not going to listen to anything you have to say," Robinson said. "Kids at this age are angry because they have to be. Their parents are no longer their friends and they are now responsible for making adult decisions." Robinson says a lot of the problem is that middle schoolers see what their older siblings are doing and figuring that this what is "cool," creating a tremendous amount of pressure to be just that. "We need to work toward changing what defines 'cool'," Robinson said. "If we accepted kids more for who they are then they would be better at deciding what 'cool' actually is." Currently one of the more effective programs in place is the athletic department's social contract which was brought in by director Michael Plansky. Since putting the contracts in place, Plansky says they have only had to in force the policy once this year. "We bring the responsibility to the kids by making them form their own social contracts saying here's what they want to do and if we want our team to succeed we all need to follow by these rules," Plansky says. "The students are in charge of assigning penalties unanimously so that everyone is on the same page and they can look out for each other." Plansky added, "The goal is to have the students looking out for each other and learning together how to be responsible. Our hope is that if they are out and see someone breaking the rules they will say 'hey, that's in our contract and you shouldn't be doing that'." Swampscott High School has a similar student teaching student method known as SADD, an organization of Students Against Destructive Decisions. "We are an active chapter and two of our high school students are on the board," Reardon said. "We do presentations every year that are funded through a SUCCESS, Inc. grant and this year we are going to mirror what Marblehead did last year by having 50 students at a time work with Nerney." "Many parents are trying so hard to be there child's best friend, but as parents that is not what we signed up for," said Marblehead Police Detective Sgt. Marion Keating. "Parents should create an information exchange where they have all the cell phone numbers and email addresses so that at any point in time they are able to get in touch with their child." Keating added, "Parents are now having to talk to their children about subjects they never thought they would have to before. For example, what should your child do if they are babysitting and the parents come home drunk and are going to drive them home? These are things that we don't think of but need to because they happen." Judy Luise, adjustment counselor at Marblehead High School, suggests teaching children how to act in advance, trying to advert problems rather than deal with the consequences. "We try and teach them in a non-judgmental environment how to react rather then reflect after the fact," Luise said. According to Jim Ryan, director of Northeast Center for Healthy Communities, several surrounding communities have taken the initiative to effectively attack the problem. "Hamilton-Wenham is currently collecting data to develop strategies, and Lynn has a whole study done up on risk factors along with protective factors and building strong neighborhoods," Ryan said. "Many communities are forming coalitions trying to get parents engaged in the issue and building communication so they can be mentors in the situation." "No parent can fully protect their child," said Moore. "What they can do is continue the conversation. It can be as simple as asking you kids how they feel after you both witness a character in a television show doing something wrong. As parents we should always be talking." JUST THE FACTS What: Swampscott Students Against Destructive Decisions ( SADD ) lecture on drug and alcohol awareness and prevention, featuring former Director of the Training Institute of Narcotic and Drug Research, Michael Nerney, now working with Partners in Prevention. Not recommended for student attendance. When: Wednesday, March 1, 7-8:30 p.m. Where: Swampscott High School Little Theater