An unusual aspect of Canada's soon-to-be-legal cannabis market is that the activists who led the legalization movement may find themselves excluded from the industry for which their efforts paved the way. Vancouver activists like Jodie and Marc Emery and dispensary pioneer Don Briere, for example, have criminal records for possessing and selling marijuana. Now those criminal records could be used against them in federal and provincial licensing systems that are under development to decide who gets to cultivate and sell recreational cannabis. [continues 769 words]
THEIR FUTURE SEEMS HAZIER AFTER HIGH-PROFILE CONVICTIONS, BUT DON'T BET ON THE EMERYS FADING AWAY For Canada's first couple of pot, Jodie and Marc Emery, it hasn't been happy trails of late. Their future in the marijuana legalization movement would seem hazier now after pleading guilty last month to trafficking and possession of the proceeds of crime that came with $195,000 in fines for each of them. The charges stem from high profile raids led by Toronto police last March at a number of Cannabis Culture dispensaries in Ontario and Vancouver, under the code name Project Gator. Three other business associates charged in the raids were fined between $3,000 and $10,000 each. Charges against 17 employees were dropped. [continues 1023 words]
Workers have been assaulted, but fear of raids stop some from calling police AFTER NEWS OF THE LATEST armed marijuana dispensary robbery, local cannabis advocate Britney Guerra appealed through a media release for any store owners who have been robbed to call police. The responses she got back shocked her. She knew there were robberies going unreported, but the problem was bigger than she suspected. Within 48 hours she had calls from four different Hamilton store owners who told her they had been robbed - perhaps by the same people - in the last month alone. [continues 705 words]
Fines, probation for Marc and Jodie Emery TORONTO * Prominent pot activists Jodie and Marc Emery have been fined and placed on probation after pleading guilty to a number of drug- related charges in a Toronto court. Marc Emery, the self-proclaimed "Prince of Pot," pleaded guilty to possession of marijuana for the purpose of trafficking, trafficking marijuana and possession of proceeds of crime more than $5,000. Jodie Emery pleaded guilty to possession of marijuana for purpose of trafficking and possession of proceeds of crime over $5,000. [continues 491 words]
The Liberal government has released its draft legislation for Bill C-45, known in shorthand as the 'Cannabis Act' for legalizing marijuana. And according to Kootenay Outdoor Producers Cooperative co-founder Todd Veri, it's better than just good news for small producers - it's everything they'd hoped for. "Our big concern was that they wouldn't allow outdoor growing or that they'd make life impossible for the co-operative model," says Veri. "Based on the report the government put together last year, we believed the government was going to go in the right direction but might need a nudge from us. It seems they took into account our documentation - we had five or six points we wanted to address and they addressed them all in the draft legislation." [continues 670 words]
Some cities want to prohibit all recreational marijuana sales; others have already started licensing dispensaries Ottawa's Cannabis Act, Bill C-45, passed third reading in the House of Commons on November 27, little more than seven months before the federal government's July 1, 2018, target date for legalizing recreational marijuana. The bill must be approved by the Senate and achieve Royal Assent but the writing is on the wall that legalization is on the way. The B.C. government has yet to reveal how it plans to regulate retail sales for non-medicinal marijuana. [continues 1445 words]
Safe-driving activists, pot dispensers and businesses all have their own views Two cannabis activists aren't impressed with the marijuana legalization plan Quebec announced Thursday. But a group that works to decrease impaired driving praised the proposed legislation. Here's a look at some of the reaction to Bill 157: Marc-Boris St-Maurice, a longtime pot activist and founder of the Montreal Compassion Centre medical-marijuana dispensary: "Their plan is still half-baked," he said, noting guidelines announced Thursday are in a draft bill that might change. [continues 849 words]
The marijuana industry is moving from counterculture to corporate. Not everyone is happy about it. On a grey Friday morning early last month, the Mayor of Niagara Falls, Ontario, took the stage to deliver the welcoming address at the Grow Up Cannabis Conference and Expo, one of the bigger industry events that have sprung up around Canada's burgeoning marijuana sector. Sporting a tie with what he described as "green flowers," Jim Diodati warmed up the audience with an anecdote about how as a politician he had braced for the "moment of truth," when he would be asked by the press if he had ever smoked marijuana (he had experimented once upon a time, he told a reporter, but was no longer a user). [continues 1484 words]
Since doper Marc Emery has claimed title of the Prince of Pot, perhaps it is time to crown Justin Trudeau the King of Weed. Thus far, it seems reefer royalty is our prime minister's primary quest, as he is obsessed with pot's legalization - by Canada Day 2018, come hell or high times - while spending little time on substantive issues other than taxing small business out of business. Finance Minister Bill Morneau claims he will now tweak his tax reforms somewhat so that the family farm, for example, can be passed on to the next generation without painful penalties, but time will tell. [continues 525 words]
Grow Up Expo features Jodie Emery as speaker at convention focussed on impending legalization of marijuana next July Jodie Emery laughs when reminded of her last visit to Niagara Falls seven years ago. It started with a trip to MP Rob Nicholson's office on St. Paul Avenue for a protest. It ended waiting for two members of her group to be released from the Niagara Regional Police station on Morrison Street after they were arrested. Emery and several pro-marijuana advocates were hoping to speak with Nicholson, Canada's justice minister at the time, about the extradition of her husband Marc, who was facing five years in a U.S. federal prison for selling mail-order pot seeds across the border. [continues 746 words]
Grow Up Expo features Jodie Emery as speaker at convention focused on impending legalization of marijuana next July Jodie Emery laughs when reminded of her last visit to Niagara Falls seven years ago. It started with a trip to MP Rob Nicholson's office on St. Paul Avenue for a protest. It ended waiting for two members of her group to be released from the Niagara Regional Police station on Morrison Street after they were arrested. Emery and several pro-marijuana advocates were hoping to speak with Nicholson, Canada's justice minister at the time, about the extradition of her husband Marc, who was facing five years in a U.S. federal prison for selling mail-order pot seeds across the border. [continues 744 words]
