Pubdate: Sun, 25 May 2014 Source: Casper Star-Tribune (WY) Copyright: 2014 Lee Enterprises Contact: http://www.trib.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/765 Author: Michael J. Dee WYOMING SUPREME COURT TREATED ME LIKE A SECOND-CLASS CITIZEN Editor: Why is it, to change the marijuana laws, criminal laws, you have to go through a political process to be secure from state police power which is unreasonable when it is not used to protect the rights of others? Why has the Wyoming judiciary declared the marijuana laws are a political question? Why is it the courts claim no fundamental rights are being deprived by the enforcement of the marijuana laws? Why do the courts declare the use of police power has a rational basis when due process of law requires the use of state police power to be either reasonable or unreasonable by the Fourth and Fifth Amendment? The only answer is that marijuana users are discriminated against by the Wyoming courts because we are second-class citizens. We are not considered persons with fundamental right to be secure in our persons houses, papers and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures, but denied the fundamental right that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, and property without due process of law provided by the Fourth and Firth Amendments. In 2007, I filed a declaratory judgment lawsuit to question the validity and construction of the marijuana laws I was convicted of in 1982. The Wyoming Supreme Court declared I did not present a justiciable controversy because marijuana is not a fundamental right: "Dee alleged the laws violated his fundamental right to possess, use and grow marijuana and contravened the tenets of the Fourth and Fifth Amendments of the United States Constitution." The fact is I never ask the court to declare marijuana is a fundamental right. I'm a second-class citizen because the Wyoming Supreme Court ignored my basic claim that being arrested was seizure of my person, deprivation of my liberty without a compelling state interest, without due process of law. All marijuana users are second-class citizens if we have to go through the political process to be secure from unreasonable police power. MICHAEL J. DEE, August, Maine - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom