Re "Back in the slammer" (Newslines, by Robert Speer, May 6): This poor guy [Bryan Epis] and his family. Isn't it obvious to everyone by now that pot is harmful only when it's illegal? There are going to be riots about this soon; they're putting our family in prison. If any one person can justify what's happened to this guy and all the other people in jail or prison for pot, please speak up. I would love to hear what you have to say. Steve Aquino Chico [end]
For a time Bryan Epis was a hero among medical-marijuana activists. Now he's more like a martyr to the cause. That's because, after an epic legal battle lasting since his arrest for marijuana cultivation nearly 13 years ago, in June 1997, the Chico man is now back in prison, ordered in February to serve out his original 10-year sentence. More precisely, he's in the Sacramento County Jail, waiting transfer to a state prison. [continues 727 words]
EDITOR'S NOTE: With the Chico City Council considering zoning for dispensaries and regulation of marijuana gardens, medical marijuana has taken center stage in city discussions. This series explores some of the issues that have arisen over Proposition 215, and aims to present an overview of medical marijuana in Chico, while exploring the potential impacts of dispensing collectives. The series will run five days and will include perspectives of medical marijuana patients, law enforcement officials and individuals who are already running dispensaries in town. [continues 1187 words]
Bryan James Epis, the first person associated with a California cannabis buyers' club to be tried in federal court for growing pot, was ordered back to prison Monday by a Sacramento judge to serve the balance of a 10-year term. Epis, 42, had been free for nearly six years on an order issued by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals after he had served more than two years of the term for growing and conspiring to grow marijuana. [continues 598 words]
Re: "Epis ordered back to slammer" (Downstroke, CN&R, May 7): Given the recent actions of DOJ [Department of Justice] in California and of the U.S. Supreme Court, I doubt that anything can be done for Epis short of a presidential pardon. And there are many other nonviolent cannabis offenders in federal prisons in the U.S. They should all be released if originally charged in states where medical cannabis is legal under state law. John Chase Palm Harbor, Fla. [end]
Re: "Epis ordered back to slammer" (Downstroke, CN&R, May 7): Bryan Epis was railroaded in a kangaroo court with prosecutorial fantasies about a (now "missing") spreadsheet being a plan to conspire to grow more than 1,000 cannabis plants. In about two hours, I am going to drive up to Oaksterdam and charge about $800 worth of high-grade cannabis bud on my MasterCard. Please explain why Epis hasn't yet been issued an apology and restitution for the obscenities he has already endured in this abominable abortion of justice? Richard Paul Steeb San Jose [end]
Three-Judge Panel Nixes His Med-Pot Appeal It's been a roller-coaster ride through the judicial system for Bryan Epis (pictured in a file photo from 2007) ever since the Chico man made history of sorts in June 1997 by becoming the first person in California arrested for growing marijuana for use by medical-marijuana patients. That ride plunged sharply downward recently. A three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has turned down Epis' appeal of his original 10-year federal prison sentence, of which he has already served two years, ordering him to finish his term. [continues 58 words]
Dear Editor: A recent letter writer called for the removal of U.S. Judge Jay Bybee for writing memos supporting torture when he was part of the Bush administration. Bybee was also part of a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that recently reaffirmed the 10-year mandatory minimum sentence of California medical cannabis provider Bryan Epis, on charges of conspiracy to manufacture marijuana. Epis' case began in 1997, shortly after the passage of California's groundbreaking medical cannabis law by voters in 1996. According to NORML (National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws), Epis' appeal was filed on various grounds, including prosecutorial misconduct and "the unclarity of the law at the time of his arrest." The judges did not even bother to hold a hearing, only issuing an 11-page denial. [continues 123 words]
SAN FRANCISCO - A three-judge panel has upheld the conviction and ten-year sentence of a Chico man, who is widely believed to be the first medical marijuana patient to be prosecuted under federal law in California. The attorney for Bryan Epis, now in his early 40s, indicated she will request the Chico man be allowed to remain free on bail pending a re-hearing of the case before the full Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal. Epis was originally convicted by a federal jury in 2002 of conspiring to manufacture more than 1,000 marijuana plants out of his West Francis Willard Avenue residence. [continues 471 words]
The "war on drugs" seems just about as successful as the one on "terror." Instead of a decrease in drug use and a drop in addiction rates, we see more Americans (one out of every 100) imprisoned. People like Chico's Brian Epis, convicted for growing pot plants, do not belong in jail. Neither do most other casualties of the "drug war." Californians know this. We've attempted to create more humane drug laws, as in the provisions of Proposition 36, allowing for treatment rather than incarceration, and our decision under Proposition 215 to allow the use of marijuana by patients with a prescription. [continues 323 words]
Judge Determines Grower Can't Be Sent Back To Prison. A Sacramento federal prosecutor has conceded that a 3-year-old court of appeals order means marijuana defendant Bryan James Epis should not re-enter prison before his appeal has been decided. Epis, 40, is the first person associated with a California cannabis buyers' club to be tried in federal court for growing marijuana. In July 2002, a jury found Epis planned to eventually grow 1,000 marijuana plants and that he did grow at least 100 plants in the spring of 1997 at his Chico residence. [continues 144 words]
Man Again Gets 10 Years in Medical Marijuana Case. For the second time in five years, Bryan James Epis, the first person associated with a California cannabis buyers' club to be tried in a federal court for growing marijuana, was sentenced Friday in Sacramento to 10 years in prison. But U.S. District Judge Frank C. Damrell Jr. denied prosecutor Samuel Wong's request that Epis, 41, be taken into custody immediately. Instead, he set an Oct. 22 hearing on defense attorney Brenda Grantland's forthcoming motion for bail, pending appeal. [continues 606 words]
WHERE'S THE HARM? By Ralph Givens Re: "Caught in the middle" ( Newslines, by Robert Speer, CN&R, June 21 ): The very idea that people are being imprisoned for using marijuana makes me ashamed to be an American. When I hear that Assistant U.S. Attorney Samuel Wong is using fraudulent evidence to convict a medical marijuana user, my disgust becomes complete. Refusing to recognize the right of California voters to legalize medical marijuana makes President Bush guilty of lying, because before he was elected he said, "I believe each state can choose that decision as they so choose." [continues 123 words]
Re: "Caught in the middle" (Newslines, by Robert Speer, CN&R, June 21): The very idea that people are being imprisoned for using marijuana makes me ashamed to be an American. When I hear that Assistant U.S. Attorney Samuel Wong is using fraudulent evidence to convict a medical marijuana user, my disgust becomes complete. Refusing to recognize the right of California voters to legalize medical marijuana makes President Bush guilty of lying, because before he was elected he said, "I believe each state can choose that decision as they so choose." [continues 101 words]
After a decade of legal wrangling and more than two years in prison, med-pot pioneer Bryan Epis faces a return to prison Today (Thursday, June 21) at 9:30 a.m., Bryan Epis will walk into the Sacramento courtroom of federal District Court Judge Frank Damrell Jr., where he is scheduled to testify once again in his marijuana-cultivation case. Epis' case began with his arrest 10 years ago almost to the day and still isn't resolved. What started out as a small-time bust has become a legal roller-coaster ride, made Epis a hero among med-pot activists, and raised serious constitutional issues. [continues 1535 words]
The judge who sentenced Bryan Epis to 10 years in federal prison now realizes that Epis was the victim of prosecutorial misconduct, according to Brenda Grantland, the lawyer handling Epis's appeal. Epis, 38, was convicted in 2002 of conspiracy to cultivate more than 1,000 cannabis plants. He was granted bail in August 2004, after serving more than 25 months. The government is intent on sending him back to prison. Grantland charges that at Epis's trial, Assistant U.S. Attorney Samuel Wong misled the jury and U.S. District Judge Frank Damrell about a crucial piece of evidence -a spreadsheet Epis had drafted in early 1997 when he briefly contemplated opening a dispensary in Silicon Valley. Epis's 16-page business plan for the Silicon Valley dispensary was on the computer that DEA agents confiscated in June, '97, along with 485 plants, when they raided the 15'-by-15' grow-site Epis maintained in his basement in Chico. Epis said he had been growing for himself and four other documented medical users, and providing a small surplus (for which he was never remunerated) to a dispensary called Chico Medical Marijuana Caregivers (CMMC). [continues 2233 words]
Robert "Duke" Schmidt has been sentenced to 41 months in federal prison for growing and distributing marijuana. U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer meted out the terms in his San Francisco courtroom July 7. Schmidt reports to the Bureau of Prisons Sept. 1. He is one of about 30 West Coast medical-marijuana growers, distributors and/or users whose cases had been put on hold pending the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Gonzales v. Raich. Schmidt first appeared before Breyer in March 2003, soon after Ed Rosenthal's widely publicized trial. [continues 1635 words]
Across the country on Monday, newspapers and websites described how the U.S. Supreme Court dealt medical marijuana advocates a "stinging defeat" (MSNBC.com), "a blow" (Washington Post), and a "setback" (Baltimore Sun) in the decision handed down in the case Gonzales v. Raich. True, Angel Raich and co-defendant Diane Monson, both members of a Santa Cruz medical marijuana co-op that was operating legally under California's 1996 Compassionate Use Act, may now be subject to federal drug charges. But the reality is: They always were. [continues 1226 words]
OAKLAND, Calif. - Advocates of medicinal uses of marijuana suffered a legal setback on Monday in the United States Supreme Court, but there was little panic or despair amid the tears of disappointment. "Just because we lost this little battle does not mean that the war is over," Angel McClary Raich, one of the marijuana users whose case was before the Supreme Court, said at a news conference here. She added: "We're just sick. We're not criminals." Though some advocates worried that the ruling might embolden opponents of medical marijuana, as a practical matter, there are very few federal prosecutions of medical marijuana users nationwide. [continues 961 words]
Marijuana, in all its forms, has enjoyed thousands of years of safe and effective medical use. Physicians in the US were enthusiastic about its use up until the time of its prohibition in 1937. When the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 was instituted, a nationwide effort was undertaken to remove references to the use of cannabis in medicine, and a sweeping campaign based on fear and propaganda was instituted to demonize the cannabis plant and its users. The Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970 (P.L. 91-513) established the current US practice of scheduling drugs and mandated the inclusion of marijuana and tetrahydrocannabinol, in Schedule I along with heroin and PCP. Drugs such as cocaine, amphetamine, methamphetamine, and most opiates are scheduled in less restrictive categories and thus are considered by law to be less dangerous than marijuana. [continues 260 words]
