Pubdate: Thu, 21 Jul 2016
Source: Ottawa Citizen (CN ON)
Page: A3
Copyright: 2016 Postmedia Network Inc.
Contact:  http://www.ottawacitizen.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/326
Author: Jacquie Miller

RAIDING POT SHOPS NOT THE ANSWER: PROF

Until federal laws are in place, it's not up to bylaw officers, 
writes Jeff Leiper.

Sending police to shut down pot shops is a "blunt instrument" in the 
face of the widespread social disobedience that has propelled 
hundreds of the illegal businesses to open across Canada, says 
Osgoode Hall Law School professor Alan Young.

"The criminal law is always an ineffective way to make a change in a 
community," said Young, a specialist in marijuana law.

"It's very slow, ponderous, and by the time you get a result, the 
legal landscape may have changed."

Ottawa city councillors and merchant groups are debating what to do 
about the illegal marijuana dispensaries opening in town. There have 
been calls for police to enforce drug laws and shut them down. 
Everyone is looking closely at what's happening in other Canadian 
cities, especially Toronto and Vancouver.

Toronto police cracked down after dozens of dispensaries sprang up 
this spring. Since late May, police and bylaw officers have raided 47 
dispensaries, arresting more than 90 people and charging them with 
either drug trafficking, benefiting from the proceeds of crime, or 
zoning infractions.

But it doesn't appear to have quelled the tide. Many of the shops 
reopened, and new ones popped up. There are now about 100 
dispensaries in Toronto, said Michael McLellan, spokesperson for a 
coalition of Toronto dispensaries. That's slightly more than before 
the raids, he said. The vast majority are helping medical-marijuana 
patients, he said. Their operators "believe strongly in what they are 
doing, that what they are doing is right, that they are helping people."

The raids are a waste of taxpayers' money, McLellan said.

Young, who helped to set up a couple of the first medical-marijuana 
dispensaries in Toronto 15 years ago, said they operated quietly, 
"under the radar." Toronto officials felt compelled to act this 
spring because of the sudden proliferation of shops, he said.

"As we move toward legalization, and people feel like the law has 
already lost all its moral force, a lot of people jumped the gun, and 
created a dispensary, some of them still dedicated toward the care of 
sick people, but many of them were just about selling marijuana to 
whoever would come through."

Did police raids solve the problem? "Not really," he said. "And now 
we've encumbered the criminal justice system with dozens and dozens 
of criminal charges that I don't believe there is any real political 
will to prosecute.

"I believe that over time many of these charges will just disappear."

Dispensaries that can prove they are genuinely helping the sick are 
operating in a "grey zone" that may provide them a measure of legal 
protection, he said.

"They don't have a legal seal of approval from the federal 
government, but they have certain protections under the charter of 
rights that we've successfully litigated over the last 15 years that 
there must be reasonable access to this medicine."

The federal government is now rewriting its medical-marijuana 
regulations after a court ruled they violated the charter. 
Legislation to legalize and "strictly regulate" the sale of 
recreational marijuana is expected in the fall of 2017.

Ottawa councillors are also discussing the approach taken by 
Vancouver. Police there said shutting them down was not a priority. 
But the city responded in June 2015 with licensing and zoning bylaws.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom