Search Results: supreme court (266)

The Colorado Supreme Court has overruled a district court decision that upheld a county court ruling requiring a doctor’s testimony for medical marijuana patients who want to use their medication while on probation. The Colorado Supreme Court decision, handed down November 18, weakens the restrictions and burdens of proof that Colorado judges can place on medical marijuana patients.

In their decision, the justices said that unless a probationer’s medical marijuana use conflicts with the specified goals of sentencing, cannabis use should be allowed.

With over 80,000 Coloradans on the state’s MMJ registry, it’s not surprising that this question frequently crops up: Can a medical marijuana patient on probation still use their cannabis medication?

The answer was supposed to be black and white after a 2015 state law approving allowing people on probation to use medical marijuana, but the reality is still gray and murky, with frequent court arguments over the burden of proof and necessity for a convicted patient’s medical marijuana use while on probation. However, a 2016 DUI case could finally push the Colorado Supreme Court to provide more definitive answers.

For the past four years, any time local police seized cannabis in a criminal investigation, they’ve been required to care for it, either by keeping the plants alive or by returning the marijuana in a usable form to the owner. That’s no longer the case.

On January 23, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled that requiring police to store marijuana in evidence is in violation of federal law. The court issued its opinion in the case of the People v. Robert Crouse.

Crouse, a medical marijuana patient, was arrested on May 5, 2011, on charges of cultivation and possession of marijuana after police seized 55 marijuana plants and about 2.9 kilograms of marijuana product from his home. He was charged with a felony count of cultivating more than thirty marijuana plants. Crouse asserted that he was in lawful possession of the cannabis for medical purposes, and a jury acquitted him of marijuana-related drug crimes.

On Thursday, a Maricopa County judge threw out a lawsuit challenging the pending Arizona ballot initiative to legalize marijuana for recreational use. Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Jo Lynn Gentry ruled that the plaintiffs had no legal standing and made no legitimate claims.

The ruling appears to clear the way for the initiative, officially designated Proposition 205, to appear on the November 8 ballot.


Randy Ankeney was once a rising star in the Colorado Republican party, only to become a pariah after being found guilty of numerous sex crimes. However, he now has the opportunity to impact the state in a completely different way. A complaint he brought about alleged prisoner-release violations by the Colorado Department of Corrections is headed to the state supreme court, and if it’s successful, his attorney, David Lane, says it could result in potentially thousands of inmates who’ve been incarcerated too long being freed — including marijuana prisoners. Denver Westword has the full story.


Medical cannabis is quickly becoming a lucrative business in Minnesota, with potential manufacturers and consulting companies wanting to get in on the action. But one group — lawyers — is being locked out of the market so far by their own code of ethics, and they’re trying to get it fixed as soon as possible.
The law firm Thompson Hall sent a petition to the Minnesota Supreme Court last week looking to change the state’s rules for lawyers. Right now, the rules say that lawyer’s can’t give advice to those applying to be one of the state’s two cannabis manufacturers. The conflict boils down to a few lines in the Minnesota Rules of Professional Conduct, basically an ethics guide for lawyers in the state.


In a move that has state police in an uproar, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court yesterday ruled that the smell of unburned pot in a car isn’t enough of a reason for cops to search it because the state decriminalized small amounts back in 2008. Basically: because some amounts of pot possession aren’t a crime, the cops can’t use the smell of weed to justify their search.
Not only that, but the court pointed out that they made a similar ruling three years ago, deciding that the smell of raw weed wasn’t enough to justify the search of someone on the street. According to the judges: the police should “focus their attention elsewhere.”

In October 2012, the Judicial Qualifications Commission’s investigative panel filed formal charges against Palm Beach County Judge Barry M. Cohen for using his bench as, in their words, a “bully pulpit” and “a neutral and detached magistrate.”
The findings came after the outspoken judge made some comments about racial profiling and mandatory sentences.
Specifically, Cohen criticized the Palm Beach County State Attorney’s Office for the way it handles criminal cases. He also criticized the law making marijuana illegal and has been outspoken on the county’s police department’s alleged racial profiling and racial bias. Some would say Cohen is just speaking the truth (including us here at Toke of the Town). The panel, however, found it inappropriate behavior for a judge and recommended a reprimand by the Florida Supreme Court. On Tuesday morning, Cohen received that reprimand.


It isn’t every day that a relatively minor pot bust case makes it all the way to the United States Supreme Court, but on Tuesday the highest court in the land heard and decided on just such a case. Obviously, the implications behind it were much larger than the measly four bags of weed confiscated during a California highway traffic stop way back in 2008.


Florida Gov. Rick Scott’s plan to randomly drug test every single state employee in Florida — from department heads to minimum wage DMV janitors — has already failed the common-sense test and an appeals court ruling. A trial run of the program found that almost no state employees were failing, while an appeals court ruled that the program violated the constitution.
But Scott hasn’t given up on the idea yet. The U.S. Supreme Court will likely decide this week whether to take up the latest petition filed by Scott’s lawyers.

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