WASHINGTON (AP) - The Obama administration on Friday gave banks a road map for conducting transactions with legal marijuana sellers so these new businesses can stash away savings, make payroll and pay taxes like any other enterprise. It's not clear banks will get on board. Guidance issued by the Justice and Treasury departments is the latest step by the federal government toward enabling a legalized marijuana industry to operate in states that approve it. The intent is to make banks feel more comfortable working with marijuana businesses that are licensed and regulated. [continues 621 words]
(AP) - The Obama administration on Friday gave banks a road map for conducting transactions with legal marijuana sellers so these new businesses can stash away savings, make payroll and pay taxes like any other enterprise. It's not clear banks will get on board. Guidance issued by the Justice and Treasury departments is the latest step by the federal government toward enabling a legalized marijuana industry to operate in states that approve it. The intent is to make banks feel more comfortable working with marijuana businesses that are licensed and regulated. [continues 765 words]
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Obama administration on Friday gave banks a road map for doing business with legal marijuana sellers without getting into trouble, another step by the federal government toward enabling a legalized marijuana industry to operate in states that approve it. The guidance issued by the Justice Department and Treasury Department is intended to increase the availability of financial services for legal marijuana businesses that are licensed and regulated, while preserving the government's enforcement power. Washington and Colorado in 2012 became the first states in the nation to approve recreational use of marijuana. A citizens' group is hoping to make Alaska the third state in the nation to do so. [continues 173 words]
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Obama administration gave banks a road map Friday for conducting transactions with legal marijuana sellers so the new businesses can stash away savings, make payroll and pay taxes like any other enterprise. It's not clear banks will get on board. Guidance issued by the Justice and Treasury departments is the latest step by the federal government toward enabling a legalized marijuana industry to operate in states that approve it. The intent is to make banks feel more comfortable working with marijuana businesses that are licensed and regulated. [continues 535 words]
White House Advises Financiers, Marijuana Sellers About Business WASHINGTON (AP) - The Obama administration on Friday gave banks a road map for doing business with legal marijuana sellers without getting into trouble, a major step by the federal government toward enabling a legalized marijuana industry to operate in states that approve it. The guidance issued by the Justice Department and Treasury Department was intended to make banks feel more comfortable working with legal marijuana businesses that are licensed and regulated, while preserving the government's enforcement power. [continues 727 words]
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Obama administration on Friday gave banks a road map for conducting transactions with legal marijuana sellers so these new businesses can stash away savings, make payroll and pay taxes like any other enterprise. It's not clear banks will get on board. Guidance issued by the Justice and Treasury departments is the latest step by the federal government toward enabling a legalized marijuana industry to operate in states that approve it. The intent is to make banks feel more comfortable working with marijuana businesses that are licensed and regulated. [continues 906 words]
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Obama administration on Friday gave banks a road map for conducting transactions with legal marijuana sellers so these new businesses can stash away savings, make payroll and pay taxes like any other enterprise. It's not clear banks will get on board. Guidance issued by the Justice and Treasury departments is the latest step by the federal government toward enabling a legalized marijuana industry to operate in states that approve it. The intent is to make banks feel more comfortable working with marijuana businesses. [continues 249 words]
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Obama administration on Friday gave banks a roadmap for doing business with legal marijuana sellers without getting into trouble, another step by the federal government toward enabling a legalized marijuana industry to operate in states that approve it. The guidance issued by the Justice Department and Treasury Department is intended to increase the availability of financial services for legal marijuana businesses that are licensed and regulated, while preserving the government's enforcement power. Washington and Colorado in 2012 became the first states in the nation to approve recreational use of marijuana. A citizens' group is hoping to make Alaska the third state to do so. [continues 127 words]
White House Clears Way, but Financial Officials Are Hesitant Washington (AP) - The Obama administration on Friday gave banks a road map for conducting transactions with legal marijuana sellers so these new businesses can stash away savings, make payroll and pay taxes like any other enterprise. It's not clear banks will get on board. Guidance issued by the Justice and Treasury departments is the latest step by the federal government toward enabling a legalized marijuana industry to operate in states that approve it. The intent is to make banks feel more comfortable working with marijuana businesses that are licensed and regulated. [continues 887 words]
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Obama administration is facing criticism over its attempt to straddle the federal law that makes marijuana illegal and state laws that permit recreational use of the drug. In the first congressional hearing since the administration announced a new, permissive enforcement policy, law enforcement and drug-prevention groups and their congressional allies see an opportunity to push back. The administration's Aug. 29 announcement allows the two states where recreational marijuana use has been legalized - Colorado and Washington - to go their own way without federal interference as long as they implement strong enforcement systems. [continues 416 words]
