| Photo: David Guralnick/The Detroit News |
| Co-owner Matt Curtis talks about the 15 to 20 varieties of marijuana sold at Clinical Relief LLC, a medical marijuana dispensary in Ferndale, Mich. The business’s client base grew to more than 1,000, according to owners, before police raids shut the place down last month. Now the City Council wants to charge a $2K per year “licensing fee.” |
So, Ferndale, what’s it gonna be — raid ’em or tax ’em? Because it’s a little unseemly to do both.
Owners of any new medical marijuana dispensaries that want to open in the city of Ferndale, Michigan will have to pay a $2,000 fee for their license and annual renewals. That may not sound like the best of news, but could taxation mean an end to police raids like the one which closed down the city’s only dispensary last month?
The City Council enacted the “licensing fee” last week, and officials claimed they did so to “recover the costs” associated with inspections and other duties city workers and police conduct for licensing, reports Michael P. McConnell of the Oakland County Daily Tribune.
| Graphic: Fishbowl LA |
| Allison Margolin, “L.A.’s Dopest Attorney,” is joining forces with her famed dad Bruce Margolin to form a powerhouse law firm. |
When Allison Margolin went into the practice of law, she followed in the footsteps of her distinguished father, attorney Bruce M. Margolin. Bruce is currently the director of the Los Angeles chapter of NORML (National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws), a post he has held for more than 30 years.
It took ambitious Allison just under a decade to establish herself as an equally sophisticated criminal defense lawyer in her own right, gaining fame as “L.A.’s Dopest Attorney.”
Now father and daughter are merging to form a new law firm which will unite two of the country’s most prominent marijuana law experts.
In his career, spanning four decades, Bruce has successfully represented thousands of clients, including Dr. Timothy Leary, well known attorney Tony Serra, Marlon Brando’s son Christian Brando, and porn star Linda Lovelace.
He has also been involved in the “Lawyer in the Classroom” Program on behalf of the Constitutional Rights Foundation.
A Columbia College graduate and Harvard Law School alumnus, Allison’s greatest professional achievements have come in the courtroom as a successful trial lawyer. She is as known for her toughness in the courtroom as she is for being easy on the eyes (Allison isn’t averse to appearing in ads rocking tank tops and fishnets.)
Profiled in front-page stories for the Los Angeles Times and Daily Journal in 2006 and recently appearing on the cover of the April issue of California Lawyer magazine, Allison has been quoted in newspapers throughout the U.S.
| Graphic: High Times |
From 12 noon until 4 p.m. Saturday, September 18, dozens of marijuana activists are scheduled to rally on an I-5 overpass in Seattle and to wave “Free Marc” signs at the traffic below.
Activists continue to call on President Obama to pardon Marc Emery, a Canadian and the so-called “Prince of Pot,” who was recently sentenced to five years in federal prison for selling marijuana seeds by mail to American customers.
“The Emery case is a prime example of the overreach of the federal government and the need for marijuana laws that match social reality in America,” said Philip Dawdy, Sensible Washington’s co-founder and vice-chair.
“It’s crazy that he’s going to prison for selling seeds and that the federal government is willing to spend millions of dollars prosecuting and imprisoning him,” Dawdy said. “President Obama should pardon Emery and get busy with reforming America’s outdated marijuana laws.
| Photo: GrassCity.com |
“It’s time to de-stupidify medical marijuana,” begins a Friday editorial by Shawn Vestal in The Spokane Spokesman-Review, which then proceeds to do exactly that.
Vestal’s excellent editorial pointed out the considerable time, effort and money spent on bringing down a local medical marijuana dispensary in Washington state.
“If someone breaks into your garage, don’t hold your breath waiting for an officer,” the paper editorialized. “But if you’re growing medical marijuana in that garage, they’ll find a way to send a car.”
“Simple folk might do something simple, like legalize it,” the editorial said. “Medical or not: Who cares?”
| Photo: The Fresh Scent |
| Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske: “Calling marijuana medicine has sent the absolute wrong message to our young people” |
Advocates Say Federal Health Study Exaggerates Claims, Fails To Connect The Dots
The results of a national survey on drug use and health were issued Wednesday by the federal government, noting a surge in the use of marijuana and other drugs such as ecstasy and methamphetamine. Gil Kerlikowske, head of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), took the opportunity to rail against medical marijuana use.
