Medical marijuana advocates tried a new approach Wednesday in their tug-of-war with the federal government, filing suit under a law that requires the government to correct its own misstatements -- including, the advocates say, the assertion that marijuana has no medical value. "Citizens have a right to expect the government to use the best available information for policy decisions," said Alan Morrison, a Stanford Law School lecturer and an attorney in the lawsuit by Americans for Safe Access. The suit was filed in federal court in San Francisco under the Data Quality Act, a little-known statute signed by President Bush in 2001. It directs federal agencies to allow members of the public to "seek and obtain correction" of false or misleading government information that affects them. [continues 376 words]
A Massachusetts botanist should be allowed to grow marijuana for medical study, a hearing officer said Monday in a ruling that would end a longtime government requirement that all federally approved researchers get their pot supplies from the University of Mississippi. Because of the monopoly arrangement, in effect since 1968, "there is currently an inadequate supply of marijuana available for research purposes," said Mary Ellen Bittner, a Drug Enforcement Administration administrative law judge. She said the application by Lyle Craker, a University of Massachusetts professor of plant biology, "would be in the public interest." [continues 395 words]
A Richmond ordinance allowing police to seize cars that are used to solicit prostitution or drug deals is unconstitutional because it doesn't entitle the owner to an early hearing to try to reclaim the car, a state appeals court ruled Wednesday. The First District Court of Appeal in San Francisco noted, however, that it's unlikely to have the last word, because the California Supreme Court is getting ready to hear multiple constitutional challenges to a similar ordinance in Stockton. The high court's ruling will also affect vehicle forfeiture laws in Oakland and Los Angeles. [continues 191 words]
A Humboldt County marijuana grower has been sentenced to 10 years in federal prison, prosecutors say. Timothy Dellas, 51, of Manila, west of Arcata, who was convicted by a jury in May of growing and possessing marijuana with the intent to distribute it, was sentenced Friday. U.S. District Judge Marilyn Hall Patel in San Francisco gave him the minimum term required by federal law for a manager in a growing operation involving more than 1,000 marijuana plants. Agents found more than 5,000 plants and an indoor growing system in buildings at a home in a rural area of southern Humboldt County where Dellas was arrested, prosecutors said. One document found in Dellas' truck estimated receipts from marijuana sales at more than $1 million, authorities said. [end]
High Court Rules State Crimes Not Grounds for Automatic Expulsion Legal immigrants convicted of possessing drugs aren't subject to mandatory deportation, even if their convictions are felonies under state law, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Tuesday. "The court is saying people with drug-possession offenses who are now contributing members of society should have a chance to stay in the country, based on their rehabilitation," said Jayashri Srikantiah, a Stanford law professor who filed arguments in the case on behalf of national civil rights and immigrants' rights groups. [continues 654 words]
But Conviction of Man With a Pound of Marijuana Upheld Medical-marijuana patients who take the drug from one place to another for personal therapeutic use can't be convicted of transporting narcotics under California law, the state Supreme Court ruled Monday. A law signed by then-Gov. Gray Davis in 2003 filled a gap in the state's 1996 medical marijuana initiative, Proposition 215, the court said in a unanimous ruling. That gap was Prop. 215's failure to address whether the initiative expressly protected patients or their caregivers from being prosecuted for transporting marijuana. [continues 382 words]
A judge in San Diego indicated Thursday that he would reject three counties' challenge to California's medical marijuana law, saying the state could enforce a law allowing people to use the drug even if the federal government bans it. Federal officers are free to enforce the U.S. law prohibiting possession and cultivation of marijuana, but that doesn't prohibit California from allowing medical use of the drug under its own law, Superior Court Judge William Nevitt said. The voters did just that when they approved Proposition 215 in 1996. [continues 409 words]
A federal magistrate today approved a $1 million bail release for the head of a Bay Area medical marijuana club that was raided two weeks ago by federal agents. Sparky Rose, 36, director of the New Remedies Cooperative, was one of 15 people arrested during the Oct. 3 sweep of eight sites and the only one still in jail. He is charged with conspiracy to grow and distribute marijuana and with money laundering. Today, Rose was granted bail by U.S. Magistrate Nandor Vardas with the approval of federal prosecutors. [continues 280 words]
Marijuana advocate Ed Rosenthal, who successfully appealed his federal convictions for growing plants for a San Francisco medical marijuana club, was indicted again Thursday on an expanded set of charges, including filing false tax returns and money laundering. The 2003 trial of Rosenthal, the "Ask Ed" columnist of High Times magazine and an authority on marijuana cultivation, drew national attention and ended in a one-day prison sentence, a disavowal of the guilty verdicts by a majority of the jury, and an eventual reversal this April. An appeals court said a juror who had qualms about the case committed misconduct by phoning an attorney friend for advice. [continues 299 words]
Appeals Court Rules Advice From Lawyer Prejudiced Case A federal appeals court overturned the pot-growing convictions of a prominent advocate of medical marijuana Wednesday because of a juror's phone call to an attorney friend, who told her to follow the judge's instructions or she could get in trouble. The juror's unauthorized contact on the eve of the verdict in January 2003 was an "improper influence" that denied Oakland resident Ed Rosenthal a trial before an impartial jury, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco said in a 3-0 ruling granting him a new trial. [continues 709 words]
The city of Emeryville has paid $15,000 to settle a suit by a medical marijuana patient whose pot plants and indoor cultivation equipment were seized by police from his apartment in 2003. James Blair was arrested and jailed on suspicion of growing marijuana for sale. But the charges were dropped in February 2004 when the Alameda County district attorney's office learned that he had his doctor's approval to use the drug, his lawyer, Joe Elford of the advocacy group Americans for Safe Access, said Wednesday. [continues 178 words]
County Suit Also Takes On Medical Pot ID Card Law California's medical marijuana law, battered in court by the Bush administration, faced a legal challenge from a new source Friday -- San Diego County supervisors, who sued to overturn Proposition 215 and a law requiring counties to issue identification cards to users of medicinal pot. Both the 1996 voter initiative and the identity-card law, which took effect last year, should be ruled unenforceable because they conflict with the federal law banning marijuana possession and distribution, the county argued in a suit filed in federal court in San Diego. [continues 456 words]
The state Supreme Court waded into the conflict between state and federal drug laws Wednesday and agreed to decide whether employees in California can be fired for using medical marijuana. The justices granted a hearing on an appeal by Gary Ross of Sacramento, who was fired after eight days of work as a systems administrator for an information technology company when he tested positive for marijuana on a pre-employment physical exam. Chief Justice Ronald George and Justices Joyce Kennard, Kathryn Mickle Werdegar and Carlos Moreno, a majority on the court, voted to review the case. [continues 331 words]
California Gives Judges Power to Make Own Findings The U.S. Supreme Court ruling Wednesday that struck down part of the federal sentencing guidelines may help prosecutors defend California's 1978 sentencing law. The state law prescribes three sentences for most crimes -- for example, two, four or six years -- and requires the judge to choose the middle term unless facts about the crime or the defendant justify the longer or shorter sentence. The California system differs in some respects from the federal guidelines that were before the high court, but the two have one thing in common: Both allow a judge to increase the sentence based on findings made by the judge rather than the jury, such as the defendant's leadership role in a crime, parole status or financial gain. [continues 444 words]
Supreme Court Reviews Local Law There's a scene in the 1942 film "The Talk of the Town" in which a fugitive framed for murder, played by Cary Grant, chides a law professor (Ronald Colman) for reducing the law to a set of rules and facts. "People wind facts around each other like a pretzel," says Grant's character, Leopold Dilg. "Where's the soul, where's the instinct, where's the warm human side? ...Your way, you have a Greek statue, beautiful but dead." [continues 1096 words]
2 California Women Plead Their Case Before Justices Washington -- Two ailing Northern California women took their plea for legally tolerated medical marijuana to the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday and ran into skeptical questioning from both wings of the court. The justices, minus Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who is being treated for thyroid cancer, heard arguments on whether the federal ban on marijuana possession and distribution overrides laws in California and nine other states allowing seriously ill patients to use pot with a doctor's recommendation. A ruling is due by summer. [continues 855 words]
Angel Raich voted for California's Proposition 215 in 1996 because she thought medical marijuana might help others. Then came the night, a year later, when Raich steered her wheelchair into the bedroom of her sobbing 9-year-old daughter, who asked her, "Why can't you do the things that other mommies do?" Partially paralyzed, in constant pain from multiple disorders and desperate for help after trying nearly three dozen doctor-prescribed medications, the 30-year-old woman, a product of a conservative upbringing that made her recoil from illegal drugs, decided pot "might be my last shot." [continues 658 words]
