Pubdate: Fri, 10 Mar 2000
Source: Herald, The (WA)
Copyright: 2000 The Daily Herald Co.
Contact:  P.O. Box 930, Everett, WA  98206-0930
Fax: (425) 339-3435
Website: http://www.heraldnet.com/
Author: Cathy A. Logg, Herald Writer, 425-339-3437,  http://www.mapinc.org/image/foxx/

IN HOPES OF A TOKE

Woman Wants Change In Medical Marijuana Law

EVERETT - Beverly Foxx expects to have a panic attack soon because she's
not in the Snohomish County prosecutor's computer yet. She may calm herself
by lighting up a marijuana pipe in the Marysville Public Safety Building.

Foxx, 64, intends to make her situation a test case to force the state
Legislature to better define the medical marijuana law, which many law
officers don't adequately understand, even if it means forcing police to
arrest her.

She hasn't been arrested or charged with a crime, but Marysville police
last week seized the marijuana she uses to ease pain from a variety of ills.

Unless she gets it back, her only options are to find a friend or another
medical marijuana patient who can provide her some, or to go to an Everett
street corner and try to score a bag from a drug dealer, thereby risking
arrest and prosecution, Foxx said Thursday.

"It'll cost me $20 for a toke or two of stuff that's been sprayed with
chemicals," she said.

Foxx and her son trudged into the prosecutor's office hoping to talk to
someone about getting her pot back. They never made it past the
receptionist, who told them there is no case file open, no information on
Foxx and her marijuana in the computer, and that it could be two to four
weeks before the Marysville police investigation lands in the prosecutor's
office.

"I will not sit around four weeks and wait," Foxx said. "I have none, and
I' m hurting. I'm standing up here today for people in wheelchairs and
people who can't stand on their own feet."

The law, enacted after voters approved an initiative in November 1998 to
legalize the use of marijuana to treat certain terminal or debilitating
illnesses, does not include specific provisions to define how much
marijuana is allowable or even where authorized patients can obtain it
legally.

On March 1, Marysville police were evacuating a motel on State Avenue
because of a gas leak outside that was potentially explosive. When no one
answered the door of the room rented to Foxx's son, officers went in to
make sure they didn't overlook anyone. They found about 35 small marijuana
plants and seized them, leaving behind an officer's business card.

‘You can't have a policeman trying to be a doctor, and that's what they're
trying to do," Foxx said.

The law needs to be modified to protect legitimate medical marijuana
patients from having their pot seized, she said.

"I don't want to fight with them," she said. "I want someone to sit down
with me and work something out. They need to have a system set up, and the
system has to be realistic. You have to have guidelines that will protect
the growers, the patients, a transport system and the doctors that write
the authorizations."

Right now, Foxx said, doctors are intimidated to keep them from signing
authorizations, and people who use medical marijuana or who take it to
patients in hospitals or senior centers risk arrest, she said. Patients
also need access to marijuana that is not contaminated with chemicals, she
said.

Foxx said she used to grow marijuana for Green Cross, an organization in
Seattle that provides it to authorized patients.

"can grow marijuana with just water and light,"she said. "It needs to be
healthy for people to use.
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MAP posted-by: Jo-D