News

New York City’s New Marijuana Policy Has Been In Effect for 48 Hours

By William Breathes on November 21, 2014 Culture, News

It’s been two days since New York City began a more lenient, pot-friendly approach to public display of cannabis. And while we won’t have any concrete data for weeks or months, we imagine it’s already changed life in the Big Apple. People aren’t going to be arrested for public display of small amounts of pot after cops stop them, frisk them and demand they turn out their pockets – eliminating a major tool that the cops used to criminalize black and brown people in the city.
But it doesn’t exactly legalize pot use, either. Woody Harrelson and the cast of Saturday Night Live summed up the changes beautifully last week. Video below.

Alaska Cops Holding on to Prohibition as Long as They Can

By William Breathes on November 21, 2014 Legalize It, News, Say what?

Despite the passage of new laws making the possession of small amounts of pot legal in Alaska, prosecutors in the state say they’ll still be pursuing cannabis cases until the new laws are signed and on the books.
In other states like Washington and Colorado, prosecutors began dropping minor possession cases even before the governor signed the bill into law – arguing that they wouldn’t be able to take the case to trial, nor would they want to waste the resources. It’s what they community they serve clearly demanded they do with the vote. But apparently, the cops and prosecutors don’t care about respecting the people they serve in Alaska.

Bipartisan Bill Would Give VA Doctors Ability to Recommend Medical Marijuana

By William Breathes on November 21, 2014 Legislation, News

We should be well beyond questioning whether or not marijuana helps our returning veterans cope with post-traumatic stress disorder and other conditions. But instead, vets are still denied access by Veterans Affairs doctors who are bound by federal laws prohibiting weed.
A bill introduced yesterday by Reps. Earl Blumenauer of Oregon and Dana Rohrabacher of California and co-signed by 10 other bipartisan lawmakers, would change that.

Massachusetts U.S. Attorney Debating Shutting Down Dispensaries Close to Schools

By William Breathes on November 21, 2014 News

Massachusetts U.S, Attorney Carmen Ortiz says her office is debating whether or not to weigh in on how close Massachusetts dispensaries can be to schools and considering shutting down shops within 1,000 feet of schools, playgrounds our housing.
According to the Boston Globe, six of the 15 dispensary proposals given initial go-ahead from state officials would fall within the 1,000 feet radius.

Dallas Cop Lauded as Hero in May Arrested for Domestic Violence in November

By William Breathes on November 21, 2014 FTP, News

Julian Harris, a rookie officer in the Dallas Police Department’s South Central Patrol Division, was arrested Thursday morning after police were called to meet with an injured woman at Dallas’ Charlton Methodist Hospital. DPD detectives say that a fight between Harris and the woman at Harris’ Dallas apartment escalated into violence that left the woman hospitalized with serious injuries.
Harris was booked into Dallas County Jail just after 11 a.m. for aggravated assault. An emergency protective order was also issued to keep him away from the woman. In May, just nine weeks after Harris graduated from the police academy, he and another officer were praised for helping rescue a group of hooky-playing boys from a flooding creek.
The Dallas Observer has more.

Mexican Government Has Been “Hijacked” by Drug Cartels, Says Author Francisco Goldman

By William Breathes on November 21, 2014 Global, News

Commons/Protoplasmakid

Last night, President Barack Obama announced he will take executive action to shield five million undocumented immigrants from deportation. The prime-time speech was big news in the U.S., kicking up a political skirmish ahead of the 2016 elections. But it was far from the continent’s top story. Instead, that title goes to the disappearance and presumed assassination of 43 students in Mexico.
The American media has largely ignored the unrest down south. Bizarrely, the Book Fair has brought the news to Miami anyway. Earlier this week, prize-winning Mexican writer Elena Poniatowska compared the massacre to the horrors of the “concentration camps.” And in an interview to promote his own appearance this weekend, fellow writer Francisco Goldman tells New Times that this is a “terrifying and exhilarating” moment for Mexico.

Arizona Pro-Pot Activist Billy Hayes Faces Serious Prison Time but Doesn’t Know When to Quit

By William Breathes on November 20, 2014 News, Say what?

Billy Benjamin Hayes Jr., 39, is one of Arizona’s most vocal marijuana activists. Few people welcomed the Arizona Medical Marijuana Act when voters passed it in 2010 more than Hayes. The lanky father of three is a marijuana enthusiast, a grower for nearly his whole life who imbibes regularly, whether by smoking, vaporizing, or eating.
His name often is seen in Internet forums of the Arizona Department of Health Services, the agency that oversees the medical-marijuana program. Having learned just enough law to be dangerous during an eight-month stint in prison on a marijuana-possession violation, he’s sued the federal government (unsuccessfully) over the law’s  ”25-mile rule,” which limits where patients can grow marijuana, and helps his pro bono pot-activist lawyer, Tom Dean, write court motions.
Hayes needs an attorney because he’s also an entrepreneur who just may be ahead of his time. Ray Stern at the Phoenix New Times has more on Hayes and the state of Arizona’s medical marijuana system.

NBC’s Tony Dokoupil on Miami’s Golden Era of Marijuana Smuggling: “Pot Today Is So Boring”

By William Breathes on November 20, 2014 Media, News

Scarface. Cocaine Cowboys. How to Leave Hialeah. Now contraband smuggling story fans can add a new title to their list of must-haves: Tony Dokoupil’s The Last Pirate. The book’s subtitle says it all: “A Father, His Son, and the Golden Age of Marijuana.” Dokoupil, a reporter for NBC, will speak about his gripping, sometimes hilarious memoir this Sunday at the Miami Book Fair International. Beforehand, he spoke to our friends at the Miami New Times about the longing he feels for South Florida’s long-lost era of pot smuggling, despite the way the business tore his own family apart.
“I’m nostalgic about that era of marijuana because I think it was the final era in which we had criminals in this country who were truly larger cultural figures,” he says. “Pot today is so boring. It’s such a field of guys in suits with dimpled ties and square jaws and creeping bellies from too many steaks.” More at the Riptide blog.

Former Cop Accused of Killing Wife After Pot Argument, Faking Her “Suicide”

By William Breathes on November 20, 2014 News

A family photo of Ashley Fallis.

Ashley Fallis’s family never bought the story that she killed herself following a New Year’s Eve celebration three years ago — and their persistence has finally paid off. Her husband, former police officer Tom Fallis, has been arrested and charged with murdering her and then making it look like a suicide following an argument about marijuana smoking.

90 Pounds of Cali Weed Mistakenly Shows Up at Clothing Store in Philly

By Jack Daniel on November 20, 2014 News, Say what?

Two of the three 30lb parcels of pot that showed up at City Blue this week

Founded on 13th and market Street in downtown Philadelphia in 1981, the high styled retail outlet City Blue now has 25 locations across Pennsylvania, Delaware, New Jersey, and Ohio.
Touting themselves as “a leader and innovator in urban fashion”, managers in all City Blue locations are likely very busy these days ordering in new items to be sure that their shelves are fully stocked for the holiday rush. With so many packages in transit during this time of year, mistakes certainly do happen, but when the manager of the City Blue store in Upper Darby, PA sliced into an unknown package delivered to his store earlier this week, he was greeted by a box full of product that he simply could not sell…at least, not legally.

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