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What a long, strange trip for state's medical marijuana law- by Patrick McCartney

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Sun, 11/05/2006 - 1:23pm — Linda

CA: What a long, strange trip for state's medical marijuana law

By Patrick McCartney - Special to the Bee

Published 12:00 am PST Sunday, November 5, 2006

Story appeared in FORUM section, Page E1

Ten years after California voters approved Proposition 215, a landmark
medical marijuana law, many qualified patients still run a gantlet of
federal drug agents and hostile police and prosecutors.

This year, DEA agents, assisted by local law enforcement agencies,
have busted dozens of storefront cannabis
dispensaries, while city councils across the state have voted to
prohibit the facilities.

Proposition 215 meant to exempt patients from prosecution for
possession of medical marijuana with a doctor's approval. But elected
officials have been reluctant to implement a measure that conflicts
with federal law and is still largely opposed by the state's law
enforcement community.

Earlier this year, San Diego County supervisors sued to overturn the
voter initiative, as well as a 2003 statute that required counties to
make voluntary ID cards available to patients and caregivers, and
established minimum plant and possession guidelines. San Bernardino
and Merced county supervisors have voted to join the suit in San Diego
Superior Court. Attorneys with the ACLU and drug-policy groups will
represent the patients when the case is heard Nov. 16.

Even if many of its goals remain unrealized, the Compassionate Use Act
of 1996 spawned a grassroots political movement that is gaining
momentum despite opposition from local, state and federal authorities.

As many as a quarter-million Californians have obtained physician
approval to use medical marijuana. As Dr. Stephen Ellis, a San
Francisco cannabis consultant, put it, cannabis is not a miracle drug
pushed by pharmaceutical companies but a traditional folk medicine
rediscovered by patients who use it.

Scientific interest has grown, too. In the decade since 56 percent of
California voters passed Proposition 215, thousands of medical studies
have been published about cannabinoids, the compounds unique to
marijuana, and the role they play in human health.

Public acceptance also has increased. A 2004 Field Poll showed that
nearly three out of four Californians support a patient's ability to
choose marijuana as their medicine. Eleven other states and the
District of Columbia followed California's lead and have approved
medical marijuana laws. All of the states limit use to a shorter list
of medical conditions than California's activist-written measure, and
none has created a public distribution system.

Since Senate Bill 420, carried by former Sen. John Vasconcellos,
D-Santa Clara, allowed patients to form cooperatives, more than 200
storefront dispensaries and delivery services have opened across the
state, many in previously unthinkable jurisdictions. With a
physician's recommendation, patients outside of the Bay Area for the
first time now can exercise choice in how they obtain medical
marijuana.

Few of the gains came easily after the passage of Proposition 215.

Unfortunately, implementation of the controversial law would fall to
the same California police and prosecutors who campaigned against the
measure.

Days after the initiative passed, a delegation of California law
enforcement officials huddled with federal anti-drug officials in
Washington, D.C., to coordinate a response. Two weeks later in
Sacramento, then-Attorney General Dan Lungren met with 300 California
law enforcement officials, including district attorneys, police
chiefs, sheriffs and narcotics officers, in Sacramento. Lungren
declared that the law should be applied "as narrowly as possible" and
gave the green light to arrest marijuana growers and prosecute them
for cultivation.

Lungren's office maintained that the new law provided only an
"affirmative defense" for marijuana suspects to invoke at trial, an
interpretation the state Supreme Court declined to review.

Enforcement varied dramatically across the state's 58 counties. Where
ballot support was strongest, patients could purchase medical
marijuana from storefront dispensaries that sprang up before
Proposition 215 passed. But an hour or so from San Francisco, police
continued to arrest patients and caregivers. Some of the sick,
impoverished by chronic illnesses, were hauled into court, where they
pleaded guilty to felony charges in exchange for light sentences.

The fortunes of the patients, caregivers and doctors waxed and waned
with court decisions and turnover of state and federal officeholders.
The Clinton administration launched anti-marijuana advertising with an
annual budget of hundreds of millions of dollars, threatened
physicians who approved medical marijuana and filed suits against
cannabis dispensaries. The Bush administration followed with more
raids against dispensaries and more criminal prosecutions.