WASHINGTON (AP) - Despite 75 years of federal marijuana prohibition, the Justice Department said Thursday that states can let people use the drug, license people to grow it and even allow adults to stroll into stores and buy it - as long as the weed is kept away from kids, the black market and federal property. In a sweeping new policy statement prompted by pot legalization votes in Washington and Colorado last fall, the department gave the green light to states to adopt tight regulatory schemes to oversee the medical and recreational marijuana industries burgeoning across the country. [continues 713 words]
Washington and Colorado Will Be Expected to Have "Robust" Regulation. WASHINGTON (AP) - Despite 75 years of federal marijuana prohibition, the Justice Department said Thursday that states can let people use the drug, license people to grow it and even allow adults to stroll into stores and buy it - as long as the weed is kept away from kids, the black market and federal property. In a sweeping new policy statement prompted by pot legalization votes in Washington and Colorado last fall, the department gave the green light to states to adopt tight regulatory schemes to oversee the medical and recreational marijuana industries burgeoning across the country. [continues 381 words]
AG Would Curb Long Terms for Low-Level Offenders Packing Prisons WASHINGTON (AP) - Attorney General Eric Holder announced a major shift Monday in federal sentencing policies, targeting long mandatory terms that he said have flooded the nation's prisons with low-level drug offenders and diverted crime-fighting dollars that could be far better spent. If Holder's policies are implemented aggressively, they could mark one of the most significant changes in the way the federal criminal-justice system handles drug cases since the government declared a war on drugs in the 1980s. [continues 1473 words]
The Department Will Not Charge Low-Level Offenders on Counts With Imperative Terms WASHINGTON (AP) - Attorney General Eric Holder is calling for major changes of the nation's criminal justice system that would scale back the use of harsh prison sentences for certain drug-related crimes, divert people convicted of low-level offenses to drug treatment and community service programs and expand a prison program to allow for release of some elderly, nonviolent offenders. In remarks prepared for delivery today to the American Bar Association in San Francisco, Holder said he is mandating a change to Justice Department policy so that low-level, nonviolent drug offenders with no ties to large-scale organizations, gangs or cartels won't be charged with offenses that impose mandatory minimum sentences. [continues 365 words]
Favors Leeway in Prosecution of Low-Level Drug Offenders Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. is calling for major changes to the nation's criminal justice system that would scale back the use of harsh prison sentences for certain drug-related crimes and cut back on imprisonment in other ways. In remarks prepared for delivery Monday to the American Bar Association in San Francisco, Mr. Holder says he is mandating a change to Justice Department policy so that low-level, non-violent drug offenders with no ties to large-scale organizations, gangs or cartels won't be charged with offenses that impose mandatory minimum sentences. [continues 383 words]
WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama says the federal government won't go after recreational marijuana use in Washington state and Colorado, where voters have legalized it. In a Barbara Walters interview airing Friday on ABC, Obama was asked whether he supports making pot legal. "I wouldn't go that far," Obama replied. "But what I think is that, at this point, Washington and Colorado, you've seen the voters speak on this issue." But the president said he won't pursue the issue in the two states where voters legalized the use of marijuana in the November elections. Marijuana remains illegal under federal law. [continues 224 words]
It's OK Even If Arrest Violated State Law, Supreme Court Rules The Supreme Court affirmed Wednesday that police have the power to conduct searches and seize evidence, even when done during an arrest that turns out to have violated state law. The unanimous decision comes in a case from Portsmouth, Va., where city detectives seized crack cocaine from a motorist after arresting him for a traffic ticket. David Lee Moore was pulled over for driving with a suspended license. The violation is a minor crime in Virginia and calls for police to issue a court summons and let the driver go. [continues 279 words]
Court Rules Banner Not Free Speech WASHINGTON -- Some Ventura County school officials were pleased with Monday's Supreme Court decision slapping down a high school student's "Bong Hits 4 Jesus" banner, effectively restricting students' free-speech rights when the message seems to advocate illegal drug use. While critics were saying the case might chill speech on campuses, Ventura County Board of Education member Mary Louise Peterson agreed with the court. "People reading that (banner) could legitimately interpret that as promoting illegal drug use," she said. [continues 620 words]
WASHINGTON (AP) - Illicit drug use among teen-agers held steady in 2000 for the fourth straight year, and cigarette smoking declined significantly, the government reported Thursday. The annual Monitoring the Future survey, a benchmark for teen drug, alcohol and tobacco use, had mostly good news, with drops among eighth-, 10th- and 12th-graders. But it also found use of the drug ecstasy, a favorite at dance clubs, increasing for the second year running. And the number of high school seniors using heroin hit its highest point since the survey began in 1975. [continues 584 words]
Plan is to cut use in half by 2007 WASHINGTON - Hammering home the need for a drug-control strategy that measures success and failure, the Clinton administration is announcing today a five-part plan designed to cut the size of the nation's drug problem in half by 2007. In a three-volume report to Congress, White House drug policy director Barry McCaffrey said drugs cost the country more than 14,000 lives annually, despite a nationwide effort that includes close to $18 billion spent this year by the federal government. [continues 345 words]
