Search Results cops

Guy In Anti-Drug Ads Pleads Guilty In 100-Plant Pot Bust

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 19, 2009 Culture, Growing, News

Photo: Huntington, W.Va. Police Department

This is what the cops described as a “sophisticated marijuana factory.” Guess they don’t get out much.

A former voice for a drug-free workplace pleaded guilty Friday to “trafficking medical grade marijuana,” reports Curtis Johnson at the Huntington Herald-Dispatch.

Wendall Searls, 56, admitted in court Friday that he grew “medical grade” marijuana for himself, family and friends.

Huntington, W.Va., police called the grow operation a “marijuana factory” when they raided the house in September. They said they found more than 100 cannabis plants in a sophisticated indoor facility. Police said they believed Searls owned the grow house, but lived with his fiancée in Putnam County.

Dispensary Death Watch #2: Latest Raids, Bans, And Moratoriums

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 18, 2009 Dispensaries, Medical, News

Artwork: Jim Wheeler

Safe access to marijuana remains a distant dream to many patients — even in states which have legalized medical use

One by one, the lights are winking out. In city after city, town after town, in states where medical marijuana is now legal, patients who had dared hope they would at last have safe access to the medicine recommended by their doctors are having those hopes dashed.

The problem? Political cowardice and the panicked reaction of the status quo.

Every week brings more news of freaked out city councils and county boards of supervisors who desperately want to appear to be “doing something” — anything — about the proliferation of marijuana dispensaries.

This phenomenon is so far mostly confined to California and to a lesser extent Colorado, but it’s unfortunately also starting to happen in Michigan, Montana and even Maine — where voters specifically approved dispensaries in November.

Rather than showing true leadership by showing genuine concern for patients and communities, too many local government officials are going for the easy, knee-jerk reaction. The level of disregard for the intentions of the voters — who clearly expressed their will by legalizing medical marijuana — is breathtaking.

Dope Of The Day: Police Chief Calls Marijuana Legalization ‘Nonsense’

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 17, 2009 Culture, Legislation

Photo: www.freedomsphoenix.com

Calm down, Chief. It’s just pot.

Port Orchard, Wash., Police Chief Al Townsend is against legalizing pot, and he’s called a new bill to legalize marijuana in the state “ludicrous.”

“If the goal of the bill is to legalize marijuana for the purpose of generating tax revenue, that’s ridiculous,” Townsend wrote in an email to Kitsap Sun crime reporter Josh Farley.

Chief Townsend calls into question the judgment of his fellow Kitsap Countian, Rep. Sherry Appleton (D-Poulsbo), one of the co-sponsors of HB 2401, which would legalize marijuana for persons 21 and older.

Former Seattle Police Chief Advocates Legalizing All Drugs

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on December 15, 2009 Culture, Legislation

Photo: normstamper.com

Norm Stamper of LEAP: “Legalizing pot but not other drugs will leave huge social harms unresolved”

With marijuana legalization apparently headed for the California ballot in 2010, Seattle’s former police chief is asking, “Why stop there?”, reports Matt Coker in the OC Weekly.

Police veteran Norm Stamper wore the blue for 34 years, and was the top cop in Seattle from 1994 until 2000. He’s also the author of Breaking Rank: A Top Cop’s Exposé of the Dark Side of American Policing and one of the most prominent members of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP).

Norm breaks it down in an AlterNet post, “Let’s Not Stop At Legalizing Marijuana,” citing polls that show a majority of Americans realize legalizing pot will produce a host of benefits, including, of course, the fact that 800,000 people a year will no longer be arrested for the herb. Taxation and regulation further bolster the pro-legalization arguments.

Marijuana Patient Will Foster Freed; Once Faced 93 Years In Prison

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on November 25, 2009 Medical, News

MPP.org

Will Foster, victim of the war on medical marijuana patients

Medical marijuana patient Will Foster, who once faced 93 years in prison for growing pot in his closet, is now a free man, according to the Drug War Chronicle.

Foster was released on parole from an Oklahoma prison today, adding a happy note to a saga that stretches back to his bust in the 1990s.

Foster was in the unfortunate position of being a public example of the mindless cruelties of the war on marijuana. The 36-year-old father of two, a computer programmer, had his life changed forever when Tulsa, Okla., officers showed up at his door with a “John Doe” warrant to search for methamphetamines. No meth was found — even after officers tore apart his 5-year-old daughter’s teddy bear.

But behind a locked steel door in his basement, the cops found a 25-square-foot marijuana garden. Foster said he grew the plants to treat the chronic pain of acute rheumatoid arthritis.

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