Pubdate: Sat, 05 Mar 2005
Source: Ottawa Citizen (CN ON)
Copyright: 2005 The Ottawa Citizen
Contact:  http://www.canada.com/ottawa/ottawacitizen/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/326
Author: Don Martin, Calgary Herald
Note: Don Martin  is a Calgary Herald columnist.
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topics/Rochfort+Bridge (Rochfort Bridge)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/opinion.htm (Opinion)

BLAMING KILLINGS ON DRUGS DOPEY

Roszko Was Headed Towards a Collision With Police, Regardless of His Grow Op

So we're trying to link murdered cops with marijuana grow-ops. It's a
very loose connection.

The Mayerthorpe madman who murdered four RCMP officers Thursday was a
chronic wingnut, a career criminal who might've shot to kill anyone
messing with his dogs just as easily as his dope.

James Roszko had a date with fate coming sooner or later, and his four
victims, average age 27, were unfortunate enough to have stumbled, and
perhaps bumbled, into his line of fire.

Yet the Liberal convention here this week is all aswirl over two
resolutions on marijuana, policy the party is clearly trying to bury
by putting them dead last in the convention handbook.

One would legalize marijuana. This push, ironically, from Alberta
delegates. The other, from B.C., would impose a mandatory minimum
sentence of two years on grow operators.

Still, it matters not on multiple fronts. Neither resolution will
pass. Even if one or both did, they'd never find a resting place in
government legislation. But it hasn't stopped the issue from hijacking
convention attention.

The most popular scrum victim was Liberal MP Dan McTeague, who has
long advocated mandatory minimums for commercial marijuana growers.
"I've done 26 scrums so far," McTeague sighed incredulously by day's
end. He wants sentencing to start at a four-year minimum, overlooking
the fact many of these growers are pawns in the organized racket,
given rent-free accommodation to keep the hydroponic trays flowing.

The former Marijuana party founder, a new convert to the federal
Liberal party, was an overnight media darling whose views were eagerly
sought on the cannabis connection to mass murder. There isn't one, he
huffed, without any sign of having puffed.

Treasury Board President Reg Alcock got into the act, declaring
himself in favour of legalizing dope and, while we're at it,
prostitution too, because organized crime would then be cut off from
the source of its illicit gains.

Deputy Prime Minister Anne McLellan surfaced as the news event du
jour, announcing federal flags would be lowered to half mast until the
funerals, then blasting grow-ops as a haven for organized crime.

It was a dopey circus in search of a reality show.

The mandatory minimum sentence wouldn't have saved them. Legalizing
dope or decriminalized pot wouldn't have done it either because, the
way I read it, this was as much or more about stolen car parts as
anything to do with the marijuana crop, which appears to have been an
inadvertent, stumbled-upon discovery.

The government reaction was correctly measured against so much
confusion on what went on and what went wrong.

McLellan only says she's open to consideration of darn near anything
to ensure this never happens again, be it tightening up marijuana laws
or lengthening grow-op sentences.

Justice Minister Irwin Cotler made a weasel-worded promise that he
"may have to seek enhanced resources" to deal with this sort of crime.

The prime minister said squat on the multiple murders all day and the
text of his convention address made no mention of the tragedy, but I'd
bet the bank he said plenty in a "spontaneous" show of scripted
sympathy during the actual delivery, which started too late for column
filing purposes.

Even official Opposition Leader Stephen Harper wisely opted to
withhold his reactive bluster until the period of mourning has passed.

They're all right. It's too early to inject a political cure into a
confused reality.

That left the Liberal convention preoccupied with dope smoking freedom
and pot growing crackdowns, neither the sort of action or reaction to
prevent a Mayerthorpe repeat in the future. 
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake