Police Chief Orlando Martinez De Castro Said Mayor Philip Stoddard Doesn't Understand The Rules For The Money, Which Comes From Seizing The Assets Of Alleged Criminals.

South Miami's mayor is accusing the police chief of using money meant for crime-prevention to pay for an awards dinner. But the chief says he followed the law just as he has been doing during his long career in law enforcement.

Every month, around 100 guests, sometimes more - mostly police brass from different departments in Miami-Dade County - meet to recognize an officer of the month. The departments take turns covering the costs. Some dinners have been known to cost about $4,000, and some have been held at places like the Rusty Pelican in Virginia Key.

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Mass Incarceration Has Gone Too Far and Helped Little, Critics Say

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Stephanie George and Judge Roger Vinson had quite different opinions about the lockbox seized by police from her home in Pensacola, Fla. She insisted she had no idea that a former boyfriend had hidden it in her attic. Vinson considered the lockbox, containing a half-kilogram of cocaine, to be evidence of her guilt.

But the defendant and the judge fully agreed about the fairness of the sentence he imposed in federal court.

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Mothers On Oxycodone Give Birth To Drug-Dependent Babies; 'It's Heartbreaking

SARASOTA, Fla.: Hospitals around the country are confronting an unsettling consequence of the prescription-pain-pill epidemic: a surge in the number of babies born dependent on drugs such as oxycodone.

One recent morning a 12-day-old girl lay writhing in the neonatal intensive-care unit at Sarasota Memorial Hospital. Erin Weatherwax, a nurse, tried to console the newborn by holding her against her chest and patting the baby's back. She placed the girl in a motorized swing that made cricket sounds. But the infant continued to squirm, unable to sleep more than a few minutes at a time.

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Marijuana prohibition is the most wasteful, destructive social policy since the Jim Crow laws of the Deep South. I don't know what it will take to reach the tipping point toward legal cannabis, but data is accumulating that may help.

Researchers at universities in Colorado, Oregon and Montana have studied the 17 states that enacted medical marijuana laws between 1990 and 2010. They found that the law was accompanied by significant decreases in traffic fatalities, with strong indications connecting this to decreases in alcohol consumption.

These researchers also plan to look at crime rates. Does anyone believe legal cannabis will be found to be associated with more domestic violence, barroom fights, turf battles and murders? Not I.

John G. Chase, Palm Harbor

[end]

If the goal of marijuana prohibition is to subsidize violent drug cartels, prohibition is a success. The drug war distorts supply and demand so that big money grows on little trees.

If the goal of marijuana prohibition is to deter use, prohibition is a failure. The United States has double the rate of marijuana use as the Netherlands, where marijuana is legal. The criminalization of Americans who prefer marijuana to martinis has no basis in science.

It's time to stop the arrests and instead tax legal marijuana.

Robert Sharpe, Common Sense for Drug Policy, Washington

[end]

When enough states legalize marijuana, the federal government will probably do the same. This will lead to many more people using it because they didn't want to break the law.

I predict that after federal law allows the recreational use of marijuana, the drug activists will begin campaigning for the legalization of cocaine. The arguments for legal marijuana will also apply to cocaine.

It seems that America is heading down the path of moral degradation.

William Armstrong, St. Petersburg

[end]

I am 71, and I've had three puffs of a marijuana cigarette in my entire life. This occurred about two years ago - not in Florida - and I ended up coughing and hacking so badly that I didn't enjoy the experience at all. I'll never try it again.

Nevertheless, after having long opposed the introduction of additional intoxicants into our social fabric - after all, I was Dunedin's city attorney for nearly four decades - I've come to the conclusion that the legalization of marijuana and its sale at the local convenience store is in the best interests of my country.

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FSU SSDP, NORML continue to advocate, educate on drug reform and cannabis law

Don't invest in the stock of Goldfish and Cheetos just yet. At least that's what Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper is suggesting to citizens in his state.

The caution came after Colorado and Washington became the first and second states in the U.S. to legalize recreational use of marijuana for adults over the age of 21 on Tuesday, Nov. 6, while Massachusetts became the 18th state in the U.S. to legalize the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes.

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While Tuesday's presidential election gained the expected national media buzz for most of the evening, a lesser-known but substantive victory took place in the Midwest: Colorado became the first state to legalize cannabis for recreational use. After failing in 2006, a remodeled Amendment 64 found success and will pave the way for a new system that allows for the taxation and regulation of marijuana similar to alcohol. When compared even with Amsterdam's marijuana regulation, Amendment 64 truly is groundbreaking on an international scale.

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Though both Colorado and Washington passed legislation Tuesday to legalize recreational use of marijuana, the battle to decriminalize the drug's use has not ended. Many Colorado citizens cheered as official results were announced, but their merriment will be short-lived, as the federal ban on the substance has not changed.

Though the legislation is not the end of the war against marijuana, the continued effort to change state laws is still a step in the right direction for those in favor of decriminalization.

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At the recent Drug Summit of the Treasure Coast, the panel on understanding the scope of drug addiction was posed a question about legalization of marijuana. It appeared that the panelists were united in opposing that idea, some with great enthusiasm.

Meanwhile, along our beaches, packages of marijuana were washing ashore. It's happened before. It will happen again.

