Pubdate: Fri, 21 Apr 2000 Source: Toronto Star (CN ON) Copyright: 2000 The Toronto Star Contact: One Yonge St., Toronto ON, M5E 1E6 Fax: (416) 869-4322 Website: http://www.thestar.com/ Forum: http://www.thestar.com/editorial/disc_board/ Author: Harold Levy, Staff Reporter POLICE WON'T RETURN WOMAN'S LEGAL POT To err in seizing it was human, police say to give back, a crime Waterloo Region police have confiscated marijuana sent to a seriously ill Kitchener woman, who is one of 34 Canadians authorized to use the drug to soothe their pain. The police force, which was unaware of the woman's Health Canada exemption when officers seized the drug, says it won't charge her but would be trafficking if it returned the marijuana. Catherine Devries, who has an excruciatingly painful back condition caused by a degenerative nerve disorder, says she was in her bathroom throwing up yesterday morning when two officers showed up at her door. "Talk about the heart pounding," Devries said later. "I thought maybe someone I know had had an accident." Instead, the officers told her they had confiscated 21 grams of marijuana mailed to her from Vancouver. Devries, who has suffered from the condition for 20 years, realized at once they were not aware of the Health Canada exemption that protects her from prosecution for marijuana use - a fact confirmed by Staff Sergeant Gary Askin of the Waterloo drug squad. Hours after the officers left, taking the exemption certificate with them, Devries was "still shaky" and upset, because she had hoped to use the marijuana to alleviate her pain. Devries was taken by friends to a hospital emergency room yesterday. Although Ottawa set up the exemption system last year, it hasn't created a legal source of marijuana. The marijuana intended for Devries was mailed to her by Hilary Black of the British Columbia Compassion Club Society in Vancouver, which Black says is "tolerated by the Vancouver police." Black said her organization is providing marijuana to Devries free "because the federal government is not doing it. "An exemption is just a piece of paper," she added. "It can't be smoked to take the pain away." Askin said police are caught in a Catch-22. "We are in a position where the federal government has arranged this (system) but provided no vehicle for us to give her the drugs," Askin said. "Our hearts are out to her, but we cannot legally give her the package, because to give it would be trafficking." - --- MAP posted-by: Greg