Veteran state lawmaker Bill Lockyer succeeded Lungren as California's
attorney general in 1998, and defended the Compassionate Use Act with
an amicus brief in a U.S. Supreme Court case brought by two California
patients.

More sympathetic to medical marijuana, Lockyer appointed a
stakeholders group of advocates and law enforcement opponents to hash
out an implementation bill, something the polarized factions could not
manage before the passage of SB 420 five years later. Until an
embattled Gov. Gray Davis signed SB 420 in 2003, Lockyer declined to
issue new guidelines on possession and cultivation.

As the number of arrests by state and federal authorities grew,
patients networked, protested and planned emergency responses. In
early 2003, Americans for Safe Access gave the federal government a
public-relations black eye, convincing Bay Area jurors to denounce
their own guilty verdict in the trial of pot cultivation expert Ed
Rosenthal. The Oakland-based advocacy group has since used persuasion
and the threat of litigation to win concessions from recalcitrant
state agencies and local jurisdictions.

With SB 420, locally elected officials have been drawn into the
conflict. City and county governments are confronting Proposition
215's call for "safe and affordable distribution of marijuana" in
weighing whether to regulate or prohibit cannabis dispensaries. Nearly
a hundred jurisdictions have prohibited marijuana outlets, but three
dozen cities and counties have adopted ordinances to regulate their
operation.

California law enforcement associations have lobbied against the
facilities, citing federal law. Some in the state's law enforcement
community have grudgingly accepted the reality, if not the
desirability, of medical marijuana. Others remain opposed to the very
notion, preferring to view dispensaries and caregivers as traffickers.

"There is no justification for using marijuana as a medicine,"
declares a position paper on the Web site of the 7,000-member
California Narcotics Officers Association.

As the U.S. Supreme Court noted in its 2005 ruling in the California
case, only Congress can amend the Controlled Substances Act to declare
a cease-fire in the nation's war on medical marijuana.

A decision in San Diego's lawsuit may settle whether state agencies --
including police and prosecutors -- must comply with a state law that
conflicts with federal law. Appeals will likely delay the outcome for
years. But after a decade, it's time California law enforcement
officers stop siding with the feds and defend the state law.

And lawmakers should adopt sensible regulations for dispensing medical
marijuana so local and state officials can honor the intent of voters:
Protect patients and provide them safe and affordable access to their
medicine.

http://www.sacbee.com/110/story/71364.html

‹ San Diego Votes to Appeal Ruling on Medical Marijuana Compassionate Coalition on Myspace ›

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Wed, 11/22/2006 - 11:11am — RSteeb
RSteeb's picture

SacBee replies to Special Agent Taylor

"Smokescreen of medical pot clouds view of the dangers"

http://www.sacbee.com/110/story/75076.html

By Gordon D. Taylor - Special to the Bee
Published 12:00 am PST Sunday, November 12, 2006

Pro-pot advocates often spread misinformation on the subject of so-called "medical marijuana." It's important to show the other side of the issue.

In the past 10 years, California has seen a surge of organized crime groups that have moved into the marijuana industry in a big way. Heavily armed drug cartels have made a multibillion-dollar business of going into our public lands and clear-cutting our pristine forests so they can cultivate enormous marijuana crops. Sophisticated criminal syndicates are buying homes in the Sacramento region and creating indoor marijuana factories in the midst of our family-oriented neighborhoods.

A rogue "pot club" industry has also developed throughout the state. Over the past two years, the DEA has participated in six enforcement actions against pot clubs operating in the Central Valley and inland Northern California. Shockingly, three of the six pot store owners were convicted felons, each of whom was armed with a handgun during the course of the investigations.

The largest of the six pot clubs sold marijuana to an astounding 400 people a day. Owned by two 26-year-old men, this Modesto pot club reported selling more than $3.4 million in marijuana within a six-month period. This pot club was going so well that the owners were paying their security guards $125 to $150 an hour.

