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| Photo: AP |
| Chris Bartkowicz faces up to life in prison on federal charges for growing medical marijuana. |
U.S. District Judge Philip Brimmer on Thursday morning was asked by federal prosecutors to block the medical marijuana defense in their case against Chris Bartkowicz of Denver, reports The Associated Press.
"The provisions of state law cited in the Government's brief demonstrate the quagmire of Colorado state law and its medical marijuana provisions, and further demonstrates that none of those provisions have relevance to the federal prosecution of the Defendant," said a motion filed Tuesday by prosecutors, reports Felisa Cardona at The Denver Post.
Prosecutors contended that Bartkowicz should not be allowed to use Colorado's medical marijuana laws as a defense, or try to argue that he was singled out or didn't know he would be subject to prosecution.
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| Graphic: Freaking News |
Officers raiding the operation two weeks ago at Christina Lake, B.C., about 160 miles east of Vancouver, found two residential buildings and a fenced-off growing operation. Police said Tuesday they found about 1,000 cannabis plants, reports CBC News.
They also found about 10 bears that the homeowner appeared to be using to discourage people from stealing any pot plants, according to Royal Canadian Mounted Police Sgt. Fred Mansveld.
"[Officers] soon noticed the bears were docile and tame," Mansveld said. "One of them jumped on our unmarked car for awhile. But it soon became apparent they were habituated to the grow operation." I'll bet they were!
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| Photo: Lewis Whyld/PA |
| PC Chloe Snell examines what the Brits like calling a "cannabis factory" in a house in East London, 2008 |
Almost 20 commercial cannabis growing operations were found by police every day in the past year by authorities, according to the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO), making the total for 2009/2010 6,886 -- more than double the 3,032 discovered two years ago, and more than eight times the annual average of 800 between 2004 and 2007, reports the U.K. Press Association.
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| Photo: Offbeat News |
| It may look an awfully lot like a, well, garden-variety GARDEN to you. But to Christine Byers of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and the St. Louis County Police, it's a dangerous DRUG LAB -- the kind for which you take away people's kids. Oh, and get big Drug War grants, too! |
A marijuana "lab"?
Really, Christine Byers of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch? REALLY??
"A North St. Louis County couple has been charged with four counts of endangering the welfare of a child after police found a marijuana growth lab in their basement," Byers cluelessly reports Thursday.
"Todd, 43, and Angela Priest, 33... had four children between the ages of 2 and 4 living with them when St. Louis County Police found the active marijuana growth lab in their basement," Christine gives us to believe. [Italics added.]
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| Photo: RCMP |
| High Prairie RCMP uncovered a 6,500-plant marijuana operation with a street value they claimed was $6.5 million. |
Investigators quaintly estimated the seizure "effectively removed the equivalent of more than two million marijuana joints from reaching the streets," reports CTV News.
Plants in various stages of growth were found in 12 portable semi-circular huts, each about 200 feet (60 meters) long, 20 feet (six meters) wide and 10 feet (three meters) high, reports CBC News.
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| Photo: Cook County Sheriff's Office |
| Here is one of the Zimmermans' enviable grow operations. Since the photo is from the Cook County Sheriff's Office, this must have been the dad's growroom. Nice! |
Sheriff's police estimate the seizures at both homes totaled "about $3 million to $5 million" at those mythical "street prices" they keep promising us.
Jay Zimmerman, 69, and his son Alan Zimmerman, 42, owned homes in Skokie, Illinois and Chesterton, Indiana, reports Chicago Breaking News. The father was charged with manufacturing and delivery of marijuana, a felony. The son was charged with felony possession of marijuana and possession of "drug paraphernalia."
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| Photo: Mother Jones |
The 7-0 vote to keep in place a 180-day moratorium passed in May came near midnight after a packed, lengthy meeting at which dozens of citizens spoke for and against allowing medical marijuana businesses in the Michigan city, reports Bill Laitner of the Detroit Free Press.
Landlord James Canner met with city officials in May in hopes of avoiding foreclosure on his 23,000-square-foot warehouse by leasing it to a tenant who would convert it into roughly two dozen grow rooms for medical marijuana caregivers, reports Jonathan Oosting at MLive.com.
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| Photo: The Record |
A Denver narc claims that illegal marijuana seizures are "up 380 percent from 2009," and believes "surplus medical marijuana" is to blame.
Commander Jerry Peters of the North Metro Task Force, who has long maintained that "drug dealers" are "taking advantage" of the medical marijuana industry, isn't sure that tightening Colorado's medical marijuana law would even help.
"I don't necessarily like the law the way it is anyway," he said. "I think this effect will be there no matter what happens."
For some good reading from our sister blog in the Village Voice Media empire, check out the rest of the story by Michael Roberts at Westword:
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| Graphic: Media Junkie |
Roosevelt County deputies arrested Poplar Police Chief Chad A. Hilde at his rural home north of Culbertson, Montana, reports Travis Coleman at the Great Falls Tribune. The chief is being charged with one felony count of "criminal production or manufacture of dangerous drugs," and one misdemeanor count of "criminal possession of dangerous drugs."
Chief Hilde, who faces up to 10 years in prison on the felony charge, has been placed on "administrative leave," according to a dispatcher Monday at the Poplar Police Department. The police chief, who says the marijuana belonged to an authorized patient, said he planned to sue the Roosevelt County Sheriff.
A juvenile female runaway told Roosevelt County Sheriff's Deputy Matt Wallace on July 30 that Chief Hilde had marijuana growing in his barn, and that Hilde told her it was for medical purposes, according to an affidavit filed by acting Roosevelt County Attorney Steven Howard.
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| Photo: The Trentonian |
The boy was reported missing by his father, 41-year-old Jonathan Lehr, at about 2:30 p.m. on Sunday, reports News 13.
The three-year-old, Benjamin Lehr, was found unhurt about two hours later when a pilot with the Maine Warden Service spotted him in some tall grass and woods not far from his home in Vienna, Maine. He was dehydrated and disoriented, but otherwise OK.