Supporting the continuation of prohibition is supporting a market where allegedly dangerous drugs are being handled in an unreliable, untraceable distribution system that runs the risk of having children stumble upon unknown substances, be it marijuana, cocaine or pharmaceuticals. This is a dangerous and irresponsible policy.

Law-abiding adults should have the responsibility of production, manufacture and distribution to make it easier to keep our children safe.

Ethel Rowland

Fort Pierce

[end]

Drug Free Collier

Thank goodness for the Drug Free Collier organization.

The team of law-enforcement, counseling and education officials monitor substance abuse trends in the community and take action. That includes advising the public on what may be going on under the radar and sponsoring events such as Operation Medicine Cabinet to get old, excess prescription drugs out of reach.

The organization's latest alert deals with synthetic drugs, such as bath salts and fake marijuana.

Their chemical makeup is not illegal, yet people who buy them at convenience stores seeking a cheap high can hurt themselves.

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They've been billed as the "ultimate odd couple" and it's easy to see why.

Bob Stutman is a retired Drug Enforcement Administration agent, while Steve Hager is the former editor of High Times magazine. Stutman and Hager spoke Monday before a crowd of more than 640 at University Auditorium in an event billed as "The Great Weed Debate: Heads vs. Feds."

They disagreed over most issues in a debate over marijuana legalization, but found common ground on the idea that locking up drug users makes little sense.

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Palm Coast is forging ahead with an ordinance to prohibit the sale of synthetic marijuana masquerading as herbal incense and is also taking a bead on chemically tainted bath salts.

City Manager Jim Landon said that the city's research showed that other communities had banned bath salts as well as synthetic marijuana. Both products circumvent existing laws against illicit drugs but contain hazardous chemicals.

"I have been told from our local law enforcement in our schools that (bath salts) are not a problem here yet," Landon said in a phone interview on Friday. "But because they are very similar in their effects and there's nothing prohibiting them from being sold for these inappropriate uses for young people, we chose to add that as a proposal to address both items in one ordinance."

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From notorious smuggler to ex-con to author and lecturer, Robert Platshorn has assumed several personas over his 69 years.

But now the West Palm Beach man's latest incarnation - pitchman for pot use by seniors - has drawn unwelcome attention from the government, which, he says, is singling him out because of his advocacy.

"They want to stop me from advocating and would like me to be poor and quiet," the parolee said. "They want to put the Tuna back in the can."

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Concerning your Aug. 18 editorial, "Voter ID law stops fraud:"

Yes, in the absolute, the voter ID law will stop fraud. But that should not be the issue. The issue should be how much and at what cost. Every change in any law or regulation has societal benefits and societal costs. The best example is our anti-drug law. Worthwhile goals to "stop voter fraud" or "stop drug abuse" are often pretexts to hold down a segment of the citizenry thought to engage in such activity. Other legislation recently enacted by Florida - and knocked down by the federal court - weakens my confidence that the voter ID law is not just pretext to hold down citizens who mostly vote Democrat.

John Chase

St. Petersburg

[end]

Judging from what Uruguay's President Jose Mujica told me in an extended interview last week, there is a real possibility that people in his country will soon be able to buy marijuana legally from a state-regulated company that will be in charge of marketing and selling the drug.

Mujica, 78, earlier this month submitted a bill to congress that may be the boldest marijuana legalization proposal anywhere in the world. It calls for the state to "take over the control and regulation of activities related to the importation, production, acquisition, storage, marketing and distribution of marijuana."

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PALM COAST -- Palm Coast officials are working on an ordinance to ban the sale of "herbal incense" by targeting its effect rather than the ever-changing chemical brew chemists cook up to stay ahead of the law when producing synthetic marijuana.

The draft ordinance would ban products that mimic the effects of a controlled substance that could be easily placed into pipes, cigarette papers and other paraphernalia for smoking or inhaling.

The makers of synthetic marijuana have been able to continue selling it as herbal incense because state laws target chemical compounds. Chemists spray chemicals similar to the THC in marijuana onto blends of leaves and roots, which are then sold as herbal incense. Chemists merely alter the compounds enough to escape the law.

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I want to thank the Drug Enforcement Administration for making it utterly impossible for any pharmacy or pain-management clinic to fill valid scripts anymore. Not a pharmacy in Broward County can supply those of us who legitimately require pain relief in order to function.

The feds have terrorized clinics, pharmacies, their distributors and even hospitals.

Do they think that everyone in South Florida is having a good time with oxycodone or any other opioids? I'm not. In fact, thanks to their overzealousness, I've been unable to work or, for the most part, even leave the house for two weeks, with no end in sight. I'm weak as a kitten and have little appetite, lost about 15 pounds and had little help from the medical community because it is terrified, too. I have scripts, but no one can fill them.

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Already shaken by a series of high-level defections, accounts of abuse among its staffers, and the high-profile breakup of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, the Church of Scientology now faces scrutiny over its controversial drug treatment program, Narconon.

Four deaths at Narconon's signature treatment facility in eastern Oklahoma have prompted local law enforcement and health officials to investigate the center and its program.

The inquiry began after Stacy Dawn Murphy, 20, was found dead in her room on July 19 after returning to the facility from a one-day leave. The cause of death is under investigation.

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