Quit taking people to jail for weed every 42 seconds

FBI Numbers: One Marijuana Arrest Every 42 Seconds in U.S.

source: http://www.tokeofthetown.com/2012/10/fbi_numbers_one_marijuana_arrest_every_42_seconds.php
By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ in News
Monday, October 29, 2012 at 12:07 pm



Half Of All American Drug Arrests Are For Cannabis; New Stats Reveal Failure of "War on Drugs"

Just over one week before voters in three states will decide on ballot measures to legalize and regulate marijuana, the FBI on Monday released a new report showing that police in the United States arrest someone for marijuana every 42 seconds, and that 87 percent of those arrests are for possession alone.

Monday's FBI report shows that 81.8 percent of drug arrests were for possession only, and just under half (49.5 percent) of all drug arrests were for marijuana.

A group of police, judges and other law enforcement officials advocating for the legalization and regulation of marijuana and other drugs pointed to the figures showing more than 750,000 marijuana arrests in 2011 -- more than 40 years after the start of the "War On Drugs" -- as evidence that this is a war that can never be won. With more than 1.5 million total drug arrests drug arrests being reported in the U.S. in 2011, that's one drug arrest every 21 seconds.




LEAP

Neill Franklin, Law Enforcement Against Prohibition: "That's a lot of money to spend for a practice that four decades of unsuccessful policies have proved does nothing to reduce the consumption of drugs"

One hopeful sign is that these numbers have decreased slightly from those of the prior year. This is perhaps reflective of the growing number of communities across the country that have recognized the need for drug law reform and implemented new policies designed to alleviate the harms of the drug war, such as the deprioritization of marijuana enforcement.

"Even excluding the costs involved for later trying and then imprisoning these people, taxpayers are spending between one and a half to three billion dollars a year just on the police and court time involved in making these arrests," said Neill Franklin, a retired Baltimore narcotics cop who now heads the group Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP). "That's a lot of money to spend for a practice that four decades of unsuccessful policies have proved does nothing to reduce the consumption of drugs.

"Three states have measures on the ballot that would take the first step in ending this failed war by legalizing, regulating and taxing marijuana," Franklin said. "I hope they take this opportunity to guide the nation to a more sensible approach to drug use."

Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP) represents police, prosecutors, judges, corrections officials and others who, after witnessing the harms of the drug war firsthand, are now devoted to ending that war.

Jury Nullification: DO IT!

Source: http://www.freeweekly.com/2012/09/27/top-secret-you-can-nullify-the-drug-war/

Top Secret: You Can Nullify The Drug War

Posted by Terrah Baker |


By Abel Tomlinson


In civics class, we are taught that we have only three branches of government. However, there is a secret fourth branch of power that remains in the hands of ordinary citizens. The secret de facto right is called “jury nullification,” which allows jurors to veto unjust laws, and override congress, the president and the Supreme Court when necessary.


As a juror, you will almost never be informed of this right to disagree with the law, and certainly not in Arkansas at this moment. Currently, New Hampshire recently became the only state that allows for jurors to be fully informed about this right.


Arkansas judges intentionally keep you ignorant through carefully crafted “jury instructions.” In an Arkansas jury trial, the judge will tell you the following:


“I instruct you on the law to be applied … You would deny the parties their right to a fair trial if you based your decision on something other than the law and evidence presented … or on some legal rule other than the ones I give you…So the basic principle is this: You are to decide this case fairly, based only on the evidence I allow to be presented in this courtroom and the law as instructed by me. You are not to consider information from any other source (Ark. Model Jury Instr. (November 2011).”


This jury instruction is very misleading, and it too deserves to be nullified as unjust. There is not one mention whatsoever about the very long history of jury nullification that traces beyond our nation’s founding. Furthermore, this instruction is a fear tactic of the highest degree to scare jurors into groveling at the feet of authority, as if the judge was King George.


John Jay, the first chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, said in 1794, “The jury has a right to judge both the law as well as the fact in controversy.” Another Supreme Court Justice and signer of the Declaration of Independence, Samuel Chase, also said,“The jury has the right to determine both the law and the facts.” Harlon Stone, the 12th Chief Justice of the Supreme Court reaffirmed in 1941, “The law itself is on trial quite as much as the cause which is to be decided.” In a more recent decision of U.S. vs. Dougherty (1972), the Court ruled, “The pages of history shine on instances of the jury’s exercise of its prerogative to disregard instructions of the judge…”


Not only did many of our founders and Supreme Court Justices agree that it is a right of jurors to oppose unjust laws, but it was seen as an essential check on government tyranny. Justice Byron White said in Duncan vs. Louisiana (1968), “A right to jury trial is granted to criminal defendants in order to prevent oppression by the Government … and to protect against judges too responsive to the voice of higher authority.” President Thomas Jefferson also said, “To consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions is a very dangerous doctrine indeed, and one which would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy.”