Federal Power to Control Drug Use Vs. States' Health Care Laws Two Northern California women who say medical marijuana is their only shield from a life of agony take their case to the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday in a clash between federal power to regulate drug use and a state's authority to determine medical care for its residents. It is a case of unusual alliances, with some prominent conservative organizations siding with the patients on the issue of states' rights and limited federal powers. A ruling is due by the end of June. [continues 928 words]
Attorney General Files Brief Supporting Two Californians California Attorney General Bill Lockyer sided with two medical marijuana patients Wednesday in their U.S. Supreme Court battle with the Bush administration, arguing that patients who use locally grown marijuana in states that allow it should be protected from federal drug enforcement. "The federal government has limited authority to interfere with state legislation enacted for the protection of citizen health, safety and welfare, " Lockyer's office said in papers filed with the court on behalf of California, Maryland and Washington, three of the 11 states with medical marijuana laws. [continues 479 words]
Democrat Says He Would Stop Pot Club Raids Pushed By Bush Sen. John Kerry hasn't tried to make medical marijuana an issue in his presidential campaign, but he has some differences with President Bush on the subject. Kerry says he would end the raids that have been a feature of the Bush administration's crackdown on medical marijuana in California, where voters approved the use of the drug for medical purposes in 1996. The Massachusetts senator has also signed a letter urging the administration to stop blocking medical marijuana research at the University of Massachusetts. [continues 816 words]
The Bush administration dropped its attempt Monday to ban foods and oils containing hemp after a federal court ruled that the substance couldn't be classified as a dangerous drug. The Justice Department told lawyers for the Hemp Industry Association that the government would allow a midnight Monday deadline to expire without asking the U.S. Supreme Court to review a ruling in February that rejected the ban, said association spokesman Adam Eidinger. The Drug Enforcement Administration announced a nationwide ban in October 2001 on hemp foods and oils, which contain trace amounts of THC, the active substance in marijuana. The DEA didn't cite evidence that hemp was dangerous but contended that federal drug laws authorized the agency to outlaw consumption of any product containing THC. [continues 145 words]
Judge Told to Await High Court's Ruling on Medical Marijuana The case of a Butte County man sentenced to 10 years in prison for growing marijuana that he said was for himself and other patients was put on hold by an appeals court Monday to await the U.S. Supreme Court's verdict on federal authority over locally grown medical marijuana. The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco ordered a federal judge in Sacramento to reconsider Bryan Epis' case after the Supreme Court decides whether the federal ban on marijuana applies to pot that is grown in the state and supplied without charge to patients under California law. [continues 193 words]
U.S. Seeking to Overturn State Law Protecting Marijuana Patients The U.S. Supreme Court cast a cloud on the medical marijuana movement's biggest legal victory Monday when the justices agreed to hear the Bush administration's appeal of a ruling that protects marijuana patients in California from federal prosecution. The administration is challenging a decision in December by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco that barred federal drug agents from interfering with the growing and use of marijuana by two women, Angel Raich of Oakland and Diane Monson of Oroville (Butte County). [continues 828 words]
9th Circuit Says Patients' Rights Protected by Ruling A federal appeals court gave some encouragement Friday to Northern California medical marijuana clubs in their effort to fend off federal enforcement, saying the clubs' cases may be affected by a recent ruling protecting patients from prosecution under federal drug laws. The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco ordered federal judges to reconsider their decisions against four medical marijuana dispensaries - in Oakland, Santa Cruz, Fairfax and Ukiah - in light of the court's ruling in December. The ruling, the appeals court said, "may control the outcome" of each case. [continues 387 words]
Congress' Power Over Marijuana Club Case at Issue A federal appeals court that has slapped restraints on the government's campaign against medical marijuana grappled Wednesday with its first criminal case on the issue, a Chico man's conviction and 10-year sentence for growing pot for himself and other patients. Bryan Epis' appeal is based on December's ruling by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that barred the use of federal drug laws against marijuana grown in the state and distributed without charge to patients under California's medical marijuana law. Congress' power to regulate interstate commerce does not extend that far, the court said. [continues 586 words]
