| tokeofthetown.com |
One of Hawaii’s potential legalization bills died in committee yesterday. Hawaii House Judiciary Chairman Karl Rhoads said that he killed House Bill 699 after finding that there was not enough support to get the bill through.
Search Results: crime/ (70)
| kansas.com |
According to the late, great Peter Tosh, goats, birds fowls and ants all love marijuana. We can also add mice to that list after a nest of them burrowed into the Wichita, Kansas police evidence locker and made their home in a few bales of marijuana leftover from a 2009 raid.
| Rose Shields |
| Ed “NJWeedman” Forchion was found not guilty of marijuana distribution by a jury of his peers on Thursday |
Here’s some great news: It’s getting harder and harder for hapless, overwhelmed prosecutors to get a marijuana conviction in the United States — even when the amount in question is a pound, and the charges are distribution, not simple possession.
Such became obvious Thursday afternoon in a Mount Holly, New Jersey, courtroom, when a jury found Ed “NJWeedman” Forchion not guilty in the cannabis activist’s marijuana distribution case, reports Danielle Camilli of PhillyBurbs.com.
The decision came after Forchion was almost held in contempt of court Thursday morning as he delivered his closing argument. NJWeedman tried to introduce his jury nullification argument into the closing, but Superior Court Judge Charles Delehey, who had already barred any discussion of it, quickly stopped him.
| U.S. Open Borders |
| President Otto Perez Molina says the War On Drugs has failed |
President Perez Molina Breaks New Ground by Proposing Legal Regulation of Drugs on Eve of Wednesday’s Speech at U.N. General Assembly
Proposal Bolsters Opposition to Drug War Among Latin American Leaders as Drug Prohibition Debate Continues to Escalate
President Otto Perez Molina of Guatemala on Tuesday announced his intention to propose legally regulating currently illicit drugs as a means of reducing crime, violence and corruption. He is expected to elaborate on his proposal Wednesday when he addresses the United Nations General Assembly.
| Osocio |
Latin America Leads The Way; UN Remains Closed To Change
The 55th annual session of the Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) started on Monday in Vienna, Austria, with a focus on strengthening the drug program of the United Nations. Government representatives from more than 100 countries will discuss international cooperation in combating drugs, and the enforcement of the current prohibition model. The UN Office on Drugs and Crime will invite delegates to celebrate 100 years of “successful” drug control. Are these people disconnected from reality?
“No changes to the UN conventions or even constructive discussions on alternative policies on drugs are to be expected at this meeting,” said Ruth Dreifuss, former president of Switzerland and member of the Global Commission on Drug Policy (GCDP), a group of international leaders that has called for an end of the global War On Drugs.
| Dumb As A Blog |
Think American cops are dumb? From time to time, police in other countries step up to the plate and prove that they can make statements every bit as stupid as those from their American brothers in blue.
Case in point: After a “drugs factory” (what the Harborough Mail chose to call a pot patch) was raided, local yokel police passed on this dire admonition to a wide-eyed public:
Police are warning that when cannabis plants reach the final stages of maturity the odour they release has carcinogenic properties … Officers who deal with the plants use ventilation masks and protective suits and people who have plants in their home, especially anyone with young children, may be exposing their family to a health risk.
Yep, and remember you read it here, first, folks: Just smelling one of those horrible cannabis plants can give you cancer!
Of course, that’s complete horse shit, and anybody who’d believe it either hasn’t looked into the subject or is a damn fool… or likely both of the above, in the case of most police officers.
| Weed Quotes |
| Richard Branson, Virgin Group: “[T]he war on drugs has failed, and … what we need to do is treat drugs as a health problem, not as a criminal problem” |
Richard Branson Joins Powerful Group That Includes Sting, Arianna Huffington, Russell Simmons, Former Heads of State, and Former U.S. Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense, Surgeon General, Attorney General and Chairman of the Federal Reserve
Virgin Group founder and social entrepreneur Richard Branson has joined the Honorary Board of the Drug Policy Alliance (DPA), the U.S.-based organization that is fighting for alternatives to current drug policy that are grounded in science, compassion, health and human rights.
| Michael D. Weinstein |
| Leave that crack jacket at home, homie. |
A man accused of drug trafficking showed up for court Friday in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, wearing a jacket the bore a cartoon-style recipe for cooking crack cocaine.
“Maybe he was hoping to impress the judge or ‘crack up’ the courtroom crowd, but the fashion police at the Broward County Courthouse labeled it a fashion fail,” reports Paula McMahon at the Broward-Palm Beach Sun-Sentinel.
“Probably not the smartest attire for a defendant!” wise-cracked Michael D. Weinstein, a lawyer who snapped the cellphone photo which accompanies this article.
The white jacket seemed to be a how-to guide for cooking crack cocaine, complete with little pictures of a white substance with a spoon, a carton of baking soda and a pot over a fire. The end product was “rock.”
The recipe was capped off by the slogan “Stack Paper Say Nothing” — in other words, make money, hold onto it and keep your mouth shut about where it came from.
| Curt Merlo/The Village Voice |
Violent crime has declined dramatically in New York City since 1990, the year when the Big Apple set a record for the most homicides in its history. A new study shows that the price of hard drugs has also plummeted in the past 20 years, and suggests the two phenomena may be linked.
The price of cocaine fell from $400-$460 per pure gram in the early 1980s to less then $200 by the early 2000s, reports Alexander Hotz at The New York World. Similarly, heroin prices dropped from $3,000 to $3,600 per pure gram in the 1980s to about $2,000 by the 2000s.
A team of anthropologists and economists at Manhattan’s John Jay College of Criminal Justice at the City University of New York (CUNY) has suggested that the collapse of heroin and cocaine prices might be at least partially responsible for the reversal of crime rates.
| Kitsap Sun |
| Now retired, Bremerton cop Roy Alloway was one of WestNET’s top officers. Next month he’s up for sentencing on federal tax fraud and gun dealing charges. |
Among defense attorneys, “narcotics officers” have a certain reputation: thuggishly violent goons who enjoy trashing suspects’ homes and bullying children. There’s no better example of why such perceptions exist than the WestNET task force in Washington state.
Reporter Sean Robinson of the Tacoma News Tribune nailed the federally funded task force to the wall in an exposé this week. The well-done piece revealed that the unit, based in Kitsap County and pulling officers from various departments, uses hyper-aggressive tactics and exaggerated claims of effectiveness, reports Nina Shapiro at Seattle Weekly.
Toke of the Town readers may remember that WestNET (West Sound Narcotics Enforcement Team) is the same bunch of wanna-be Rambos who busted into the house of medical marijuana dispensary operator Christine Casey, pulled a gun on her 15-year-old son and took the money from her nine-year-old daughter’s Mickey Mouse Wallet.