Jury nullification also has a proud history of promoting sincere justice during the slavery and Prohibition eras. It was used many times when Northern juries refused to convict slaves that violated the Fugitive Slave Act. In the case of alcohol prohibition, juries nullified alcohol control laws approximately 60 percent of the time. This significant resistance helped repeal prohibition with the adoption of the 21st Amendment.


Just as nullification helped end prohibition, it is now necessary for potential jurors everywhere to become informed and end the tyranny of the Drug War. Not only are we locking thousands upon thousands of peaceful humans in cages for victimless crime, but federal and state governments are now spending over $50 billion annually on a war that experts conclude has been a complete failure. The 2011 report from the Global Commission on Drug Policy explicitly finds: “The global war on drugs has failed, with devastating consequences for individuals and societies around the world …”


A 2011 Gallup poll found that 50 percent of Americans believe marijuana should be legalized. A recent National Law Journal poll also found 75 percent of Americans would act on their own beliefs of morality regardless of a judge’s jury instruction. Hence, it is now time to act. Paul Butler, a former federal prosecutor and law professor at George Washington University wrote in the New York Times:


“If you are ever on a jury in a marijuana case, I recommend that you vote “not guilty” — even if you think the defendant actually smoked pot, or sold it to another consenting adult. As a juror, you have this power under the Bill of Rights; if you exercise it, you become part of a proud tradition of American jurors who helped make our laws fairer.”

It is a distinct honor to serve as a juror and armed with the truth about nullification, you wield an incredible power that can overrule extreme legal injustices approved by politicians. As President John Adams said, this is “not only [the juror’s] right, but his duty.”


If selected for jury duty, ignore the judge’s intimidation tactics, and understand that jurors can never be punished for their verdict. The juror oath and jury instructions are not legally binding and must be regarded as advice. However, it is best to remain silent about this knowledge in order to remain in the jury pool.


Please Google “jury nullification,” visit the Fully Informed Jury Association’s website (FIJA.org), share this article, and begin informing your friends and family about their secret rights. We can end this cruel and immoral drug war. Now is the moment for peace.


For information on the FIJA Arkansas chapter, find us on Facebook.

Outrageous

Waste Potential

REUTERS: Feds will wait and see if they want to keep taking people to jail for weed if it is too dangerous after the states legalize this fall

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/21/us-usa-marijuana-legalization-idUSBRE89K00Q20121021

U.S. stance on marijuana unchanged by legalization votes: official

Sat, Oct 20 2012

By Alex Dobuzinskis

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A top Justice Department official has told "60 Minutes" the federal government is ready to combat any "dangers" of state-sanctioned recreational pot, amid criticism of the Obama administration for its relative silence on legalization drives in three states.

Voters in Colorado, Washington state and Oregon are set to vote on November 6 on whether to legalize and tax marijuana sales, raising the possibility of a showdown with the federal government, which views pot as an illegal narcotic.

Deputy Attorney General James Cole, in comments to "60 Minutes" posted on Saturday to the website of CBS affiliate KCNC-TV in Denver, said his office's stance on pot would be "the same as it's always been" if voters approved legalization.

"We're going to take a look at whether or not there are dangers to the community from the sale of marijuana and we're going to go after those dangers," Cole told "60 Minutes" in an outtake from a report on Colorado's medical marijuana industry due to air on Sunday, according to the CBS affiliate.

Cole's statement is an indication the federal government, which has raided medical pot dispensaries in several of the 17 states that allow cannabis as medicine, could also take aim at state-sanctioned recreational marijuana.

It also represents a break with the Obama administration's relative silence about the pot referendums, which has led to uncertainty about whether federal officials would stop states from taxing and regulating sales of pot in special stores to those 21 and older, as proposed under each of the three state initiatives before voters.

Representatives for the Justice Department did not return calls or emails seeking comment on Cole's remarks.

A top legalization backer, however, dismissed them as "innocuous," unlike the stance Attorney General Eric Holder took in 2010 just weeks before a failed California referendum to legalize pot.

"WAIT AND SEE"

In 2010, Holder issued a toughly worded letter that said his office "strongly" opposed the California proposal and would "vigorously enforce" drug laws against participants in the recreational pot trade, even if state law permitted it.

Holder's statement is credited with helping to convince some California voters to reject the proposal.

"Compared to what they did two years ago in California, to have their federal posture be essentially a wait-and-see approach is encouraging," said Ethan Nadelmann, head of the Drug Policy Alliance, which through affiliates has funded marijuana legalization campaigns.

Polls show the American public is increasingly leaning toward legalizing pot, but no state has taken that step.

Nadelmann said pot legalization is popular with young people and independents, two groups of voters crucial to President Barack Obama's re-election campaign, and that his administration is "being smart in basically not weighing in at this time."

Marijuana is the most commonly used illicit drug in the United States. Pot activists say prohibition fails to prevent its use and enriches criminal cartels, but opponents of legalization say it would endanger health and public safety.

Former heads of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration in September sent a letter to Holder urging him to publicly oppose the legalization referendums. On Monday, a former federal official expressed dismay at the Obama administration's silence.

"It's shocking, because all you have to do is say things that this administration's already said," John Walters, who served as "drug czar" to former President George W. Bush, told reporters on a conference call.

Cole's remarks to "60 Minutes" were in response to a question about the possibility of recreational pot being allowed in Colorado, according to the station, which posted a video with the outtake on its website.

"I think it is pretty clear from this video that the Obama administration won't take any legalization measure lying down," Kevin Sabet, a former adviser to Gil Kerlikowske, the Obama administration's drug policy director, said in an email.

(Additional reporting by Keith Coffman; Editing by Paul Simao)

Kid dies in jail for weed. STOP THE MADNESS!

Source: http://www.tokeofthetown.com/2012/10/marijuana_inmate_with_allergy_dies_after_being_giv.php

Marijuana Inmate With Allergy Dies After Being Given Oatmeal

7 Comments

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ in News

Wednesday, October 17, 2012 at 10:20 am

KATU.com

Michael Safiotti -- in jail for marijuana -- died after jail workers served him oatmeal containing dairy products, then refused to help him when he had an allergic reaction

Although marijuana has never killed anyone in history, the marijuana laws have claimed another tragic victim.

Michael Saffioti, 22, who, upon his mother's advice, had turned himself in to the Lynnwood Police Department after missing a court date, was dead after just one night in the Snohomish County Jail in Washington state, reports Molly Shen of KATU.com. The county could face a lawsuit for ignoring Saffioti's food allergy.

The young man knew dairy products could kill him; he read labels and carried medication, and suffered severe reactions from just being near dairy protein. His anxiety over the allergy was so severe, in fact, it left him needing medication.

"Ultimately, he found and thought he was better functioning using marijuana," said his mother, Rose Saffioti, who is a nurse.

But Michael didn't have a doctor's recommendation to use cannabis medicinally, which left him vulnerable to prosecution. His marijuana use led to several encounters with law enforcement. After the most recent incident, he and his mother went to the police station, carrying his medical history, after he had missed a court date.

"I wanted Michael held accountable for his legal issues and I insisted on it," his mother said. "But I didn't want him to die."

Michael started having trouble breathing after eating the oatmeal that was served to him in jail. According to other inmates, he begged for help.

The guards accused him of faking it, and allowed him to die in horrible pain. The autopsy found his allergic reaction to milk products contributed to his death.

"I know there's a period where he knew he was going to die," his mother said. "And he trusted me. Everything was supposed to bet set up, that he'd be taken care of."

"He was scared," she said, reports The Associated Press. "I said, 'You are doing the right thing. They are going to take care of you.' He said, 'I have a bad feeling that they are not going to take me seriously.' "

"You can't get help. You can't call 911," said Anne Bremner, an attorney representing the Saffioti family. "You're at their complete mercy. When the jail's the one that gives you something that's going to kill you -- that they know is going to kill you -- they, at a minimum, have to rescue you. And they didn't."

The Snohomish County Sheriff's Department wouldn't comment on Saffioti's death or the potential lawsuit until its "investigation" is complete.

Rose Saffioti said she will sue the county, but that her first goal is to hold someone criminally responsible. Michael's death is one of six deaths to occur in the same jail since 2010. It's one of at least two that are resulting in wrongful-death claims against the county.

She and attorney Bremner are encouraging the Snohomish County prosecutor's office to file involuntary manslaughter charges against jail workers whom they believe should have helped prevent Michael's death.

BRAD PITT: Quit taking people to jail for weed

Brad Pitt & 'The House I Live In' Director Eugene Jarecki Dissect America's Failed War On Drugs

Seated in a big leather armchair with popcorn and a Stella Artois beer on a Friday night in Los Angeles, Brad Pitt was ready to talk about drugs.



Minutes before, in a small theater downstairs, Pitt introduced director Eugene Jarecki's documentary "The House I Live In" about the war on drugs with this confession:

My drug days are long since passed but it's certainly true that I could probably land in any city in any state and get you whatever you wanted. I could find anything you were looking for. Give me 24 hours or so. And yet we still support this charade called the drug war. We have spent a trillion dollars. It's lasted for over 40 years. A lot of people have lost their lives for it. And yet we still talk about it like it's this success.

"The House I Live In" is a harrowing and comprehensive look at what President Richard Nixon coined "the war on drug abuse" in 1972. The film looks at how things have exploded since then, how we ever got there in the first place, and what the hell it all really means. Jarecki's personal ties to the subject matter make "The House I Live In" that much more salient.


Pitt, an executive producer on the film, is no stranger to speaking out for thelegalization of drugs. When Jarecki introduced the project to him years before, he told Pitt that he felt the war on drugs "is possibly a barrier to keep the impoverished down. To keep them shackled," Pitt explains. "And I thought well that may be even too liberal for me [laughs], but we just came off of Hurricane Katrina. We had just witnessed that there was a particular portion of our society that was being ignored and that this could be the case."


The Huffington Post sat down with Pitt and Jarecki on Friday evening to talk about the film and America's war on drugs. Here are some highlights from the conversation:


HuffPost: Why do you think the drug war isn't being talked about in this election? Or talked about much at all amongst politicians?

Brad Pitt: It’s been this taboo subject forever -– unless you're claiming victory for a bust or a win. It's absolutely taboo to talk about it as a failure. Which it is. It's an incredible failure.


Eugene Jarecki: If it was any other federal program, it would be looked at as a ridiculous federal waste. It's only because it's law-enforcement-tough-on-crime, it has that sort of veneer, that no one says this is a gigantic federal invasive program that is a huge waste of money.


Pitt: If we spent a fraction of that on education ...


What do you wish you were hearing people talk about right now?

Pitt: Certainly that it's a backwards strategy that perpetuates itself. But also Eugene came at it in a way that I had never thought about before. That the drug war is actually being used to hold a portion of our society down. It's staggering to me what is being perpetrated in this name of a war on ... immorality. It's criminal in itself. And we've got to look at that. We have to change that.


Do you think there's a parallel from another generation for what we now consider the war on drugs?

Jarecki: Prohibition. Look, we did this with Prohibition. It blew up on our face, turned into the mad criminal justice disaster that it became and we quickly scrambled, corrected ourselves and said, "That was a crazy idea."


Why aren't we doing that now?

Jarecki: The difference between then and now is we have built an entire industrial sector in this country that has come to rely, in the most unholy way you could imagine, on a steady flow of human beings to sustain itself.


Pitt: You're talking about the penal system, yeah?


Jarecki: Yes. The prison industrial complex, to put it in its crassest term, is a system of industrial mass incarceration. So there's what you call bureaucratic thrust behind it. It's hard to shut off because politicians rely upon the steady flow of jobs to their district that the prison system and its related industries promise.


You have a joint venture there that is blocking reform. And that makes reform even taboo to talk about. Because everybody in Washington is subtly getting a piece of the action. On both sides of the aisle. Look, there were people profiting from slavery too. And then we stopped it. It took a long time ...


How did we get here?

Jarecki: A serious drug dealer is a predator in a way. Well, we all want to protect each other from predators. But people who are hurting themselves with a drug on a porch because they're poor, they don’t have a job and they're marginalized in this society -– I have friends who have lots more comfort than that who take Prozac. So why are those other people specially singled out that they're not allowed to self-medicate?


Pitt: The only way to end the war on drugs is to take the profit out of it. I know this comes with a whole other host of problems and I don't know if I'm actually presenting it as a reality, but we have to look at the what-if-everything-was-legal and people were allowed to make their own choices. And we were treating it less as a criminal issue and more as a sickness. People do drugs to escape. We're not talking about experimentation. People with long-term drug use are escaping.


It's symptomatic.


