Pubdate: Wed, 12 Jul 2006
Source: Asheville Citizen-Times (NC)
Copyright: 2006 Asheville Citizen-Times
Contact:  http://www.citizen-times.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/863
Author: Jon Ostendorff

TIPS LEAD TO TEACHER'S DRUG ARREST

BRYSON CITY — A Swain County teacher arrested on drug charges once 
owned an Asheville business that aided advocates for medicinal and 
industrial uses of marijuana. Delphia "Maria" Birchfield Keathley, 
35, of Jenkins Branch Road, Bryson City, has been suspended from her 
job as an English teacher at Swain High School, Superintendent Robert 
White said Tuesday.

Police arrested Keathley after getting a tip that a teacher from 
Bryson City was buying marijuana in Asheville and taking it home to 
sell, according to a written statement from the Asheville Police 
Department. She is charged with felony possession with intent to sell 
and deliver marijuana, maintaining a vehicle for the sale of 
marijuana and drug possession.

Keathley did not immediately return a telephone message seeking 
comment. An anonymous caller left police a telephone message giving 
detailed allegations on the spot where drugs were sold and the car 
Keathley was driving — a yellow 2005 Chevrolet Cavalier, police said. 
An undercover officer in an unmarked car spotted the Cavalier leaving 
the area where the drugs were being sold just before 9 a.m. Monday, 
according to police. The officer asked a marked patrol car to stop 
the car for traffic violations.

Officers found Keathley behind the wheel and 6 ounces of marijuana in 
the car, police said.

In the late 1990s, Keathley, then Maria Leatherwood, owned an 
Asheville business called High Mountain Hemporium that sold hemp 
products. Hemp is fiber made from the marijuana plant. Hemp is not a 
drug. The business, now closed, was on Wall Street. The last tax bill 
was mailed to Keathley's home in 2000. A group called Community of 
Compassion for Cannabis often met there, said its co-founder, Steve 
Rasmussen. Its official office was in Weaverville.

Maria was very helpful," he said. "Hemporium was a real center for 
education and activism about cannabis and the fact that it is a 
medicinal and industrial herb. I think it's very wrong that she is 
being charged with possession. She is an activist." Community of 
Compassion in 1999 unsuccessfully asked Asheville City Council to 
make efforts to control marijuana the Police Department's lowest 
priority. The group supports the medicinal and industrial uses of 
marijuana as well as community education about the plant, Rasmussen 
said. White said he could not comment on Keathley's former business. 
He said Keathley has been a teacher for five years. He said he has 
not had complaints about her.

Staff writer Jordan Schrader contributed to this report.
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman