News

Browsing: News

N.J. Man With M.S. Free On Bail While Appealing 5-Year Pot Sentence

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 27, 2010 Growing, Medical, News

John Ray Wilson, a multiple sclerosis patient, has been granted $15,000 bail so he can remain free while appealing his five-year prison sentence for growing 17 marijuana plants behind his home

A Franklin Township, N.J., man who was sent to prison for growing marijuana which he said was used to treat his multiple sclerosis will remain free on $15,000 bail while he appeals his conviction, a Superior Court judge ruled Tuesday.

John Ray Wilson, 37, is serving a five-year sentence for second-degree “drug manufacturing” and third-degree drug possession for growing 17 marijuana plants behind the house he rented, reports Jennifer Golson at The Star-Ledger.

Humboldt County Accepts DEA Funds For Pot Eradication

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 27, 2010 Growing, News

Photo: Public CEO

Do you live in Humboldt? These idiots just got $170,000 more in federal money to pay them overtime for stealing your pot.

The Humboldt County, California Board of Supervisors accepted $170,000 from the federal government for “marijuana related law enforcement work” last Tuesday morning, despite one man’s advice to the contrary.

“Respect the sacred herb,” Tad Robinson said during the public comment portion of the meeting. “Say ‘No DEA, this is not what we want our law enforcement to do in Humboldt County.'”

The funding, from the federal Drug Enforcement Administration, will be used to pay Humboldt County Sheriff’s deputies overtime “for the eradication of marijuana.” The money will also pay for the salary and overtime of reserve officers, reports Donna Tam at the Redwood Times.

California Courts Rule In Favor Of Marijuana Patients

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 26, 2010 Medical, News

Graphic: TopNews

It was an open and shut case — or at least, the police in a northern California town thought so when they confiscated more than two pounds of marijuana from a couple’s home, even though doctors authorized the pair to use cannabis for medical purposes.

San Francisco police evidently thought the same with a father and son they suspected of using the state’s medical marijuana law to operate what the cops claimed was an illegal trafficking organization, reports KTVQ.

But both those cases, along with possibly dozens of others, were tossed out in recent weeks because of a California Supreme Court ruling that struck down a seven-year-old state law that put an eight-ounce limit on the amount of marijuana that medical users are allowed to possess.

‘Father Of Medical Marijuana’ Dennis Peron Suffers Stroke

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 26, 2010 Culture, News

Photo: The Wow Report

Dennis Peron is co-author of Prop 215, which legalized medical marijuana in California

Dennis Peron, the “father of medical marijuana” who co-authored Proposition 215, the 1996 ballot initiative which legalized medical cannabis in California, has suffered a stroke, reports Joe Eskenazi at SF Weekly.

“That’s why I didn’t give a speech at the Hemp Expo,” Peron, 65, told the Weekly. The cannabis guru and gay rights activist said he suffered the stroke about a month ago and underwent an operation Sunday to “unclog my artery.”

Peron in the 1990s came to serve as a figurehead for the cannabis legalization movement, and was highly influential in the debate in California, thus helping to change the political atmosphere surrounding marijuana in the United States.

A Long Island native, Peron served the Air Force in Vietnam and afterward moved to San Francisco’s Castro District in 1969, where he sold marijuana and ran the Big Top pot supermarket out of his home in the 1970s.

He opened the Church Street Compassion Center in 1993, the very first “pot club” in the United States, which became the legendary San Francisco Cannabis Buyers Club in 1995, a year before Prop 215 legalized medical pot.

Upcoming Marijuana March Reaches Goal Of 300 Cities

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 26, 2010 News

Graphic: Cures Not Wars

The National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) is hailing the passage of another milestone for the Global Marijuana March, with Georgetown, Guyana and Ryebrook, N.Y., as the 299th and 300th cities holding a march, rally, forum or benefit on the weekends of Saturday, May 1 and May 8.

NORML and numerous other groups called for more cities this year to participate, so that organizers could meet and surpass their stated goal of more than 200 cities.

“Worldwide action is necessary for any outright legalization, since cannabis is largely prohibited globally by a United Nations treaty known as the Single Convention, enacted in 1962 through the efforts of top anti-cannabis zealot Harry Anslinger, the original instigator of U.S. cannabis prohibition in 1937,” said Allen St. Pierre, executive director of NORML.

Canada: Ottawa Police Chief Supports Pot Decriminalization

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 26, 2010 Legislation, News

Photo: Chris Mikula/The Gazette

Ottawa Police Chief Vern White said although he doesn’t want people to have criminal records for simple marijuana possession, he doesn’t agree that cannabis is harmless.

Ottawa Police Chief Vern White said he isn’t interested in arresting marijuana users or giving them criminal records, and would support discussing decriminalization. “My only concern about the word ‘decriminalizing’ is the suggestion to the public that [marijuana]is not a dangerous drug,” he said.

The Ottawa Citizen asked about pot decrim following a recent community meeting, reports Tony Spears.

An Angus Reid poll earlier this month showed a majority of Canadians want to legalize marijuana. And on April 20, hundreds flocked to Parliament Hill to light up in an annual tradition in support of decriminalization.

Pot Patients, Growers Prepare To Fight County Restrictions

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 23, 2010 Growing, Medical, News

Photo: Julie R. Johnson/Corning Observer

Ken and Kathy Prather, owners of medical marijuana dispensary Tehama Herbal Collective in Corning, California

Hundreds of people are signing up as litigants in a class action lawsuit to be filed against Tehama County, California, for its recently approved medical marijuana cultivation regulations.

Many of the potential litigants, medical marijuana growers and patients, met in Red Bluff on Thursday to fill out forms naming themselves as plaintiffs in a lawsuit being backed by California NORML, reports Julie R. Johnson of Tri-County Newspapers.

Kathy Prather, co-owner of Tehama Herbal Collective (THC), a marijuana dispensary in Corning, said the lawsuit will be filed against Tehama County because of its recent ordinance regulating medical cannabis cultivation.

MI: Medical Pot Demand Booming; Agency Can’t Keep Pace

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 23, 2010 Medical, News

Graphic: Medical Marijuana Blog

One year into Michigan’s medical marijuana law, health officials can’t keep up with the demand.

Because of a growing backlog of about 3,000 applications, those wishing to use marijuana medically or grow it for patients have a three-month wait for registry cards, according to the Michigan Department of Community Health, reports Scott Davis at Lansing State Journal.

“We’re (now) getting a thousand applications a week,” said department spokesman James McCurtis. “It’s going to take some time to get through all applications, even with new help.”

The department said it had issued 13,239 permits for use of marijuana and 5,460 permits for caregivers to grow it, as of April 16. The program kicked off in April 2009.

Florida Senate Unanimously Passes Bong Ban

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 22, 2010 Legislation, News

Photo: Florida House Democratic Caucus

Are these bongs “destructive utensils” that “destroy communities”? The Florida Senate thinks so.

The Florida Senate has unanimously passed a bill that would ban the sale of glass smoking pipes at most stores that currently carry them.

Senate Bill 366 requires 75 percent of a business’s gross sales to come from tobacco products before they are allowed to sell bongs, water pipes and “air-driven pipes,” reports WJHG.

It passed the Senate unanimously, 36-0, on Wednesday.

Supporters of the legislation claim the pipes can be used to smoke illegal drugs like marijuana and cocaine.

The proposal could hurt some businesses, like Condom Knowledge in Panama City Beach.

Lawyers Say Marijuana’s Drug Status Should Change

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on April 22, 2010 Medical, News

Graphic: Salem News

The New England Journal of Medicine on Wednesday published an editorial by two law professors arguing that the federal government should change to a less restrictive status for marijuana under the Controlled Substances Act.

Marijuana’s current Schedule I status, according to the professors, stops researchers from studying the medical benefits and health risks of cannabinoid-based medicine, even though state laws in 14 states allow doctors to recommend the drug, reports Lauren Cox at ABC News.

“Although state laws represent a political response to patients seeking relief from debilitating symptoms, they are inadequate to advance effective treatment,” the professors argue. “Medical experts emphasize the need to reclassify marijuana as a Schedule II drug to facilitate rigorous scientific evaluation of the potential therapeutic benefits of cannabinoids and to determine the optimal dose and delivery route for conditions in which efficacy is established.”

Previous 1 … 455 456 457 458 459 … 490 Next