Jarecki: There's a journalist in the film named Chuck Bowden, the guy with the really deep voice who sounds like he's been drinking whiskey all day. Chuck has a deep knowledge of the drug war, particularly with how it's impacted Mexico. He said something very interesting to me about decriminalization. He said, you know people think that when you decriminalize, you'll drop the price and they tell you two lies about that. The first lie is that if you decriminalize, people will use drugs less. Because they were really using it because it was forbidden. Well that's a bunch of bull. That didn’t happen in Prohibition, in fact, use went up a little bit.


The second lie is that if you drop the price by decriminalizing, the violence will go down. Say in Mexico. He said that’s also a lie. Because the people that are living off of the drug war using violence right now, they are people who use guns to make their living. And right now drugs are the substrate. Take the drugs away, they still need to make their living and they still have the gun. So what happens is the violence will simply migrate. It will shift over to carjackings, kidnappings. And I said yikes! And he said no, that’s a good thing.


Why is that?

Jarecki: Because now the violent concentrate themselves where we know who is violent. Right now we've got them all pooled together with the poor and the nonviolent and the people who are just in pain and self-medicating, and we are indiscriminately jailing them all. So he said decriminalization will actually put law enforcement back in the position of knowing the difference between a threat to the community and somebody who isn't.


Pitt: And there's another issue. You can control quality. The quality of drugs is higher than it's ever been, but it’s still all over the map. If you decriminalize, then they could control the quality.


Jarecki: If you decriminalize it, then the government can get involved in it the way they do with a controlled substance.


Pitt: And I would propose you would have fewer deaths.


"The House I Live In" opened in select theaters on October 5 and in Los Angeles on October 12. Other Hollywood muscle behind the film includes executive producers Danny Glover, John Legend and Russell Simmons.

OUTRAGE: 10 years in prison for medical weed. THIS MUST STOP!

10 Years in Prison for Legally Growing Medical Pot? The Feds' Insane Assault on Perfectly Legal Activity

October 9, 2012 |
As President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign gears up for its final push, his Department of Justice (DOJ) is aggressively pursuing medical marijuana cases in direct contravention of earlier pronouncements on the issue. Federal prosecutors are taking advantage of election season politics by gambling that the White House will not stand in their way and appear to look soft on crime at this critical juncture. Their well-times aggression is just another example of gaming the system and ringing-up meaningless prosecutions which serve no purpose other than padding the resumes of federal prosecutors. It is far afield from their mission statement and self-professed duty to protect the public.

The latest victims of this nationwide attack were a father and son in Monroe County, Michigan, Gerald Duval, Jr. and his son, Jeremy. They were convicted at trial in a federal case that centered on their growing medical marijuana in greenhouses. Gerald’s sentencing hearing was held on October 1 in federal court in Detroit. USDJ David Lawson handed down a 10 year sentence of which 87.5% will have to be served before the senior Duval is eligible for release. In a sentencing memorandum, prosecutors claimed that the Duvals “shamelessly exploited” Michigan’s medical marijuana law to try and get around the federal prohibition on marijuana. The prosecutors’ memorandum recommended an even longer sentence of 16 years for the Duvals’ decision to follow the state of Michigan’s medical marijuana law.

The federal prosecutors on the case chose interesting language in their pleas for a lengthy sentence. Equating adherence to a state law with which they disagree to shameless exploitation speaks volumes about the legal wrangling in which the prosecutors are engaging. The fact that the defendants were operating lawfully under the Michigan medical marijuana statute is completely removed from the equation. In almost all of these cases, jurors are prohibited from hearing any testimony regarding the laws of the state. The defense may not raise the issue because, in short, the state laws are not a valid defense upon which the accused can rebut the federal charges. That the accused believed they were in full compliance with state law and unaware of a conflict with federal drug statutes is of no moment. All the jurors are permitted to hear is the various ways the defendant violated federal law. The accused’s strict adherence to the state’s medical marijuana law is deceptively omitted from the proceedings.

“The Duvals’ case is another tragedy from President Obama’s war on medical marijuana,” said Steph Sherer, Executive Director of Americans for Safe Access (ASA), a leading medical marijuana advocacy group. “This type of enforcement is unnecessary and far from the public health approach that medical marijuana patients deserve.” A press release from ASA cites the fact that accused medical marijuana caregivers have “no chance of defending themselves against federal law.”