Drug Czar Kerlikowske used the study to argue in mainstream media outlets that marijuana “is not medicine,” claiming that the issue of medical marijuana sends “mixed messages” to youth.
| Photo: Jesse Tinsley/Spokesman-Review |
| Paul Ellis sold medical marijuana from this Spokane Valley strip mall until he was raided by the Spokane County Sheriff’s Office — days after giving them a tour of the place and of his home marijuana grow operation. In the window is reflected a Washington State Patrol office. |
Paul Ellis thought he wasn’t doing anything wrong when he opened a medical marijuana dispensary in Spokane, Washington last December. He located the operation, called Med Mar Dis, across the street from a Washington State Patrol office, and asked the sergeant who worked there if Ellis could use law enforcement labs to test his cannabis for contaminants.
But Spokane County Sheriff’s detectives didn’t see things that way, reports Nina Shapiro at our sister Village Voice Media blog, Seattle Weekly. The Spokane County Prosecutor’s office is considering filing drug charges against Ellis after detectives raided his dispensary and home on September 2, reports Meghann M. Cuniff at the Spokane Spokesman-Review.
| Graphic: Boston Freedom Rally |
The Massachusetts Cannabis Reform Coalition (Mass Cann) will host its 21st annual Freedom Rally Saturday, September 18, beginning at High Noon on the Boston Common.
This year’s theme, “Cannabis Is Medicine,” highlights Mass Cann’s ongoing efforts to obtain passage by a reluctant Legislature of a law that would allow patients or registered caregivers, with their doctor’s written recommendation, to possess and grow marijuana for the patient’s personal medical use.
| Photo: Lotsa ‘Splainin’ 2 Do |
| Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske falsely claimed that marijuana profits are a “small part” of the cartels’ operations — when the government’s own figures estimate the figure at 60 percent. |
Just Say Now Infiltrates Press Conference, Hand Delivers 52,536 Petition Signatures
The Just Say Now campaign to legalize marijuana slipped into a press conference Thursday with US Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske to deliver a petition signed by 52,536 people, asking President Obama to end the federal government’s war on marijuana.
Daniel Pacheco, a Colombian student studying at Georgetown University and member of Students for Sensible Drug Policy, confronted Kerlikowske and offered the petition on behalf of 52,536 Just Say Now activists, and the 28,000 people killed in Mexico in the bloody battle with drug cartels.
“Today I represented the voices of 52,536 people who asked President Barack Obama to end the war on marijuana, to deliver our petition directly to Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske, the man most responsible for the country’s continued prohibition of marijuana,” Pacheco said. “We ask that President Barack Obama and his administration hear Mexican President Calderon’s and Colombian President Santos’ call for a debate on legalizing marijuana in the United States – the only way to have any impact on the brutal war with cartels.”
Kerlikowske accepted the petition from Pacheco and Just Say Now. But when asked to respond to Mexican President Felipe Calderon’s call for an open conversation about legalizing marijuana as a way to defund the drug cartels, Kerlikowske falsely claimed that marijuana profits are a “small part” of the cartels’ operations.
| Daniel Rhoades/A Life Of Absolute Gangsterism |
Man, I really hate to tell you this. But if you’re a cannabis user in California, you should stop drinking beer, unless you are into donating money to continue being busted for pot.
The second biggest contributor to the main group opposing Prop 19 marijuana legalization in California — behind only law enforcement organizations — is the trade association for the state’s beer distributors, according to Steve Fox of the Marijuana Policy Project, co-author of Marijuana Is Safer.
On September 7, the California Beer and Beverage Distributors made a whopping $10,000 contribution to a committee opposing Proposition 19.
“Unless the beer distributors in California have suddenly developed a philosophical opposition to the use of intoxicating substances, the motivation behind this contribution is clear,” Fox said.
“Plain and simple, the alcohol industry is trying to kill the competition,” Fox said. “They know that marijuana is less addictive, less toxic and less likely to be associated with violent behavior than alcohol. So they don’t want adults to have the option of using marijuana legally instead of alcohol.”
“Their mission is to drive people to drink,” Fox said.
| Graphic: Hemptopian |