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Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Legislators aim to snuff out penalties for pot use

(CNN) -- The U.S. should stop arresting responsible marijuana users, Rep. Barney Frank said Wednesday, announcing a proposal to end federal penalties for Americans carrying fewer than 100 grams, almost a quarter-pound, of the substance.

Current laws targeting marijuana users place undue burdens on law enforcement resources, punish ill Americans whose doctors have prescribed the substance and unfairly affect African-Americans, said Frank, flanked by legislators and representatives from advocacy groups.

"The vast amount of human activity ought to be none of the government's business," Frank said on Capitol Hill. "I don't think it is the government's business to tell you how to spend your leisure time."

The Massachusetts Democrat and his supporters emphasized that only the use -- and not the abuse -- of marijuana would be decriminalized if the resolution resulted in legislation. Watch Frank lay out the proposal »

The Drug Enforcement Administration says people charged with simple possession are rarely incarcerated. The agency and the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy have long opposed marijuana legalization, for medical purposes or otherwise.

Marijuana is a Schedule I controlled substance, meaning it has a high potential for abuse and no accepted medical use, according to the drug control office.

"Smoked marijuana has not withstood the rigors of science -- it is not medicine and it is not safe," the DEA states on its Web site. "Legalization of marijuana, no matter how it begins, will come at the expense of our children and public safety. It will create dependency and treatment issues, and open the door to use of other drugs, impaired health, delinquent behavior, and drugged drivers."

Allen St. Pierre, spokesman for the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, likened Frank's proposal -- co-sponsored by Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas -- to current laws dealing with alcohol consumption. Alcohol use is permitted, and the government focuses its law enforcement efforts on those who abuse alcohol or drive under its influence, he said.

"We do not arrest and jail responsible alcohol drinkers," he said.

St. Pierre said there are tens of millions of marijuana smokers in the United States, including himself, and hundreds of thousands are arrested each year for medical or personal use. iReport.com: Is it time to legalize pot?

There have been 20 million marijuana-related arrests since 1965, he said, and 11 million since 1990, and "every 38 seconds, a marijuana smoker is arrested."

Rob Kampia, director of the Marijuana Policy Project, said marijuana arrests outnumber arrests for "all violent crimes combined," meaning police are spending inordinate amounts of time chasing nonviolent criminals.

"Ending arrests is the key to marijuana policy reform," he said.

Reps. William Lacy Clay, D-Missouri, and Barbara Lee, D-California, said that in addition to targeting nonviolent offenders, U.S. marijuana laws unfairly target African-Americans.

Clay said he did not condone drug use but opposes using tax dollars to pursue what he feels is an arcane holdover from "a phony war on drugs that is filling up our prisons, especially with people of color."

Too many drug enforcement resources are being dedicated to incarcerating nonviolent drugs users, and not enough is being done to stop the trafficking of narcotics into the United States, he said.

Being arrested is not the American marijuana smoker's only concern, said Bill Piper of the Drug Policy Alliance Network. Those found guilty of marijuana use can lose their jobs, financial aid for college, their food stamp and welfare benefits, or their low-cost housing.

The U.S. stance on marijuana, Piper said, "is one of the most destructive criminal justice policies in America today."

Calling the U.S. policy "inhumane" and "immoral," Lee said she has many constituents who are harassed or arrested for using or cultivating marijuana for medical purposes. California allows medical marijuana use, but the federal government does not, she explained.

House Resolution 5843, titled the Personal Use of Marijuana by Responsible Adults Act of 2008, would express support for "a very small number of individuals" suffering from chronic pain or illness to smoke marijuana with impunity.

According to NORML, marijuana can be used to treat a range of illnesses, including glaucoma, asthma, multiple sclerosis, HIV/AIDS and seizures.

Frank, who is chairman of the Financial Services Committee, said that about a dozen states have approved some degree of medical marijuana use and that the federal government should stop devoting resources to arresting people who are complying with their states' laws.

In a shot at Republicans, Frank said it was strange that those who support limited government want to criminalize marijuana.

Asked whether the resolution's passage would change his personal behavior, Frank quipped, "I do obey every law I vote for" but quickly said he did not use marijuana, nor does he encourage it.

"I smoke cigars. I don't think other people should do that. If young people ask me, I would advise them not to do it," he said.

If HR 5843 were passed, the House would support marijuana smokers possessing up to 100 grams -- about 3½ ounces -- of cannabis without being arrested. It would also give its blessing to the "nonprofit transfer" of up to an ounce of marijuana.