The ASA is particularly troubled by this latest round of prosecutions. Sherer further criticized the Obama administration’s handling of this issue by stating, “The federal raids and prosecutions in Michigan are unfortunately only an example of the broader aggressive campaign by the Obama administration to undermine state medical marijuana laws.” Sherer noted earlier claims by Obama that he was “not going to be using Justice Department resources to try to circumvent state laws.” Despite this promise, the DOJ under Obama has conducted more than 200 SWAT-style raids and indicted in excess of 70 medical marijuana providers. In these raids, DEA agents typically assault the targeted premises wearing full body armor and brandishing machine guns in an effort to intimidate their victims into submission. This is nothing less than state-sponsored violence against a targeted segment of the populace.

In order to understand this latest assault on the citizenry, one must closely examine the motives of the prosecutors pursuing these cases. These are relatively easy cases to bring. Federal prosecutors are being handed virtual “slam dunks” by states which enact medical marijuana laws because they all begin with the premise that regardless of what the state may permit, federal law is being violated. One might think that with the alleged abundance of criminal activity that exists within the US, there would be more urgent matters to pursue. Federal prosecutors are quick to offer the familiar refrain that prosecution is a limited resource and must be applied where it most needed. Yet there appears to be an abundance of prosecutorial resources available for these seemingly benign matters.

When the DOJ goes before Congress seeking increased funding, they are fond of citing year over year increases in prosecutions and convictions. Few lawmakers, if any, delve into the quality of those prosecutions. For statistical purposes, medical marijuana convictions serve the US attorneys as well as do convictions for serious, major crimes. The same is true for the resumes of individual prosecutors. Racking-up convictions and lengthy sentences is what is required for federal prosecutors to put themselves on the fast track for advancement up the judicial corporate ladder. The hallmark of their sociopathy is the inability to recognize that their careers are being furthered on the bodies of others.

The current assault on medical marijuana providers extends far beyond the case of Gerald and Jeremy Duval. On September, 27, a federal jury in Helena, Montana convicted Chris Williams of eight charges including conspiracy to manufacture, possess and distribute marijuana. Williams was originally charged in 2011 when federal agents from the DEA raided the Montana Cannabis’ Helena greenhouse which was operating lawfully under Montana state law. It was the largest of 26 medical marijuana businesses raided in one day across the state of Montana. As with the Duvals, Williams was precluded from arguing that he was fully compliant with state law. His judge, USDJ Dana Christensen, agreed with federal prosecutors who said that state law is irrelevant in matters involving the federal Controlled Substances Act.

Williams was taken into custody immediately after the verdict was announced. He faces decades in prison under federal mandatory minimum sentencing and a maximum sentence which could be life in prison without the possibility of parole. “It’s a tragedy,” said Chris Lindsey, president of the Montana Cannabis Industry Association (MTCIA) and former partner of Williams. “Federal law needs to change and respect the wishes of the citizens, who overwhelmingly favor the availability of medical marijuana for those in need. Federal law makes no allowance for it, and Mr. Williams will pay a heavy price for the government’s refusal to bend to the will of voters in Montana and around the country.”

Lindsey went on to cite how the jury was prohibited from hearing that Williams’ acts were in compliance with state law. “It is sad that Chris was tried for what he did and for what he believed in, but he couldn’t actually talk about what happened with the jury,” said Lindsey. “They didn’t get the whole story because of the way criminal trials are run. Chris and his attorney did the best they could to get their story in front of the jury, but the system doesn’t allow it.”

Lindsey went on to cite the issue of compliance with state law. “I think it’s a tragedy, I mean it was something that we were trying to comply with state law, thought we were, but the federal government of course has not changed its position on marijuana and they don’t really care that it’s medical marijuana. How do we deal with the fact that most Americans believe that medical marijuana should have its role and how do we reconcile that with the fact that the federal government absolutely refuses to acknowledge publicly that marijuana has any role?”

Also commenting on the Williams verdict was Montana First, an organization devoted to bringing “sanity” to Montana’s marijuana laws. Spokesperson Bob Brighton reacted to the verdict by saying, “One thing is crystal clear, our nation’s failed so-called War on Drugs must end, particularly where medical marijuana is concerned in states whose voters and legislators have endorsed it.”

From the perspective of federal prosecutors, however, the War on Drugs is anything but a failure. Rather, it is the gift that keeps on giving. It provides justification for their ongoing aggression and offers a virtually limitless pool of targets for prosecution. Compliant media enablers, who often serve as mere stenographers instead of reporters, can be counted upon to disseminate government press releases thinly disguised as news items. Truly objective accounts of this ongoing war, which is in all actuality a war against the people, are largely absent. The success of this disinformation campaign is evidenced by President Obama’s reticence to reel in his Justice Department during this campaign season.

