Pubdate: Thu, 05 May 2016
Source: Toronto Sun (CN ON)
Copyright: 2016 Canoe Limited Partnership
Contact: http://www.torontosun.com/letter-to-editor
Website: http://torontosun.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/457
Author: Mark Bonokoski
Page: 17

ONE TOKE OVER THE LINE, SWEET JESUS

The Great Remembrance Day Bust, as it became known in peer folklore, 
began with two long-haired gun-wielding undercover Toronto drug cops 
busting down the door and charging up the stairs, followed by six 
uniformed officers.

It was 2 a.m. I was still in college, and had just returned from my 
part-time job on the sports desk at Canadian Press.

I was making Kraft dinner, and was standing in the kitchen wearing 
nothing but undershorts and a Fly United T-shirt depicting two ducks 
copulating in mid-flight.

That, and a pair of jeans and sneakers, would be how I was attired 
when arraigned later that morning for possession of marijuana, along 
with the other three students who communally shared that old rooming house.

But that was after spending the night's remainder in "the pit" at 52 
Division, and then being driven in a paddy wagon to be fingerprinted 
and mug shot at police HQ before being jammed into a communal cell to 
await bail court.

If Arlo Guthrie had been there, he'd have written a song.

The cops wrongly thought they were busting a speed lab.

One of my co-accused, however, was making a tidy profit at the time 
by dealing pot at our Ryerson campus, and so he was therefore charged 
with the criminal offence of possession for the purposes of trafficking.

The demon weed, considered a scourge back in the late Sixties and 
early '70s, had various courts handing out what were strictly 
enforced minimum seven-year sentences for high-level trafficking 
and/or importing.

My co-accused, who kept his pot proceeds in an antique cash register, 
had more than a pound of weed in his room, all nicely arranged in 
nickel and dime bags, and this was considered a big-time amount.

It took him years, and thousands of dollars in lawyers' fees, to get 
the Crown to finally drop the trafficking charge to one of simple 
possession, and send him on his way with a rather significant fine.

Me? I got my charges dropped early in the game because I was the only 
one who refused to 'fess up.

Today I have a nephew who has a medical marijuana certificate, and 
who works in one of the many still-illegal pot dispensaries 
throughout Toronto that the cops now ignore.

Sunny ways, friends.

The other day, Conservative MP Kellie Leitch, a medical doctor who 
has already declared her intent to seek the leadership of her party, 
said if ever elected prime minister she would repeal any legislation 
that would unleash Reefer Madness 2.0 on unsuspecting Canadian youth.

For 2016, this is so cult-classic 1970.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has already announced his intent to 
legalize marijuana, of course, and has given the task to Toronto MP 
Bill Blair, the former Toronto police chief who once oversaw the 
squad of drug cops who liked nothing more than busting down doors to 
haul out bad guys.

While there is a mischievous irony in this, there is also no turning 
back, especially now that legal pot growers are already seeing 
significant dollar signs dancing in their heads

My only concern is the ability to measure impairment.

Remembering only the vague buzz from the marijuana of the '70s, I 
recently inhaled an entire modern-day joint without stopping, 
blissfully ignoring the fact that the THC content had perhaps 
strengthened considerably during the decades following the Great 
Remembrance Day Bust.

One toke over the line, sweet Jesus, indeed.

I couldn't move a muscle for 10 hours.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom