Pubdate: Fri, 30 Sep 2005
Source: Red Deer Advocate (CN AB)
Copyright: 2005 Red Deer Advocate
Contact:  http://www.reddeeradvocate.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2492
Author: Joe McLaughlin
Note: Joe McLaughlin is Advocate managing editor.
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization)

DECRIMINALIZE MARIJUANA

It's never a good idea to create laws whose effects will be far
reaching and long lasting on the basis of emotion.

There was emotion aplenty in Ottawa this week when relatives of the
four Mounties murdered by James Roszko last year went to the capital
to plead with MPs to get tough with violent criminals.

The rage and sorrow that Canadians feel about these unspeakable acts
remain very close to the surface. Much of what the grieving families
said resonates with citizens from coast to coast.

"If we lay this before our politicians and they do nothing and this
happens again, then the blood of those men and women will be upon
their heads," said Rev. Don Schiemann, whose son Peter was gunned down
in Mayerthorpe last March, along with Anthony Gordon, Brock Myrol and
Leo Johnston.

The four officers were ambushed at a building on Roszko's land that
housed a marijuana grow operation and stolen car parts.

Their families want the federal government to get tougher on drug
offences, on violent crime and to scrap its plans to decriminalize the
use of marijuana.

Without a doubt, there are many things the government can do on the
first two fronts.

For too many criminals, there's a revolving door on prisons. They get
caught, convicted do a short stint in jail, get released after serving
one-third of their sentence and go back into a life of crime.

There are minimum sentences prescribed for a number of violent crimes,
but the evidence shows that they are not working.

Roszko had a lengthy rap sheet for a range of crimes including child
molestation but was on the street enough to terrorize his small
community. He had a violent hair-trigger temper and he hated police
officers.

Roszko was part of a drug trade that is getting more and more
concentrated in the hands of ruthless thugs.

The profits to be made in drugs are huge. Criminal gangs constantly
seek to protect and expand their sales turf.

Grim evidence of that fact is becoming a commonplace in Central
Alberta. A man widely known to be involved in drugs was stabbed to
death in Red Deer a year ago this week. Shootings and knifings related
to a drug war are becoming weekly occurrences in and around Hobbema.
Arson, assault and murder to protect and expand dealers' market share
are common across Canada.

The sale and use of highly addictive drugs like crystal
methamphetamine is growing.

The way pushers expand their market is to get users addicted and turn
them into dealers.

Marijuana, however, is not like crystal meth, heroin or cocaine. It is
neither addictive nor as dangerous.

Pharmacologists and legislators have known that for years. In 1969,
the federal government established the Le Dain Commission to determine
the risks of occasional marijuana use and the consequences of it being
deemed a criminal activity.

They recommended decriminalizing its use. That does not mean making it
legal; it means treating it as a misdemeanour.

Successive federal governments, both Liberal and Conservative, refused
to move on that recommendation.

The consequences of their inaction have become more damaging than the
occasional use of the drug itself.

Young people were branded with criminal records, which prevented them
from working in other countries, a harsh punishment in an increasingly
globalized world. The law wastes valuable police resources and is
unevenly applied. Police forces in large jurisdictions with more than
enough serious crimes to deal with turn a blind eye to low-grade
marijuana use and judges treat offenders lightly. In smaller centres,
however, prosecutions are aggressively pursued and court sentences are
harsh.

The Martin government recognized the expense, unevenness and futility
of the situation last year in proposing a law that would decriminalize
possession of small amounts of marijuana while treating pushers and
commercial growers more harshly. It makes sense, but in one respect,
it is wanting.

To choke off drug sales, you have to work on both the supply and the
demand sides of the market. The effect of the Martin government's plan
to decriminalize marijuana would be to further concentrate the supply
of marijuana in the hands of increasingly large, ruthless and violent
gangs.

If smoking a joint is to be considered a minor transgression, growing
a single pot plant so you don't have to buy it from a criminal gang
should be treated in the same way.

Going one step further, allowing it to be sold to adults under
controlled conditions in select stores and taxed, would undercut gangs
and provide revenue for the fight against serious crime.
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