Assemble a group of result oriented, get ahead at any cost prosecutors, give them virtually limitless power, and the results are fairly predicable. It should be a surprise to no one that they would wage war against the very people they have been entrusted to protect in order to advance their own careers. The recent round of attacks against medical marijuana providers is merely the latest incarnation of a problem that has been festering for years. What is certain is that when this pool of low-hanging fruit is exhausted, these same prosecutors will simply set their sights on another group of ready-made targets.

Ultimately, this is the real story. It has little to do with medical marijuana or any other alleged offense. There is a highly destructive force at work that actively seeks new targets and is committed to eviscerating everything in its path, all for self-advancement. They justify their actions by bandying about words like “truth” and “justice,” but then work overtime to conceal relevant facts from jurors and ultimately the same public they allegedly serve. This embracement of deception is rooted in a twisted belief that their work is too important to be burdened with unnecessary rules or restrictions that are applicable only to others. For those medical marijuana caregivers now facing lengthy terms in federal prison, it is a tragic lesson in what can happen when those in positions of power subvert laws with which they disagree in a self-serving belief that the end justifying the means.

American Conservative on Legalizing Weed

Source: http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/marijuana-legalizations-tipping-point/

Marijuana Legalization’s Tipping Point

Colorado, Washington, and Oregon will decide on historic reforms in November.
By KELLEY VLAHOS • October 10, 2012

Shutterstock.com

Allen St. Pierre has waited for marijuana legalization since 1991. Well, longer than that — but that was the year he started working at the National Organization to Reform Marijuana Laws (NORML). So every election cycle his job is to cheer on the latest pro-marijuana initiative as though it will be the breakthrough the movement needs.


This time, the reality may be so close, he almost seems hesitant to gild the lily.


“It’s clear we’re on an upward trend and one of these two states could break through and cross the Rubicon and set up an incredible government challenge,” St. Pierre told TAC, referring to Washington state and Colorado, where marijuana initiatives have the best chance of passing on Nov. 6. Current polling shows that majorities in both states support the measures.


Elsewhere in the U.S., pro-marijuana referenda include a wide-ranging legalization measure in Oregon, initiatives calling for brand new medical marijuana laws in Arkansas and Massachusetts, and an effort to reverse the legislative gutting of medical-marijuana access in Montana. Seventeen states and the District of Columbia now have medical marijuana laws on the books.


Not since the failed California initiative to fully decriminalize and regulate the sale of cannabis beyond medicinal access has there been such a powerful opportunity to re-frame and advance the debate on marijuana reform. The legalization movement has benefited from a new approach, appealing to middle American sensibilities about the failure of the drug war and the hard lessons of prohibition. It is also gaining traction with fiscal conservatives who would rather tax marijuana sales than shuffle thousands of drug offenders through courts and prisons each year. According to this fiscal impact study, for example, the State of Colorado expects to save $12 million and raise $22.6 million in the first year of legalization through marijuana sales tax and licensing fees (embedded in the Colorado amendment is a clause mandating that the first $40 million raised be earmarked for a public school construction fund).


“For too long this [issue] has been ignored or treated as some Cheech & Chong joke,” said Tom Angell, a representative of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP), a national organization of cops and criminal justice experts — both active and retired — dedicated to “speaking out about the failures of our existing drug policies.”


He pointed to the most recent Gallup Poll asking Americans whether marijuana should be legal. For the first time since Gallup started asking in 1969, more than 50 percent said “yes.”


“More people are recognizing that we cannot afford to continue arresting and prosecuting and locking up people for marijuana,” Angell says. “State legislators and city councilors across the country are now asking themselves, are we going to pay to arrest people for pot or fill some pot holes in the town?”


Most Americans understand that marijuana prohibition — much like the ban on liquor in the 1920s — is fueling a violent black market and bloated prison system, he added. In an era of shrinking state and local budgets, people are sensing the wisdom of redirecting those resources into fighting violent crime like murder and rape, and bolstering drug treatment and education efforts.


“We have people from all over the political spectrum,” Angell notes. “People are more comfortable speaking out.” And the support is coming from some unlikely places. Earlier this year, televangelist Pat Robertson told the world he supported legalization. In 2010, Sarah Palin generated headlines when she called pot a “minimal problem” and suggested “there are other things our cops should be looking to engage in.” Former Republican congressman Tom Tancredo recently endorsed Amendment 64 in Colorado, and GOP Senate candidate Michael Baumgartner has endorsed legalization in Washington.


“The shift in public opinion,” Angell explains, “is happening so rapidy.”


In Colorado, Amendment 64: Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol Act of 2012 enjoys a wide swath of support from retired police officers, the NAACP, clergy, the Denver County Republican Assembly, and the State Democratic Party Convention, virtually insulating it from the typical attacks in which hippie dopester caricatures abound. The measure would amend the Colorado state constitution to make it legal for individuals over the age of 21 to possess up to one ounce of marijuana and/or grow up to six plants. It would allow the state to tax and regulate its sale, while maintaining current medical marijuana laws.


The major effort against it, a campaign called Smart Colorado, is headed by Wade County District Attorney Ken Buck, a controversial Republican who unsuccessfully attempted to ride the Tea Party wave into the U.S Senate in 2010. Smart Colorado, according to Colorado news reports, is operated by cadre of Denver lobbyists and funded mostly in part by Florida strip-mall tycoon and major Republican contributor Mel Sembler.


Sembler, a big-time donor to neoconservative national-security causes, according to RightWeb, is also a big anti-drug warrior and the founder of Straight Inc., a residential “tough love” teenage drug-treatment program that was forced to shut its doors in 1993 after numerous accusations of excessive physical force, psychological abuse, and at least one conviction of false imprisonment. Sembler now heads the Drug Free America Foundation and enjoys the support of prominent Republicans like George W. and Jeb Bush.


Still, the pro-Amendment 64 campaign is better funded. Supporters have invested $800,000 for advertisements to run throughout the month. Much of the $1.1 million raised by the pro-marijuana campaign was donated by Peter Lewis, the billionaire behind Progressive insurance. Lewis has been bankrolling a number of the initiatives this year and all told has put between $40 million to $60 million into the cause nationwide since the 1980s, according to a profile by Forbes.


Meanwhile, the Washington legalization initiative, known as I-502, is also attracting attention for the money it’s raised – more than $4 million, mostly from Lewis, George Soros, and Ethan Nadelmann. While the most recent survey has the majority of voters supporting legalization in Colorado 51 percent to 40 percent with the rest undecided, the measure is leading in Washington 57 percent to 34 percent.


Initiative 502 is succeeding in the polls despite infighting between the pro-legalization campaigners and those representing the medical-marijuana community, reminiscent of the fractious nature of the failed California vote, in which northern California growers and distributors actively campaigned against Proposition 19. Critics said it was because of self-interest, but the growers and distributors insisted the law was poorly written and smacked of government overreach.


In Washington, the medical marijuana community says it’s concerned about a measure within the referendum that incorporates strict new rules for driving under the influence of drugs (DUID) that do not take medical-marijuana users into account.


Oregon’s measure is more extensive and contentious, and lacks the money and hefty organized support of the other two states, making it the least likely to pass legalization. “Oregon’s Measure 80 seems to be the step child — it comes to the dance late, it doesn’t have a pretty partner and it’s pretty broad and idealistic,” observed St. Pierre.


The big question is, what would the feds do if marijuana is legalized in any of these states? Surely they do not have the resources to arrest every small-time user and grower but are likely to continue to go after sellers.


Marijuana is still considered a Schedule I narcotic under the federal Controlled Substances Act and therefore quite illegal. Marijuana reformers have been completely bewildered over President Obama’s crackdown on medical marijuana facilities, particularly in California and Colorado. His Justice Department has been more aggressive then his predecessor’s, which is not what they had expected.


“We do know the government will oppose the will of the voters, as hard as that is to believe,” St. Pierre said sarcastically, noting that marijuana reform will likely come before the U.S Supreme Court again, where it has already been defeated, most recently in 2005. The U.S Court of Appeals for the D.C district has agreed to take up a case arguing against marijuana’s Schedule I designation beginning Oct. 16.


Meanwhile, the hope is that public opinion will continue to shift in favor of legalizing marijuana. ”It’s going to take the grassroots building of support to show federal politicians that there is support for this, and that it’s not a third rail they can’t touch,” said Angell.


“And” he added, “we’re feeling really good about Election Day this year.”


Kelley Beaucar Vlahos is a Washington, D.C.-based freelance reporter.