Growing

Oakland City Atty. Tells Council: Hire Your Own Pot Farm Lawyer

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on February 5, 2011 Growing, Legislation

Oakland City Attorney John Russo doesn’t want to play Pot Farm with the City Council anymore.

Russo has delivered another blow to the city’s plans to license and tax large-scale marijuana farms — he’s withdrawn his legal advice and told the City Council to hire their own attorney.

In the letter Russo advises the council to retain outside counsel for the duration of the deliberations on the medical cannabis cultivation issue, reports Cecily Burt of The Oakland Tribune. He said that once an attorney has been secured, his office will turn over the files it has amassed so far.

Man Arrested After Calling 911 For Marijuana Growing Advice

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on February 4, 2011 Growing, News

Photo: Danbury News-Times

Robert Michelson, 21, thought it would be a good idea to call 911 to get legal advice on growing marijuana

Well, at least he got an answer to his question. A Connecticut man who called 911 looking for legal advice on growing marijuana is now facing multiple drug charges.

Robert Michelson, 21, allegedly called Farmington Police Thursday night to ask “how much trouble he could get in” for growing one marijuana plant, police said, reports the Danbury News-Times.

The dispatcher advised Michelson that he could be arrested. Michelson then thanked the dispatcher and hung up.

Police then traced the call to an address on Waterville Road. Narcotics officers from Farmington went to the house and reportedly discovered that Michelson was — surprise, surprise! — growing marijuana.

Feds Warn Oakland: Industrial Marijuana Farms Are Illegal

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on February 3, 2011 Growing, News

Photo: Adrian Rushton/Colchester Gazette

There was some more ominous saber-rattling from federal drug warriors Wednesday as a U.S. Attorney strongly warned Oakland that big industrial marijuana farms are illegal, and that the Department of Justice is considering “civil and criminal legal remedies” if the city goes ahead with its plans to permit them.

In a letter [PDF] obtained by The Bay Citizen, U.S. Attorney Melinda Haag warned that the DOJ is “concerned” about Oakland’s “licensing scheme that permits large-scale industrial marijuana cultivation and manufacturing as it authorizes conduct contrary to federal law and threatens the federal government’s efforts to regulate the possession, manufacturing, and trafficking of controlled substances.”

The central point of Haag’s letter was clear: Marijuana is illegal under federal law.

DEA Hits Michigan Again: Two Caregivers Raided, Charged

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on February 2, 2011 Growing, News

Photo: Addiction Inbox

Two Michigan men face federal marijuana charges in U.S. District Court in Grand Rapids, but the lawyer for one of the defendants said the men were in compliance with the state’s Medical Marihuana Act.

The number of plants seized was within state law because of the number of caregivers who were growing at the location, according to the lawyer, Bob Baldori, reports Andy Balaskovitz at Lansing City Pulse.

Randall Darling, 24, and Joseph Johnson, also in his 20s, each face counts of growing more than 100 marijuana plants, according to court documents.

The federal cultivation charges come with a five-year minimum prison sentence. Warrants were issued for Darling and Johnson on January 20. Both await pretrial hearings.

Both defendants were within the state’s medical marijuana law, according to Baldori, who represents Johnson. While the DEA confiscated more than 200 plants from a grow operation in Mason, Baldori said Johnson and Darling are both patients and caregivers with the maximum allowed five patients.

California Green Rush: Real Housewives Or Weeds Wanna-Be’s?

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on January 31, 2011 Culture, Growing

Photo: Qwickstep.com

By Jack Rikess

Toke of the Town

Northern California Correspondent

“Angela” blames most of her problems on the economy. “I had a total of three houses, the one I lived in and two others I bought as investments in early ’04. After my real estate business stalled in ’08, I was basically sitting on three empty houses that I couldn’t move or even rent. That when I decided that maybe there was another way: I would grow marijuana.”

And that’s where all of Angela’s troubles started.

Colorado Medical Grower Bartkowicz Gets 5 Years In Prison

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on January 28, 2011 Growing, Medical, News

Photo: Chris Bartkowicz

Happier Times: In 2009 when he uploaded this photo to Facebook, Chris Bartkowicz wrote in the caption: “it’s legal so I started growing it outta my ears. Love this LAW!! LEGAL WEED!!!” He was sentenced to five years in federal prison on Friday.

Chris Bartkowicz, a Colorado man who ran a medical marijuana growing operation from the basement of his home, was sentenced Friday morning to five years in federal prison.

Bartkowicz pleaded guilty in October to federal drug charges, which vengeful Drug Enforcement Administration agents raided within hours after Chris showed the grow operation to a TV news team.

Under his plea agreement, Bartkowicz and federal prosecutors settled on a prison term of five years, and federal District Court Judge Philip Brimmer chose to accept that deal, reports John Ingold at The Denver Post. His release will be followed by eight years of supervised probation. Under federal sentencing rules, Chris must serve at least 85 percent of his sentence, which means, like the case of Marc Emery, a minimum of 51 months in prison.

“Five years is a long time,” Assistant U.S. Attorney M.J. Menendez said during the hearing. “It’s going to allow him time to get treatment and it’s going to give him time to reflect on what brought him here today.”

Law Enforcement Says Hunters At Risk From Marijuana Growers

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on January 24, 2011 Growing, News

Photo: Randy Pench/Sacramento Bee

A special agent with the Bureau of Land Management looks at marijuana plants illegally growing on BLM land in El Dorado County, California.

California’s public lands are overrun with medical marijuana growing operations, guarded by armed crews toting powerful weaponry — and hunters are at risk, according to a law enforcement panel including game wardens and a Bureau of Narcotic Enforcement task force commander.

The message came Sunday during the 24th International Sportsmen’s Exposition at Cal Expo in Sacramento, reports Loretta Kalb of The Sacramento Bee.

The Mexican drug cartels have turned to California for their operations that now supply much of the United States with weed, according to the panelists.

Stoner Photo of the Day: Got Milk?

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on January 18, 2011 Growing

Photo: Hapee Farmer

Got milk? Or how about something even safer and better for you?

Medical Marijuana Patient Sues To Keep Growing Pot Plants

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on January 17, 2011 Growing, Medical

Graphic: Michigan Medical Marijuana Association

A registered medical marijuana patient in Michigan is suing the Lyon Township and Oakland County because they’re trying to take his growing cannabis plants away from him.

Steven J. Greene got a notice from the township attorney on December 20 telling him he had 30 days to get rid of the marijuana plants growing inside his mobile home — on threat of seizure and prosecution under the township ordinance, reports Mike Martindale at The Detroit News.

A copy of the letter was also sent to the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office, which discovered the plants last year after both a storm and an attempted break-in set off burglar alarms at Green’s residence in separate incidents, according to Greene’s attorney, Thomas Loeb.

Greene, who is HIV positive, is on medical disability and uses marijuana to combat nausea from drugs used to treat his health condition, Loeb said.

D.C. Medical Marijuana Rules Take Effect Next Week

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on January 14, 2011 Dispensaries, Growing, Medical

Photo: Clarissa Stark

In the U.S. capitol, the District of Columbia’s medical marijuana program’s rules governing who can grow, dispense and buy marijuana go into effect next week, once they’re published in the D.C. Register.

The rules, originally drafted and opened to public comment last August, had some changes requested by medical marijuana advocates in a second version released in November, reports Martin Austermuhle at the DCist. However, the system envisioned by city officials is extremely restrictive and not particularly patient-friendly (or dispensary-friendly, either, for that matter).

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