Grow Up Expo features Jodie Emery as speaker at convention focused on impending legalization of marijuana next July Jodie Emery laughs when reminded of her last visit to Niagara Falls seven years ago. It started with a trip to MP Rob Nicholson's office on St. Paul Avenue for a protest. It ended waiting for two members of her group to be released from the Niagara Regional Police station on Morrison Street after they were arrested. Emery and several pro-marijuana advocates were hoping to speak with Nicholson, Canada's justice minister at the time, about the extradition of her husband Marc, who was facing five years in a U.S. federal prison for selling mail-order pot seeds across the border. [continues 747 words]
A police raid on a new downtown London pot shop resulted from citizen complaints, not because the illegal business was openly selling cannabis to anyone older than 19, the city's police chief says. Police swooped in on the London Relief Centre on Richmond Street last Wednesday, less than two weeks after it opened in defiance of the law, charging five staffers and seizing cannabis and cash. But unlike the spring crackdown on pot shops, when police raided five dispensaries across the city, last week's clampdown only targeted the Richmond Row operation, leaving London's four other dispensaries unscathed. [continues 340 words]
At the jam-packed Cannabis Culture store on Bank Street, staffer Ming Saad says she's not concerned about the provincial government's threat to shut down illegal marijuana stores. "We're not going to go down without a fight, and I hope the other dispensaries won't, either," she said cheerfully on Friday, shortly after the provincial government announced it will open 150 cannabis stores run by the LCBO by 2020. The illegal shops like Cannabis Culture that have sprouted across the province, especially in Ottawa, Toronto and Hamilton, were shut out of the provincial plan. There won't be any independently owned stores. The government also promised to close the illegal shops. [continues 1127 words]
Latest raids to curb illicit sales Toronto's seven Canna Clinics have gone up in smoke. A team of Toronto Police, working alongside the city's Municipal Licensing and Standards (MLS) officials, raided all seven illegal weed shops Thursday morning. In an investigation that stretched to Canada's west coast, a total of 12 warrants were issued for 15 locations - 12 of them in Toronto and three in Vancouver. According to Toronto Police spokesman Mark Pugash, that included five residences in Toronto with ties to the Canna Clinic operations, along with three similar residences in Vancouver. All seven clinics were padlocked and police were busy inside Thursday morning gathering evidence. [continues 237 words]
4/20 participants extol virtues of pot as drug that helps you cope Leigh Filbert admits he lived the "rock-star lifestyle" in the past and acknowledges now his body is paying for it. Filbert suffered a stroke a little over a year ago that left the right side of his body paralyzed. He suffers from anxiety he also contends is paralyzing, emotionally. Attending his first 4/20 rally, Filbert biked around the Legislature grounds on Thursday "to gather constructive information" about the cannabis movement as he continues on his road to recovery. [continues 398 words]
Canada's best-known marijuana activists emerged from a Toronto court appearance vowing to hit the road on a national tour demanding true pot legalization, not "prohibition 2.0." Jodie and Marc Emery face charges including pot possession and possession for the purpose of trafficking after police raided their Cannabis Culture shops in Toronto, Hamilton and Vancouver. Out on bail, they were told Friday to return to Old City Hall court May 23. "This is no way to treat people in 2017 for something that will be legal next year," thanks to the sacrifices of activists including her husband, Jodie Emery told reporters. [continues 132 words]
Other Conservative candidates have expressed mixed reactions to the Liberals' proposal to overturn prohibition of the drug Conservative leadership candidates are split over marijuana policy, with Kevin O'Leary the only serious contender voicing support for legalization and Maxime Bernier refusing to say whether he'll vote in favour of the Liberal legislation to lift the prohibition on the recreational use of cannabis. Mr. O'Leary said up to 30 per cent of the population uses the drug medicinally and recreationally, and he believes the Conservative Party membership understands it has to embrace "a much larger constituency." [continues 929 words]
This week, the Trudeau Liberals introduced The Cannabis Act, legislation that will legalize the recreational use of marijuana. I am opposed to this legislation and I will vote against it, but the Liberals will use their majority to pass it. So when I am elected prime minister in 2019, I will repeal this legislation. Marijuana, like other pharmaceuticals, is a harmful drug and dangerous when not used under the supervision of a physician. As a physician, I know the impact this drug can have on the developing brains of children and young people. This is clear from the research, which shows that young people who use marijuana have lower high school graduation rates, which puts their future in jeopardy. Worse, the science shows that marijuana use in 18 to 25 year olds can result in brain deformities. [continues 411 words]
The queen of Canada's movement to legalize marijuana has not been afraid to cultivate her undeniable girl-next-door charm - or invite controversy - for the cause. And now, an escalating series of police raids that have shut down the Cannabis Culture chain Jodie Emery types eagerly on her iPhone. "This is a good one," she says. We're barely a minute into our interview at a small Ethiopian restaurant near the gay village, and she's on Twitter calling out Toronto police. It's absurd, she says, that they're spending resources raiding marijuana dispensaries with legalization just around the bend. Where the TPS is concerned, Emery can be forgiven for seeming a bit spiteful. It's just shy of three weeks since she and her husband, Marc Emery, who's riding shotgun tonight, were arrested at Pearson International Airport (on their way to a marijuana expo in Spain) and slapped with a string of marijuana-related offences - 15 for him, five for her, ranging from trafficking to possession of the proceeds of crime to conspiracy - after raids on their Cannabis Culture stores. [continues 1500 words]
Emery, Marc
