Dear Editor, The problem Mr. Erbacher discusses reaches far beyond homeopathy [Pseudoscience dangerous, March 1 Letters, Langley Advance]. For example, many plants have medicinal properties, like garlic and ginseng and coffee, but overuse of those plants can cause sickness and even death. Water is good for you, but if you try to drink too much too fast, you can die. Nutmeg is harmless in low doses, but is a powerful hallucinogen in large doses, and a deadly poison in higher doses. [continues 306 words]
Local Leaders Are Upset That Medical Marijuana Growers Are Targets Of Violence. Legal marijuana is proving a major crime headache for the Langleys. On Sunday morning, a medicinal marijuana grow operation in Brookswood was raided by armed thieves, the RCMP say. Two men knocked on the door at about 3:30 a.m., claiming they had car troubles. They forced their way past the residents, and tied up and blindfolded the victim. The two home invaders, armed with a rifle and a knife, ransacked the home looking for drugs, money, and weapons, said Cpl. Holly Marks, spokesperson for the Langley RCMP. The legal grow op in the garage was cut down and taken. [continues 414 words]
Crime changes and policing changes, and so CrimeStoppers is changing, too. A staggering array of calls has come in to CrimeStoppers over the past several decades, RCMP Cpl. Jack Stetz said Tuesday. Stetz was the speaker at this month's Greater Langley Chamber of Commerce dinner, and talked to the local businesses owners about the past and present of the non-profit group. "CrimeStoppers was started by a cold case in Albuqerque, New Mexico, by a Canadian detective wh lived down there," Stetz said. [continues 303 words]
The government may seize a Langley property after pot was found there earlier this year. A Langley property worth three quarters of a million dollars has been taken over by the government after police found marijuana growing there this summer. On June 10, police in Langley, Surrey, and Abbotsford swooped down on four properties, including one in Langley. All four were being used to grow pot, and eight people were arrested, including Brent Goss, Tyler O'Neill and Alexis O'Neill of Langley. All eight are facing a number of drug related charges, and the O'Neills have also been charged with unauthorized possession of a firearm. [continues 99 words]
A grow op was dismantled in a quiet Brookswood neighbourhood on Friday. A Brookswood marijuana grow op was dismantled by the Langley RCMP on Friday, but the resident won't face any charges. Police were originally called out to a home in a cul-de-sac, on 38th Avenue east of 200th Street, to check on the well-being of the resident, said Cpl. Holly Marks. The man apparently hadn't been heard from in a while. When officers arrived and knocked on the door, they found no one home, but they did detect the odour of marijuana. [continues 77 words]
Dear Editor, While the Canadian media blathered endlessly to each other and distracted the public with the Long Gun Registry issue, something that is literally 15 to 20 times bigger is about to run right over Canadian taxpayers - something that already costs more each year ($1.2-1.5 billion) than the LGR has cost to date. And that cost is about to climb steeply. It's something that - unlike the LGR - actually increases crime and subsidizes criminals. Recent changes to the Controlled Drugs And Substances Act make just about anything involving marijuana a "serious" crime. That means bigger fines, and more chance of jail for longer stints, for smaller offenses. That means less "pleading-out", which will mean even longer and more expensive court backlogs - on the taxpayers' dime. [continues 224 words]
Dear Editor, I am a rural property owner in Langley and have been for many decades. Over the years, our family has witnessed crime and theft in our area increase dramatically. Twenty years ago we did not ever lock our house or our cars in our driveway. Back then, Langley was a friendly, trusting place where people passing you on the street would wave and smile. Now, the neighbours get anxious and jittery when a non-familiar vehicle is in the area. Our doors are always locked. Our possessions are guarded. The kids are driven to school instead of walking themselves. The list goes on. [continues 201 words]
Dear Editor, Like many of us, Mr. Erbacher is alarmed at the government's willingness to use our own money to knowingly lie to us [Government lies and wastes, Sept. 10 Letters, http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v10/n750/a10.html. What I find most alarming is the public's willingness to believe it. When I was a child, one would have a lot of difficulty gathering enough evidence to counter the propaganda. Telling someone to "look it up for themselves" usually entailed an afternoon at the library. [continues 93 words]
Public access to Burns Bog shouldn't be banned completely, says the president of the Burns Bog Conservation Society. Eliza Olson was asked to comment on three outdoor marijuana grow-ops found near the 10400-block of 64th Avenue earlier this month, a discovery made by a police helicopter. Officers on the ground seized a total of 1,200 mature plants as well as related equipment. According to Delta police, the plants were just a few weeks from harvest and would have yielded an estimated street value of $450,000. [continues 257 words]
Dear Editor, I suppose I should cease to be shocked at this government's ability both to lie and to waste money. As I sit in my seat at the movie theatre to watch Inception - which I highly recommend - I am bombarded with commercials. That is to be expected. What I did not expect was to see an ad full of blatant lies funded by my tax dollars. I am talking, of course, about the government's "not4me" anti-drug campaign. You may have seen the signs on SkyTrain advertisements or in buses. It is yet another rehashing of the failed "Just say no" campaign of the Ronald Reagan administration. [continues 164 words]
Dear Editor, Please send this to Jeff Waddell: http://rawstory.com/rs/2010/0630/g20-cops-threatened-women-rape/ and tell him to stick up for the police to these women and children's faces [Police critique utter garbage, July 9 Letters, Langley Advance]. When all the evidence about the G20 abuses finally comes out, Canadians will learn something about their police forces that marijuana people have known for years: that they simply cannot be trusted. Russell Barth, Federally Licensed Medical Marijuana User [end]
A local business owner wants to open a medical marijuana dispensary. Langley needs a medical marijuana dispensary somewhere in the community, according to the local business owner who is licensed by Health Canada to provide medical pot. Randy Caine submitted proposals for licensed dispensaries to Langley Township and City, three and two weeks ago, respectively. He said the need is there. "We have a very large seniors population here," he said. He expects demand to continue to rise as the population ages and more people struggle with chronic diseases and other conditions. [continues 371 words]
Langley City residents are invited to a public meeting to discuss legal marijuana. People with questions about medical marijuana can seek answers at a community meeting on Friday evening, July 9 (tonight). Hempyz, a gift and novelty store on Fraser Highway, is sponsoring the meeting at 7:30 p.m. in the Douglas Recreation Centre. Since 1999, Health Canada has administered the Marijuana Medical Access Regulations that allow people to use pot for certain medical conditions. Hempyz owner and meeting organizer Randy Caine is licensed to dispense medical marijuana to people who have Health Canada approval - a responsibility that involves going through annual legal screening. [continues 266 words]
Dear Editor, There are times when lawyers and judges should be held in higher esteem, especially when they are protecting our precious, hard-fought freedoms. Thankfully, a judge of the BC Court of Appeals had the wisdom to put the brakes on the continual erosion of our rights and freedoms [Courts protect grow operators, May 28 Opinion, Langley Advance]. Private property rights are the fundamental cornerstone of any free society. Instinctively, it appeared to be Big Brother intrusion: the grow-op search/seizures by bureaucrats (without court ordered warrants) on private property were in violation of our basic rights and freedoms. [continues 502 words]
Dear Editor, I do not know about Canada, but in the United States, law enforcement officials who under the colour of law deprive individuals their rights is a crime. In response to Matthew Claxton [Stoners need better arguments, April 30 Painful Truth, Langley Advance], the Canadian and American judiciary have reviewed the marijuana laws by rational review. Rational review is used by the courts when no fundamental rights are affected by the law. Judicial review of these criminal laws by rational review is deprivation of rights under the colour of law. [continues 222 words]
Dear Editor, Prohibition's racist roots [Prohibition has racist roots, May 14 Letters, www.langleyadvance.com] is a main part of the reason it still exists: drug prohibition gives the police all the "legal" right they need to stop, search, and generally harass the young, the poor, people of colour, and people with non-regulation hair-cuts. What most people don't realize is that the practice police have of simply stopping people, asking them questions, searching them, and generally harassing them is completely illegal. [continues 288 words]
A new ruling will require warrants before electrical inspectors can search for pot. To get the Public Safety Inspection Teams (PSIT) back up and running, Langley Township will have to jump through a few extra hoops. On Thursday, the B.C. Court of Appeal ruled that Surrey's similar program violated the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The programs are based on sending municipal electrical inspectors and bylaw officials into homes with suspiciously high power consumption. In many cases - well over 90 per cent in Langley's experience - such homes were using the extra power to light and heat indoor marijuana grow operations. [continues 260 words]
Dear Editor, Russell Barth offered many cogent arguments [Drugs: Effective arguments abound, May 7 Letters, www.langleyadvance.com], however he was not exhaustive. Yet another reason to consider re-legalizing cannabis is the way in which it was made illegal in the first place. The campaign to make drug-use illegal was not a public health campaign. Much like the movement to ban alcohol, prohibition was forced upon the nation by religious zealots who thought that they had the right to control the private behaviour of others. [continues 169 words]
Dear Editor, The gang problem will continue unless we stop subsidizing gangs [Fighting gangs in Langley, May 7, Langley Advance]. The Conservative federal government is subsidizing gangs. It even has a gang bailout bill that will cost the taxpayers $10 billion per year! Isn't that great? Your tax dollars are being used to artificially inflate the price of drugs so that gangsters can buy more flashy things and attract your kid. Maybe they will have so much money that they can even buy bigger guns. [continues 178 words]
Dear Editor, I guess it no longer occurs to reporters that cops are often mistaken, misinformed, or just plain lying. "The trade spreads its tendrils into the economy in several ways, said RCMP Chief Supt. Janice Armstrong," your story noted [Big money in B.C. marijuana trade, May 7, Langley Advance]. "Tendrils" denotes a creeping sneaky, tangled up image in the mind. Prohibition is the real problem, but Mounties always portray it as the cure. Your story adds, "Armstrong noted that as with street level drug dealing, gangs keep their members away from the actual grow ops most of the time." [continues 186 words]
