A new program is offering addicts in Montreal and Vancouver free heroin in an attempt to help them improve their lives; so why aren't more of them signing up? It's a chance to cut the chain that keeps addicts tied to a routine of daily degradation as they find desperate ways to get the money to get high. The North American Opiate Medication Initiative, known as NAOMI, is offering hundreds of junkies haunting the slums of Montreal and Vancouver the chance to join a research study that provides free heroin. [continues 1026 words]
Transit Police Permitted To Carry Guns, Arrest Suspects In Effort To Boost Safety VANCOUVER -- Transit police in Vancouver are now carrying guns and have been given new powers to arrest people outside stations who may be dealing drugs or committing other crimes and using the trains as a get-away system. It is the first transit police force in Canada to be given such powers. About 70 officers have been trained and have met the same qualifications required to work for a municipal force. [continues 350 words]
VANCOUVER -- Marc Emery took a hit from a joint as his fans smoked and screamed for his freedom in front of the U.S. consulate. The marijuana activist faces extradition for seed sales -- a crime that isn't prosecuted in Canada -- and up to life in prison if convicted by a U.S. court. In the same breath, supporters gathered around him Saturday demanded sovereignty for Canada and the global legalization of pot. People everywhere are outraged and scared it could happen to them, declared Mr. Emery, 47. [continues 132 words]
VANCOUVER -- Marc Emery took a hit from a joint as his fans smoked and screamed for his freedom in front of the U.S. consulate. The Prince of Pot, as he is described by American prosecutors, faces extradition for seed sales -- a crime that isn't prosecuted in Canada -- and up to life in prison if convicted by a U.S. court. In the same breath, supporters gathered around him demanded sovereignty for Canada and the worldwide legalization of pot. People everywhere are outraged and scared it could happened to them, declared 47-year-old Emery. [continues 296 words]
Vancouver -- Marc Emery took a quick hit from a joint as his fans smoked and screamed for his freedomin front of the U.S. consulate. The self-proclaimed Prince of Pot, faces extradition for seed sales -- a crime that isn't prosecuted in Canada -- and up to life in prison if convicted by a U.S. court. In the same breath, supporters gathered around him demanded sovereignty for Canada and the world-wide legalization of pot under a billowing cloud of smoke from spliffs being waved in the air. [continues 544 words]
The Charges Stem From Police Raids Of Clubhouses Here And In Kelowna VANCOUVER - Members of the Hells Angels motorcycle club and their lawyers packed a courtroom Thursday to make plans for six separate trials, one expected to run for half of 2006. Little is known about the cases involving some 20 bikers who were charged as police raided their clubhouses in Vancouver and Kelowna this summer. They relate to the production and trafficking in methamphetamine and many of the men are accused of committing offences in association with a criminal organization. [continues 261 words]
VANCOUVER -- Members of the Hells Angels motorcycle club and their lawyers packed a courtroom yesterday to make plans for six separate trials, one expected to run for half of 2006. Little is known about the cases involving about 20 bikers who were charged when police raided their clubhouses in Vancouver and Kelowna this summer. The charges relate to production and trafficking of methamphetamine, and many of the men are accused of committing offences in association with a criminal organization. The biggest of the six trials will be led by federal prosecutor Martha Devlin, who told the court yesterday she expects her evidence will take four to six months to deliver. [continues 223 words]
VANCOUVER - Canadian justice officials can't turn pot activist Marc Emery over to the United States to face possible life in prison after ignoring his sale of marijuana seeds in this country for nearly a decade, his lawyer said Tuesday. "For nine years he's been doing this quite openly," John Conroy told a news conference after Emery was granted bail. "They've known about it, the local authorities haven't done anything about it." [continues 494 words]
Vancouver Program Could Hit Montreal, Toronto IT'S A DAILY grind for the thousands of junkies living in Vancouver's east-side slum. Waking up dope sick, the body screaming for a fix. Stumbling to the street to turn a $10 trick and shooting every penny directly into the bloodstream. Many of those junkies are fighting for a chance to be part of a study that will give them heroin for free. Crazy? Many people thought the opening of Canada's first supervised injection site a year and a half ago was as sick as the 4,000 addicts spreading HIV and hepatitis in an 8-block neighbourhood sometimes called Canada's Third World. [continues 954 words]
VANCOUVER (CP) -- Impatient pot-heads, high enough to think they can force the legalization of marijuana, are ruining a relaxed relationship with police by brazenly buying and selling weed in a downtown cafe, says one legalization activist. "The heat is perceived to be on us even more because of their activities," said Ted Smith, founder of a 1,300 member compassion club that sells marijuana to sick people. The Da Kine Smokeshop in the bohemian Commercial Drive neighbourhood is just in it for the money while pretending to be a righteous provider of relief to the ill who say it alleviates pain and suffering, he said. [continues 595 words]
Injection Facility Tries To Serve 5,000 Addicts. Treatment Programs At Risk, One Worker Says VANCOUVER--A woman comes flying down the street and pounds the doorbell at the city's safe injection site, her hands wringing and covered in scabs. The door doesn't open; the site is busy and she has to wait, but she can't. She moans and cries at a dealer for a flap of heroin and races back to the doorway of the shooting gallery, whips up her pant leg and jams the needle into her skin. [continues 974 words]
VANCOUVER (CP) - A local hemp clothier that has had dizzying success making corporate promotional wear is poised to become the first publicly traded hemp business in North America. Hemptown is looking to raise $25 million so it can build mills in Canada and a market for fabric-grade hemp, which it is now forced to buy in China. "We can grow the fibre in Canada; we sure can make clothes," said Jason Finnis, Hemptown's chief operating officer. "It's turning the fibre into yarn, that's the one step in the process we don't have." [continues 746 words]
VANCOUVER -- A police crackdown in skid row is breaking up hooker buddy systems, driving them off into dark alleys where they are more likely to be attacked, street counsellors said yesterday. The social workers were outraged that only the enforcement arm of a plan to clean up the open drug market on the Downtown Eastside has been implemented, while funding for treatment programs is still being haggled over. Annabel Webb, an spokeswoman for Justice for Girls, said a "police state" has been imposed on the neighbourhood. [continues 379 words]
Social Workers Decry Crackdown On Traffickers Before Addiction Centres Open VANCOUVER -- A police crackdown in skid row is breaking up hooker buddy systems, driving them off into dark alleys where they are more likely to be attacked, street counsellors said yesterday. The social workers were outraged that only the enforcement arm of a plan to clean up the open drug market on the Downtown Eastside has been implemented, while funding for treatment programs is still being haggled over. Annabel Webb, an spokeswoman for Justice for Girls, said a "police state" has been imposed on the neighbourhood. [continues 378 words]
