Pubdate: Fri, 08 Jul 2011
Source: Detroit Free Press (MI)
Copyright: 2011 Detroit Free Press
Contact: http://www.freep.com/article/99999999/opinion04/50926009
Website: http://www.freep.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/125
Authors: Bill Laitner and Dawson Bell
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Cannabis - Medicinal)

NO ONE IS OUTSIDE FEDERAL MARIJUANA LAWS, U.S. SAYS

A memo from the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington says state 
laws allowing medical marijuana opened the door to abuses and calls 
for legally targeting "large-scale, privately operated industrial 
marijuana cultivation centers" as well as distribution operations 
known as dispensaries.

The memo -- which arrived June 29 in the e-mail inboxes of U.S. 
attorneys nationwide, including the Detroit office -- says that no 
patient or other user is shielded from federal prosecution by state 
laws. The memo comes after Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette 
unleashed a salvo last week, saying there was widespread lawbreaking 
linked to medical marijuana in Michigan.

The federal memo has medical marijuana advocates feeling betrayed by 
the Obama administration, which had been linked with hopes for 
leniency in the war on drugs.

"The $64,000 question is, are the U.S. district attorneys in offices 
across the country really going to go after these dispensaries and 
grow operations? We'll have to see," said Art Cotter, chairman of the 
medical marijuana committee for the Prosecuting Attorneys Association 
of Michigan.

On Thursday, about two dozen operators of compassion centers -- where 
patients use the drug -- met near Flint to discuss the new threats to access.

"We now we have a double threat because of this (federal memo) and 
our own attorney general," Rick Thompson, editor of Oak Park-based 
Michigan Medical Marijuana Magazine, said from the meeting.

U.S. pushes for strict pot law enforcement

Just when medical marijuana users are protesting plans for tighter 
restrictions on the drug in Michigan, a memo from federal authorities 
in Washington is asking for tougher enforcement.

The memo, sent from the U.S. Department of Justice to U.S. attorneys 
and being circulated this week among Michigan's county prosecutors 
and sheriffs, is exactly what many in Michigan law enforcement said 
they were waiting for -- a green light to stamp out what they say is 
proliferating drug abuse and lawbreaking under the cover of medical marijuana.

According to Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette, the memo shows 
that the Michigan Medical Marihuana Act -- passed by 63% of voters in 
2008 -- is entirely pre-empted by federal drug law.

"We are making that case as we defend Livonia's commonsense zoning 
ordinance in court," Schuette spokeswoman Joy Yearout said.

The Livonia ordinance amounts to a total ban on medical marijuana 
cultivation and use in the city, lawyers from the American Civil 
Liberties Union have said in the case.

Defense attorneys, operators of medical marijuana facilities, such as 
compassion clubs, and medical marijuana users decried the memo as a 
step backward.

"This is an attack on the patient community," said Kristen Ford, 
field director for the nonprofit Americans for Safe Access, based in 
Washington, D.C.

Rick Thompson, editor of the Oak Park-based Michigan Medical 
Marijuana Magazine, said Thursday: "All of us are more concerned now 
with federal intrusion."

State law no shield

The Justice Department memo says, without naming specific states, 
that "planned facilities have revenue projections of millions of 
dollars, based on the cultivation of tens of thousands of cannabis plants."

Such large-scale operators must be stopped, and even smaller-scale 
users and distributors are not shielded from federal prosecution, 
"even where those activities purport to comply with state law," says 
the memo signed by U.S. Deputy Attorney General James Cole. Some say 
the memo makes clear that the Obama administration, contrary to the 
sense of a 2009 memo, opposes giving leniency to medical marijuana users.

"There was this feeling that the local police and prosecutors were on 
their own" for enforcing drug laws against people claiming a medical 
need for pot, Macomb County Prosecutor Eric Smith said Thursday.

"Now, I think we're all going to see that the abuses have to stop at 
all levels. When this law passed in Michigan, every person who voted 
for it had good intentions. But what we've seen is that for every one 
person who uses medical marijuana responsibly, someone else is 
abusing it and profiting from it," Smith said.

Federal authorities are not changing their policy but instead are 
trying to correct a misreading of their stance, Berrien County 
Prosecutor Art Cotter said. Law enforcers and marijuana users alike 
misinterpreted an October 2009 memo from the Justice Department that 
"seemed to suggest, 'Don't go after medical marijuana patients,' " 
Cotter said. He chairs the medical marijuana committee for the 
Prosecuting Attorneys Association of Michigan.

"People read into that the idea that, as long as something complied 
with state law, the feds would not get involved. Now, this new memo 
is saying, no, dispensaries and large grow operations are not immune 
from our prosecution," he said.

Federal prosecutors sued the Michigan Department of Community Health 
last year to obtain records of seven patients who are part of a 
criminal drug investigation. The government won its demand in early 
June, in spite of the Michigan Medical Marihuana Act's promise of 
confidentiality to anyone who receives state approval. Last week, a 
Traverse City attorney representing the Michigan Association of 
Compassion Clubs asked for a stay in the case until an appeal can be heard.

Focus not on patients

Although precise statistics were unavailable this week, it appears 
that federal authorities have continued to prosecute alleged 
violations of federal marijuana laws on a regular basis since passage 
of the state's medical marijuana law.

Some of the cases have been brought against growers who initially 
claimed to be operating in accordance with the state statute. But 
federal law enforcement officials said such a defense is irrelevant 
in a federal prosecution.

"We're going to enforce federal law," Rich Isaacson, a special agent 
in the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's Detroit office, said 
Thursday. Nevertheless, the focus of federal law enforcement is on 
"large-scale growers," not on medicinal users and caregivers 
operating within state law, Isaacson said.

In one federal prosecution begun in December, a pair of Ingham County 
men were each charged with the manufacture of more than 100 marijuana 
plants, a federal felony punishable by a minimum of five years in 
prison and a fine of up to $2 million. Both pleaded guilty in May in 
an agreement with prosecutors expected to minimize potential prison time.

The agreement makes no mention of medical marijuana.
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