Most of the people buying marijuana from these pot clubs do not appear to be seriously or terminally ill; they are able bodied, some even athletically fit, most in their 20s and some even in their late teens. These young people are purchasing marijuana not because they are seriously or terminally ill, but because they want to use marijuana for recreational purposes. To put it bluntly, they want to smoke marijuana to get high while using state laws as their shield.

Marijuana has no proven safe and effective medical use and therefore remains a prohibited substance under federal law. Contrary to misinformation spread by many medical marijuana advocates, pot is not a harmless or soft drug. In fact, it's eight times more potent today than it was in the early 1970s. Sadly, more teenagers enter drug treatment for marijuana dependency than for all other illegal drugs combined.

It's up to each of us to not only protect our public lands and neighborhoods, but to educate our young people about the dangers of marijuana and help them see through the "medical marijuana" smokescreen.

About the writer:

* Gordon D. Taylor, a veteran DEA agent, has oversight of Drug Enforcement Administration operations in 34 counties throughout the Central Valley and inland Northern California. He is responding to the Nov. 5 Forum article "What a long, strange trip for state's medical marijuana laws."

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http://www.sacbee.com/dyn/comments/standard/comments_separate.html?uri=http://www.sacbee.com/110/story/75076.html

Comments

14 Comments Posted

rocketman at 6:50 AM PST Sunday, November 12, 2006 wrote:

Give me a break

The problem isn't marijuana. Marijuana is much less harmful than alcohol. I have never seen anyone smoke marijuana and start fights or engage in violent crimes. The same cannot be said of marijuana. The real problem is the federal government's conservative views and unwillingness to legalize or even test marijuana. go away Mr. DEA agent...you are a joke.

7 out of 9 people found this comment helpful.

Kingsrgood at 9:02 AM PST Sunday, November 12, 2006 wrote:

High cost of Prohibition

The problems that Prohibition Agent Gordon Taylor cites should be laid at the doorstep of hemp PROHIBITION rather than hemp itself. Hemp is a plant that has grown freely from the Earth since time immemorial, and has been used as a safe folk remedy for thousands of years. It can be effective in treating chronic pain, nausea, appetite loss and anxiety to name just a few. Crime syndicates setting up growing sites deep in National forests, or purchasing houses to convert to nurseries, and even high cash flows at dispensaries will all disappear overnight as soon as hemp prohibition is recognized as another wasteful, overly long, unneeded 'war' based on lies and put to a long overdue end. Taylor grieves that some patients with Physician recommendations for therapeutic use are neither elderly nor terminally ill, but the language of Prop. 215, which Californians approved by 57% vote in 1996, provided that M.D.s could recommend it to treat ANY medical condition it could help.

7 out of 9 people found this comment helpful.

guither at 9:36 AM PST Sunday, November 12, 2006 wrote:

Blatant lies at taxpayer expense

Is there no oversight at all to deal with people like Gordon Taylor abusing his position to lie about marijuana (thereby protecting the very lucrative drug war on which the DEA depends for its very existence)? 1. Marijuana has proven safe and effective medical benefits. The DEA putting its fingers in its ears and saying "NYAA, NYAA, I can't hear you" doesn't negate the established medical proof. 2. Just because Taylor says pot is more potent, doesn't make it dangerous. Prohibition has caused some increased potency, but users simply use less. You want to control potency? Then legalize and regulate, just like with alcohol. 3. The fact that young people are in treatment for "marijuana dependency" has nothing to do with the dangers of marijuana, and everything to do with Mr. Taylor's efforts to arrest everyone who uses this relatively safe drug. The numbers show that people are in treatment for marijuana BECAUSE of criminal justice referrals, NOT from dependency. Stop lying.

6 out of 8 people found this comment helpful.

COmidnightrider46 at 10:07 AM PST Sunday, November 12, 2006 wrote:

Fear Mongering is no way to address the DRUG WAR anymore!

Clearly, the point where I resort to activism against you, MR. DEA AGENT, is where you start discussing hints of just how 'healthy' these dispensary clients are. I find it outrageous to portray the medical marijuana industry (both in California & Colorado) so very erroneously. Patients helping Patients is not a BOOM INDUSTRY! SURE, there are bad guys, these are the ones you might have gotten out of the picture. Forests DEFINITELY need to be protected. We have a new FENCE going up shortly which may begin to address the foreign organized crime element on some level. Each and every day, I meet with and see people with terminal illness, and seriously debilitating chronic pain. What cracker jack box did you get your medical degree from? I guess it is called "DIAGNOSIS from a DISTANCE". NOPE, don't buy it, just as the rest of your 70 year old rhetoric no longer scares average US citizens. Get back on track with the METH and other real problems,which NEED the time and energy conveyed

4 out of 7 people found this comment helpful.

rsteeb at 10:18 AM PST Sunday, November 12, 2006 wrote:

Cannabis prohibition is futile; its cornerstone is an absurd lie.

"Enforcement" professionals often spread misinformation about Cannabis in futile attempts to justify the unconscionable. Why are our pristine forests plagued by cartels' illicit crops? Prohibition-- with the black market value of the herb being close to that of gold, it WILL be grown. The law of supply-and-demand requires no armed thugs for its immutable enforcement! As to presumptuous assessments of dispensary patrons' health by "law enforcement officers", consider these facts: Emancipation is therapeutic. Aging is a terminal condition we all share. Cannabis is effective against many age-related diseases, possibly even preventing Alzheimer's. The DEA's own judge Francis L. Young has never been contradicted, but the arbitrary and capricious misclassification of Cannabis as a CSA Schedule I substance remains in effect. Until that glaring error is remedied, the Controlled Substances Act is the big lie supporting injustice and sending children the wrong message.

5 out of 8 people found this comment helpful.

goladyvols at 10:18 AM PST Sunday, November 12, 2006 wrote:

Welfare for bureaucrats

He just can't admit, to himself, he's wasted his entire career, accomplishing nothing of substance, living off the public dole, shredding the Constitution, making war on his fellow Americans, while making much ado, about nothing, etc., etc. These guys are "experts" at nothing, but blowing their holes, & raping the taxpayers, just like their fellow acronym mercenaries. Message to Gordon D. Taylor...GET A REAL JOB, like everybody else...party's over...gravy train's arriving at the station, get off the dole...leech...

6 out of 8 people found this comment helpful.

tkrdk83 at 10:32 AM PST Sunday, November 12, 2006 wrote:

the joke's on you

anyone who can't deal with life without using pot or alcohol is a joke.

3 out of 12 people found this comment helpful.

allan_e at 4:04 PM PST Sunday, November 12, 2006 wrote:

...and refuge of scoundrels.

Excellent, eloquent and well thought out response there tkrdk83... It is sad... to see the same lies year after year from the minions of Prohibition II like Agent Taylor. Is cannabis medicine? Yes absolutely, the government has known since 1974 that cannabis can be effective in treating cancer. The study from UCLA's Donald Tashkin released this year shows no correlation between smoking cannabis and cancer, in fact smokers who had consumed as many as 20,000 joints in their lifetimes had no increase in cancer risk. Former DEA minionette Andrea Barthwell is a shill for GW Pharmaceuticals, manufacturers of Sativex®, a whole cannabis extract, now in Phase III FDA trials in the US. A question for Agent Taylor, "what is so criminal about cannabis that its prohibition must be enforced at the point of a loaded weapon?" In 5,000 years of recorded use, no deaths directly related to consuming ganja. If cannabis kills, it is thru the insanity of Prohibitionists engaged in their drug jihad.

4 out of 6 people found this comment helpful.

peetyjay at 7:54 PM PST Sunday, November 12, 2006 wrote:

That is the best argument he's got?

Are you kidding? I expected a DEA agent to come well equipped with facts and figures regarding so-called marijuana abuse. First, if marijuana were decriminalized altogether, there would be no black market for the Mexican Mafia to partake in. Then again, Mr. Taylor would lose much work. Second, many business owners have handguns, this is nothing shocking. Third, he conveniently does not mention that the majority of clubs are much more legit than the example he chooses to use. One of which, WAMM, does not charge its clients, and grows only for terminally ill patients. The DEA raided them a few years ago. They arrived with automatic machine guns, and forced a terminally ill person in a wheelchair to the ground. It is a shame that folks Mr. Taylor and other DEA agents have been so blinded by their profession that they feel compelled to defend such abhorrent acts. They call this article "another view." No doubt, this one is from a myopic perspective. .

4 out of 5 people found this comment helpful.

cobey1 at 9:50 PM PST Sunday, November 12, 2006 wrote:

not as dangerous as reefer madness - not safe for human consumtion

Anyone who has a pothead friend ( and we all have at least one) knows that the only ones who don't know the harmful effect of marijuana are the potheads themselves. I could attest from personal experience that the stuff makes a person forgetful and unambitious. Not to mention paranoid. My theory is that a high (unintended pun) percentage of the people who believe that 9-11 was orchestrated by the US government are smoking the stuff and it's making them stupid. Look at thier aurguements for pot. It grows naturally. So does poison oak, rattlesnakes and poisonous mushrooms among other natural wonders you shouldn't bring home to the kids.

4 out of 10 people found this comment helpful.

rbrandes at 10:00 AM PST Monday, November 13, 2006 wrote:

What Mr. DEA agent failed to include, because it would have rendered his argument null and void, is the fact that a person must have a doctor's prescription in order to purchase medical marijuana. Period.

0 out of 2 people found this comment helpful.

ollallie at 9:11 AM PST Tuesday, November 14, 2006 wrote:

4 points for potheads

1) DEA is enforcing FEDERAL law; we have a discrepancy between state and federal marijuana laws. Passing Prop 215 created the conflict, and now people act as if DEA shouldn't do its job. As much as your conservative counterparts might want to argue for states' rights (oh the irony), federal law prevails. 2) All you need to get medical marijuana is a doctor's recommendation. Notice I didn't say prescription. Take the time to read the law. I've seen ads in the SNR for doctors who will write recommendations, so I don't think it takes much to get one. 3) There have been negative consequences to passing Prop 215; involvement by organized crime, and indoor pot gardens popping up in neighborhoods. If what the DEA says is true, of course it's going to attract a criminal element. It's too lucrative not to. 4) Your fluffy rhetoric with your pothead jargon speaks volumes about what you really want - to legalize pot all together. Which is it? Pot is medicine or pot is a recreational drug?

5 out of 6 people found this comment helpful.

allan_e at 10:07 AM PST Wednesday, November 15, 2006 wrote:

Ollallie... sigh...

Yes, the DEA is enforcing federal law. It is federal law that is wrong. The DEA is enforcing a Prohibition utilizing "law" founded upon racist and xenophobic lies and a complete lack of scientific credibility. In 1988 the DEA Administrative law judge Francis Young called cannabis "the safest therapeutic substance" known to man. It is the feds, via the DEA, that continues to claim there is no medical use for cannabis. That is a lie that endangers patients and which led to the death of Peter McWilliams. There is a federal trial convening in Fresno for Dustin Costa. No mention of his medical use of cannabis is allowed. Why not? Because cannabis, according to the lie, has no medical use. As to "which is it?"... both and all degrees in between. Fluffy rhetoric? lol... Why do the feds hide? Allowing no discussion on their "blogs," no impromptu press conferences and no national debate... ? 'Cause they know the[y] would lose. Facts fail them. Prohibition II fails worse than Prohibition I.

1 out of 2 people found this comment helpful.

romaceng at 10:22 PM PST Wednesday, November 15, 2006 wrote:

freedom of personal choice

I think everyone has missed the central point. Whatever happened to "freedom of personal choice". This country was founded on the principal of individual freedom. "Personal choice" is just that. Personal. Not subject to outside action or comments. If I do, that is my choice. If not, that is also my choice. So be careful Agent Taylor for someday you may have to get a "prescription" for that fat laden Porterhouse steak. If you can even get one.

0 out of 0 people found this comment helpful.

------------------------------------------------------

http://www.sacbee.com/110/story/79109-p2.html

This story is taken from Sacbee / Opinion. Letters to the editor

We have a social problem - Published 12:00 am PST Sunday, November 19, 2006

Marijuana: The nark needs to chill

Re "Smokescreen of medical pot clouds view of the dangers," Forum, Nov. 12:

DEA agent Gordon Taylor needs to lighten up on some of society's most vulnerable citizens -- patients who benefit from doctor-approved cannabis. He wrote a commentary disseminating much medical advice, but only physicians are qualified to do that.

The Institute of Medicine states, "[S]cientific data indicate the potential therapeutic value of cannabinoid drugs, primarily THC, for pain relief, control of nausea and vomiting, and appetite stimulation." The United Kingdom classifies marijuana as a soft drug, punishable for personal amounts by a simple warning. The United States should emulate Europe. And Taylor should help our sick and dying people live, not seek to imprison them.

- Peter Gabriel Keyes, Sacramento

--------------------------

Re "Spaced out law enforcement,". letter, Nov. 12: I think some pot advocates have been smoking too much of the stuff because they seem to have forgotten some important facts.

DEA, a federal agency, is enforcing the law -- federal law. Unfortunately, in California we have a discrepancy between state and federal marijuana laws. I wonder if "we, the people of California" would have voted for Proposition 215 if we knew what we know now; that the aforementioned rub between state and federal law would cause a law-enforcement quagmire, that marijuana gardens would pop up in our neighborhoods, that it would encourage the involvement of organized crime.

Pot advocates say that Proposition 215 is for those who are seriously ill, but the truth is that all one needs to get medical marijuana is a recommendation from a doctor, not an actual medical prescription. From what I can tell, it doesn't take much to get a doctor's recommendation; local free publications carry ads for doctors who will write them. To me, medical marijuana is an absurdity. Maybe we should locate all dispensaries and marijuana gardens next to people who voted for Proposition 215. I bet a lot of people would be singing a different tune.

- Darcy Jones, Sacramento

3 Comments Posted

rsteeb at 10:29 AM PST Monday, November 20, 2006 wrote:

The federal law is wrong, Darcy!
Cannabis is a "Schedule I" substance under the Controlled Substances Act, which is the law being "enforced" by DEA. Therein lies the fundamental problem. Does anyone actually believe Cannabis is more dangerous than Schedule IV Vallium, Ativan or Xanax, let alone Schedule II Methamphetamine and Fentanyl? Cannabis is medically beneficial and is less toxic and addictive than caffeine. It MUST be rescheduled or removed from CSA "control". Interfering with the legitimate medical treatment of those who benefit from Cannabis is atrocity; as is arresting anyone for "illicit flowers" in their possession.

2 out of 3 people found this comment helpful.

ollallie at 1:20 PM PST Monday, November 20, 2006 wrote:

Recreational or medical use?

I'm glad that you people are finally showing your true colors. If I'm not mistaken (though it's unclear, given the pothead jargon), you're saying that you want to legalize marijuana all together. How can you argue that one should be able to use marijuana recreationally (a.k.a. to get high) and at the same time say that it should be used as medicine? You're not allowed to use morphine, vicodin, percocet, valium, oxycontin (remember Rush Limbaugh?), or even cough syrup to get high. Is there something really that special about marijuana? Opiates also come from a plant, my friend, but I don't hear you using that argument on behalf of morphine. To base your legalization argument on the claim that marijuana is less dangerous than other drugs is a logical fallacy. Marijuana still has negative consequences, both for users and on society. We don't need to legalize another substance that impairs people's judgment.

1 out of 2 people found this comment helpful.

rsteeb at 2:41 PM PST Monday, November 20, 2006 wrote:

Who is to say?

When I began "recreational use" of pot in 1968, the diminution of my asthma symptoms was an unexpected "side-effect". Relief of anxiety and insomnia were additional "side-effects". In 2001, when my Ophthalmologist wrote my "recommendation" pursuant to the Compassionate Use Act, the emancipation from low-grade terror of arrest was yet another bonus. What we don't need is arbitrary and capricious laws prohibiting the production, distribution nor use of the least-toxic herb known to mankind. Medicinal OR recreational!

1 out of 3 people found this comment helpful.

"When tyranny is abroad, SUBMISSION is the crime."
- Rev. Andrew Eliot, May 29, 1765

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