The resolution would not address laws forbidding growing, importing or exporting marijuana, or selling it for profit. The resolution also would not speak to state laws regarding marijuana use.

Via: CNN.com

Cass County man kills himself as police investigate marijuana plants at his home

CASSOPOLIS -- A Cass County man apparently shot himself as police came to his door during a drug investigation Monday, authorities said.

Nels Wilson, 51, was found dead inside his mobile home at 25560 Jefferson Court Road after Michigan State Police approached his home to question him about marijuana plants found growing outside, according to a news release. Police had flown over Wilson's property as part of Operation Hemp, a joint venture of the Southwest Enforcement Team and State Police, and spotted more than 130 marijuana plants, including some 8 feet tall, near his trailer and garage, Prosecutor Victor Fitz said.

An officer heard a gunshot from inside the Jefferson Township residence, south of Cassopolis, as they approached, the news release said. They went inside to find Wilson was found dead with an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound, it said.

Home-invasion

suspects sought

OSHTEMO TOWNSHIP -- Four suspects are being sought in connection with a home invasion this morning at Nottingham Place Apartments, police said.

Kalamazoo County sheriff's deputies were called around 1 a.m. to an apartment at 760 Drake Road, where a resident reported that he had been punched in the face by one of four men who came to his door. The men forced their way inside and stole wallets, cell phones and video games, a news release said.

Police ask that anyone who may have information call 383-8821.

Three arrested

in armed robbery

STURGIS -- Three men were arrested Tuesday night in Kalamazoo following an armed robbery in Sturgis.

A woman told police she was sitting outside her home in the 1200 block of Laura Drive around 11 p.m. when two men came onto her porch and one pointed a gun at her, a news release from the Sturgis Police Department said.

She was ordered to go inside, where one of the men pointed a gun at her head as they took an undisclosed amount of cash, it said. The suspects, who left in a car driven by a third man, were tracked to a nearby location, where police were able to identify them and get information that they were headed to a residence on Stadium Drive in Kalamazoo.

Kalamazoo Department of Public Safety officers were notified and arrested the three men a short time later. They were being held at the St. Joseph County Jail on armed-robbery and home-invasion charges.

Meth lab busted

KALAMAZOO -- Two people were arrested after police discovered a methamphetamine lab at a home Thursday on Random Road.

Kalamazoo Valley Enforcement Team officers found several one-pot meth containers inside the home in the 3300 block of Random and in an adjacent garage, a press release from KVET said.

A 20-year-old man was arrested on outstanding warrants and faces methamphetamine possession and manufacturing charges, police said. Another 20-year-old was arrested on an outstanding warrant.

Bomb threat

closes store

COMSTOCK TOWNSHIP -- The Wal-Mart store on Gull Road was closed for more than two hours Tuesday after someone reported a bomb was inside.

Employees and customers were evacuated from the store at 6065 Gull Road around 4 p.m. while a Michigan State Police K-9 unit and Kalamazoo County sheriff's deputies searched it.

Nothing suspicious was found inside the store, and employees returned to work, a press release from the Sheriff's Office said.

Tip leads to

drug arrests

DECATUR-- A citizen tip led police Tuesday to a home on 39th Street where they found marijuana and items to make methamphetamine.

The Van Buren County Sheriff's Office Narcotics Unit responded to the tip at 10:45 p.m. after a resident reported a chemical odor coming from a home at in the 81000 block of 39th Street.

A 34-year-old woman admitted there was drug paraphernalia inside, but she refused to let police in, a news release from the Van Buren County Sheriff's Office said. When she was told a search warrant would be served, she tried to run back inside, it said.

Deputies entered the home and found a makeshift anhydrous ammonia tank and other items for making meth, they said. Outside the home, 17 marijuana plants were found.

The woman faces charges of operating and maintaining a meth lab, manufacturing marijuana and resisting and obstructing an officer.

A 36-year-old man, who arrived while deputies waited for a warrant, was arrested on charges of manufacturing marijuana and operating and maintaining a meth lab, the sheriff's office said. A 15-year-old boy who was home at the time was taken into custody by Child Protective Services workers.

Friday, July 11, 2008

An American Pastime: Smoking Pot


The Netherlands, with its permissive marijuana laws, may be known as the cannabis capital of the world. But a survey published this month in PLoS Medicine, a journal of the Public Library of Science, suggests that the Dutch don't actually experiment with pot as much as one would expect. Despite tougher drug policies in this country, Americans were twice as likely to have tried marijuana than the Dutch, according to the survey. In fact, Americans were more likely to have tried marijuana or cocaine than people in any of the 16 other countries, including France, Spain, South Africa, Mexico and Colombia, that the survey covered.

Researchers found that 42% of people surveyed in the United States had tried marijuana at least once, and 16% had tried cocaine. About 20% of residents surveyed in the Netherlands, by contrast, reported having tried pot; in Asian countries, such as Japan and China, marijuana use was virtually "non-existent," the study found. New Zealand was the only other country to claim roughly the same percentage of pot smokers as the U.S., but no other nation came close to the proportion of Americans who reported trying cocaine.

Why the high numbers? Jim Anthony, the chair of the department of epidemiology at Michigan State University and an author of the study, says U.S. drug habits have to do, in part, with the country's affluence — many Americans can afford to spend income on recreational drugs. Another factor may be an increasing awareness that marijuana may be less toxic than other drugs, such as tobacco or alcohol. (However, the study also found that the United States is among the leading countries in the percentage of respondents who tried tobacco and alcohol). As for the popularity of cocaine, the reason may simply be the close proximity of South America, the world's only coca plant producer. And, finally, Anthony notes, it's a matter of culture: the U.S. is home to a huge baby boomer population that came of age when experimenting with drugs was a part of the social fabric. "It became a more mass population phenomenon during a period when there were a large number of young people who were in the process of creating a culture of their own," Anthony says.

The survey also found that more Americans not only experimented with drugs, but also tended to try pot and cocaine for the first time at a younger age compared with people in other countries. Just over 20% of Americans reported trying pot by age 15 and nearly 3% had tried cocaine by the same age. Those percentages jumped to 54% and 16%, respectively, by age 21. That finding isn't surprising, says Dr. Richard Schottenfeld, a professor of psychiatry and a drug expert at the Yale University School of Medicine, since peer influence has a significant impact on the prevalence of drug use. In the Netherlands, for example, there is a large, vocal and homogeneous conservative population that is staunchly opposed to marijuana, says Schottenfeld. And anti-drug activists have made recent attempts to tighten the country's cannabis policies.

Yet experts say the findings of the new survey don't fairly reflect the success or failure of any particular drug policy. The survey asked only whether people had ever tried drugs in their lifetime — it did not ask about habitual use. "For drug policy, what you look at is regular use," says Tom Riley, a spokesman for the U.S. Office of National Drug Control Policy. "Somebody having tried pot in 1968 in college doesn't really have much to do with what the current drug use picture in the United States is."

Though current findings may not provide enough context to judge existing drug policy, Anthony says they do highlight some valid issues, especially since stringent laws don't appear to impact whether kids experiment with drugs. "One of the questions raised by research of this type is whether Americans will want to continue supporting the incarceration of young people who use small amounts of marijuana," Anthony says.

The ongoing study, which surveyed more than 85,000 people in 17 countries, is part of a larger project through the World Health Organization's World Mental Health Survey Initiative. Anthony says further research about the frequency of worldwide drug use, and new data from additional countries will be released in the future.

Via: Time.com

Tuesday, July 8, 2008

Marijuana, Cocaine Have Contrasting Effects On Driving Performance, Study Says

Victoria, British Columbia: Cannabis and cocaine have contrasting effects upon psychomotor performance, according to survey data published in the current issue of the journal Traffic Injury Prevention.

Investigators at British Columbia’s Center for Addiction Research surveyed the attitudes and driving behaviors of adults in drug treatment that had a history of driving under the influence of cannabis, cocaine, or alcohol. Authors reported that pot’s acute effects were more likely to make respondents drive more cautiously or refuse driving altogether.

“When comparing negative physical effects and reckless style of driving with frequency of driving under the influence of cannabis or cocaine, increased negative physical effects from cannabis were inversely related to frequency of driving under the influence of cannabis,” investigators concluded. “In terms of driving behavior, cautious or normal driving was commonly reported for cannabis, whereas reckless or reduced driving ability was frequently reported for cocaine.”

For more information, please contact Paul Armentano, NORML Deputy Director, at: paul@norml.org. Full text of the study, “Driving behavior under the influence of cannabis or cocaine,” appears in Traffic Injury Prevention. Additional information on marijuana use and on-road accident risk appears in the NORML report "Cannabis and Driving: A Scientific and Rational Review," available online at: http://www.norml.org/index.cfm?Group_ID=7459.

Via: Norml.org