Judge strikes down ban as breach of free speech A federal law cutting off funds to any public transit agency that runs ads calling for legalization or medical use of an illegal drug was declared unconstitutional Wednesday by a federal judge. U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman of Washington, D.C., said the amendment attached to a $3.1 billion transportation measure, signed in January by President Bush, violated freedom of speech by banning messages based on their viewpoint. "The government has articulated no legitimate state interest in the suppression of this particular speech other than the fact that it disapproves of the message, an illegitimate and constitutionally impermissible reason," Friedman said. He prohibited the government from enforcing the funding restriction. [continues 280 words]
The state Supreme Court put limits Thursday on a voter-approved law providing treatment rather than prison for drug users, ruling that the law doesn't apply to people convicted of driving under the influence of drugs. Proposition 36, passed in 2000, requires probation and treatment for anyone convicted of possessing drugs or drug paraphernalia, using drugs or similar activities, which are not spelled out in the law. It excludes crimes "not related to the use of drugs," which the court to ruled unanimously included driving under the influence. [continues 97 words]
Civil liberties and medical marijuana advocates sued Wednesday to overturn a new, little-noticed federal law cutting off funds for any public transit agency that runs ads calling for the legalization or medical use of any illegal drug. The suit, filed in federal court in Washington, D.C., will be followed by similar challenges in San Francisco and other cities, unless the law is struck down, said Joseph White, executive director of a group called Change the Climate. A congressman's displeasure at the group's marijuana ads in the D.C. transit system gave rise to the law. [continues 219 words]
Bush Push To Expand Drug Wars Shot Down By Ninth Circuit Ruling The Bush administration's attempt to expand the nation's drug wars to foods and oils containing hemp was shot down Friday by a federal appeals court, which said hemp doesn't get people high and hasn't been outlawed by Congress. The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals allowed sales of hemp foods to resume in March 2002, five months after the Drug Enforcement Administration announced an abrupt nationwide ban. On Friday, the court said the DEA had no authority to reclassify hemp as a dangerous drug without first showing that it has a "high potential for abuse.'' [continues 455 words]
Prop. 215 Polls Better Now Than When It Passed Californians are higher than ever on medical marijuana. Proposition 215, the state's pioneering initiative that made it legal for doctors to recommend pot to patients, has gained significant support across all segments of California's population since voters approved it in 1996, according to a Field poll released today. The survey of 500 registered voters in the state found that 74 percent now favor legal protections for patients who use marijuana to cope with illnesses, compared with 56 percent who approved it on the ballot. And, the poll shows, support for Prop. 215 comes from all political, ideological and age groups. [continues 965 words]
Support Seen Throughout State's Population Californians are higher than ever on medical marijuana. Proposition 215, the state's pioneering initiative which made it legal for doctors to recommend pot to patients, has gained significant support across all segments of California's population since voters approved it in 1996, according to a Field poll released today. The survey of 500 registered voters in the state found that 74 percent now favor legal protections for patients who use marijuana to cope with illnesses, compared with 56 percent who approved it on the ballot. And, the poll shows, support for Prop. 215 comes from all political, ideological and age groups. [continues 765 words]
U.S. Appeals Court Ruling Is Likely to Face a Challenge Medical marijuana advocates scored a potential legal breakthrough Tuesday when a federal appeals court ruled that two Northern California women could use locally grown pot without risking federal prosecution. The federal ban on marijuana is probably unconstitutional as applied to individuals who obtain the drug without buying it, get it within their state's borders and use it for medical purposes on their doctors' advice and in compliance with state law, said the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco -- the first court ever to issue such a ruling. [continues 714 words]
U.S. drug czar John Walters held fast to the Bush administration's hard line on medical marijuana during a San Francisco visit Monday, saying city officials who distributed pot under a voter-approved initiative would be risking federal prosecution. Walters, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, went to Glide Memorial Church to praise its drug treatment programs and tout the administration's plan to fund local efforts against urban drug abuse. But he spent much of his time fielding questions about medical marijuana, the target of federal raids and prosecutions since California voters approved its use in 1996. [continues 197 words]
Doctors May Discuss Option With Patients California's medical marijuana law survived its most serious legal threat Tuesday when the U.S. Supreme Court scuttled a Bush administration plan to punish doctors who recommend the drug to their patients. The justices, without comment, denied review of a ruling by a federal appeals court in San Francisco last October that said doctors and patients have the right to discuss the subject freely, without fear of severe federal penalties against the physicians. The government had sought to revoke the doctors' licenses to prescribe federally regulated narcotics -- vital to many medical practices -- and disqualify them from the Medicare program. [continues 861 words]
Congress Can't Bar Use Of Local Weed, They Say Medical marijuana advocates took their best shot Tuesday at winning an exception from federal drug laws, arguing to a federal appeals court that the government has no power to deny home-grown pot to two women who use it to ease severe pain. Banning patients from using locally produced marijuana, with their doctors' approval, goes beyond Congress' constitutional authority to regulate interstate commerce, the women's lawyer told the court, which seemed sympathetic. [continues 360 words]
Court Hears New Case For Legal Marijuana Northern California medical marijuana clubs made another bid for legal status Wednesday, telling a federal appeals court that the use of a drug to ease severe pain is a basic right that should override federal narcotics laws. The case offers the only opportunity to decide "whether Americans have a fundamental constitutional right to relieve their pain," Gerald Uelmen, a Santa Clara University law professor, told a panel of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. [continues 467 words]
San Francisco -- U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, in a striking departure from his court's and the Bush administration's hard line on crime, criticized the nation 's imprisonment policies Saturday and called for the repeal of mandatory-minimum sentences for federal crimes. "Our resources are being misspent. Our punishments are too severe. Our sentences are too long," Kennedy said in a speech at the American Bar Association convention in San Francisco. Mandatory-minimum sentences are an increasingly common feature of federal laws, particularly drug laws, and require prison terms of a specified number of years for defendants convicted of particular crimes, regardless of the sentencing judge's views. [continues 618 words]
Segregationists Tried To 'Cherry-Pick' The Rules The Bush administration's top lawyer on medical marijuana told a lawyers' convention Saturday that if California were allowed to defy federal drug laws, other states could ignore federal civil rights laws. Speaking at a panel of the American Bar Association's annual convention in San Francisco, Justice Department senior trial counsel Mark Quinlivan said states-rights arguments being advanced on behalf of California marijuana providers and patients were comparable to legal arguments made in the past by Southern segregationists. [continues 606 words]
The Bush administration, pressing its campaign against state medical marijuana laws, has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to let federal authorities punish California doctors who recommend pot to their patients. The administration would revoke the federal prescription licenses of doctors who tell their patients marijuana would help them, a prerequisite for obtaining the drug under the state's voter-approved medical marijuana law. Justice Department lawyers this week asked the high court to take up the issue in its next term, which begins in October. The department is appealing a ruling by an appellate court in San Francisco that said the proposed penalties would violate the freedom of speech of both doctors and patients. [continues 470 words]
Supreme Court Asked to Sanction Doctors Who Recommend Pot The Bush administration, pressing its campaign against state medical marijuana laws, has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to let federal authorities punish California doctors who recommend pot to their patients. The administration would revoke the federal prescription licenses of doctors who tell their patients marijuana would help them, a prerequisite for obtaining the drug under the state's voter-approved medical marijuana law. Justice Department lawyers this week asked the high court to take up the issue in its next term, which begins in October. The department is appealing a ruling by an appellate court in San Francisco that said the proposed penalties would violate the freedom of speech of both doctors and patients. [continues 658 words]
Federal prosecutors have signaled they will ask an appeals court to send marijuana advocate Ed Rosenthal to prison for cultivating pot for medical patients. The U.S. attorney's office filed notice with the federal appeals court in San Francisco that it intends to appeal U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer's decision to spare Rosenthal from a prison term for his federal cultivation and conspiracy convictions last month. The notice was dated last Thursday and was obtained by reporters Monday. [continues 253 words]
The Bush administration failed to give proper public notice before announcing a ban on food products containing hemp, which contains a tiny amount of the active ingredient in marijuana, a federal appeals court ruled Monday. In a 2-1 decision, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco declared the Drug Enforcement Administration's short-lived ban illegal on procedural grounds. The issue is not settled, however. The DEA has issued an identical ban in separate regulations that were circulated to the public before adoption. [continues 230 words]
Feds Not Likely to Ease Off on Tough Policies Analysts were skeptical Thursday of predictions by medical marijuana advocacy groups that a judge's refusal to sentence Bay Area pot icon Ed Rosenthal to prison would eventually turn around the federal government's hard-nosed policies on the drug. A rebuff in a single case - even a high-profile prosecution like the Rosenthal case - probably won't slow the Bush administration's crackdown on medical cannabis in California, several commentators agreed. [continues 643 words]
Medical Marijuana Backers Claim Victory A federal judge, striking a dramatic blow to the government's campaign against medical marijuana, spared pot advocate Ed Rosenthal from a prison sentence Wednesday for his conviction on cultivation charges, saying Rosenthal believed he was acting legally. Rosenthal, 58, a prominent author, columnist and authority on marijuana growing, could have received at least five years in prison under federal law for his conviction of growing more than 100 plants for the Harm Reduction Center, a San Francisco dispensary operating under California's medical marijuana law. A federal prosecutor had asked for a 6 1/2-year sentence. [continues 736 words]
Advocate Predicts He Won't Serve Any Time America's most celebrated drug defendant has spent what may be his final days before prison working quietly in his Oakland office, preparing his magazine columns and his next book about marijuana growing. No big send-offs. No wild parties for the icon of the medical marijuana movement. "I'd like to be a pop culture figure, but I don't think it's going to go that way," Ed Rosenthal said from Los Angeles, where he was attending a publisher's trade show over the weekend. "I'm dealing with constitutional issues and people's rights." [continues 1004 words]
Feds Say He Hasn't Admitted Wrongdoing Federal prosecutors are asking for a five-year prison sentence for Ed Rosenthal, a prominent medical marijuana advocate convicted of growing pot for a San Francisco dispensary. The U.S. attorney's office said in a filing late Tuesday that Rosenthal has never admitted the wrongfulness of his conduct, has falsely claimed that he was an officer in Oakland's city-endorsed medical marijuana program and should get the minimum five-year term provided by federal drug laws. [continues 339 words]
Oakland Man Predicts He'll Win On Appeal A federal judge denied a new trial Friday to medical marijuana advocate Ed Rosenthal, ruling that he had no right to tell jurors the city of Oakland had authorized him to grow pot for seriously ill patients. Rosenthal, 58, of Oakland, a national authority on marijuana growing and author of a recent book advocating legalization of the drug, was convicted Jan. 31 by a federal court jury in San Francisco of federal cultivation charges. He is scheduled to be sentenced June 4 and faces at least five years in prison. [continues 422 words]
Appellate Judges Grill Federal Lawyer Over Strategy In Oregon Portland, Ore. -- A federal appeals court seemed skeptical Wednesday about Attorney General John Ashcroft's attempt to use federal narcotics laws to punish doctors who prescribe lethal drugs to dying patients under Oregon's physician- assisted suicide law. Ashcroft's November 2001 directive would effectively repeal the voter- approved Oregon measure, the only one of its kind in the nation, by revoking the federal prescription licenses of doctors who helped patients end their lives. His action could sidetrack the assisted-suicide movement, which is strongly opposed by conservative religious groups that are among the Bush administration's closest allies. [continues 597 words]
In another sign of the state-federal split over drugs, a state appellate court ruled Tuesday that possession of marijuana pipes is legal in California, just six weeks after bong-sellers around the nation were the targets of federal raids. The Court of Appeal panel in Riverside County said a 1975 California law "deliberately decriminalized the possession of a device for smoking marijuana. " The same law changed marijuana possession from a possible felony to an infraction punishable by a $100 fine. [continues 212 words]
California patients using local weed aren't exempt from federal drug laws, judge rules In another legal setback for medical marijuana in California, a federal judge says two patients who used locally grown pot with their doctors' approval could face prosecution under federal drug laws. In a ruling made public Monday, U.S. District Judge Martin Jenkins expressed sympathy for the two women, for whom "traditional medicine has utterly failed." But he said the federal ban on marijuana applied to everyone, including patients using drugs that never cross state lines. [continues 370 words]
