MADISON -- Longtime medical-marijuana advocate Donald Christen says it is time to take the marijuana issue to its natural conclusion: Legalize it for everybody older than 19. Christen and his group, Maine Vocals, have launched two petitions: one to loosen regulations on possession and cultivation of marijuana for medical use; the other to end cannabis prohibition altogether. The measures would prohibit public use of "marijuana intoxicating products," but would allow physicians to prescribe cannabis for patients of any age. Some police officers and prosecutors consider marijuana a "gateway drug" that can lead to substance abuse. [continues 242 words]
Organizer, Medical-Pot Backer Is Acquitted Using Affirmative Defense SKOWHEGAN -- Longtime marijuana advocate Donald Christen was acquitted Thursday in Superior Court on cultivation and furnishing charges, convincing a jury that his pot is for medical purposes. The verdict could have far-reaching effects on both sides of the medical marijuana issue in Maine, his lawyer, Walter McKee of Augusta, said. "We had raised the affirmative defense that the marijuana being cultivated or being furnished was medical marijuana," McKee said Thursday afternoon. "Don acknowledged that he cultivated marijuana and he acknowledged that he possessed it with the intent to furnish it, but indicated that what he was cultivating and what he had possessed with the intent to furnish was medical marijuana, for one patient in particular." [continues 653 words]
WATERVILLE -- There were 34 fatal drug overdoses in Maine in 1997 -- 19 determined by the medical examiner's office as accidental. In 2006, there were 167 drug overdoses resulting in death, 135 of them by accident. "It's epidemic," said Marcella Sorg, director of the state's Rural Drug and Alcohol Research Program at the Margaret Chase Smith Policy Center at the University of Maine. "It really started to rise in the late 1990s; it really began to rise rapidly in 2002." [continues 709 words]
Retired police officer Peter Christ on Tuesday compared the contemporary war on drugs to National Prohibition of the 1920s. He even likened the bloody St. Valentine's Day Massacre to a "drug-related shooting" in today's big cities. "When some reporter writes a story about a drug-related shooting, the reader says, 'See what drugs cause,'" he said. "Not one reporter in 1929, when reporting on the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, referred to that as an alcohol-related shooting. They all called it what it was -- a Prohibition-related shooting." [continues 586 words]
WATERVILLE -- Retired police officer Peter Christ on Tuesday compared the contemporary war on drugs to National Prohibition of the 1920s. He even likened the bloody St. Valentine's Day Massacre to a "drug-related shooting" in today's big cities. "When some reporter writes a story about a drug-related shooting, the reader says, 'See what drugs cause,'" he said. "Not one reporter in 1929, when reporting on the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, referred to that as an alcohol-related shooting. They all called it what it was -- a Prohibition-related shooting." [continues 582 words]
WATERVILLE -- A retired police captain is touring Maine this month to call for an end to marijuana prohibition. Peter Christ, who spent 20 years as a captain on the police force in suburban Buffalo, N.Y., is a founding member of LEAP -- Law Enforcement Against Prohibition. He will be speaking at Colby College tonight at 7 p.m. in Room 122 in the new Diamond Building on campus. The title of the lecture is "War on Drugs? Or War on People?" [continues 256 words]
A 1999 Dodge Durango sport utility vehicle parked in the garage at the Fairfield Police Department and more than $22,000 in cash sit waiting to be claimed -- not by the former owner, but by police and prosecutors. The heavy V-8 Magnum SUV and the cash all could end up being public property, split among several agencies if local authorities can prove to a judge that they were obtained by selling illegal drugs. In Winthrop, a single sweep of a marijuana-growing operation netted Police Chief Joseph Young and his department more than $8,000 in drug forfeiture money. [continues 1020 words]
EDITOR'S NOTE: In the first of a series, Morning Sentinel staff review local issues and events of 2004. Today, a look at crime. On Oct. 18, 2004, two men wearing dark clothing and black ski masks walked into a credit union in North Vassalboro, pointed a gun at the female tellers and demanded cash. They got the cash and they got away. When police finally caught up with Albert "AJ" Peaslee Jr., 21, of Augusta, Jimmy Lee Wilson, 20, also of Augusta and Jeremy Jones, 26, of Gardiner, they were told the loot from the heist was spent on heroin, crack cocaine and gambling. [continues 1499 words]
AG Seeks Forfeiture Of Seized Merchandise WATERVILLE -- District Attorney Evert N. Fowle said Friday that police and prosecutors have agreed to seek a court petition for forfeiture of merchandise seized in a raid at a Main Street head shop April 10. Items including smoking pipes, bongs, water pipes, rolling papers and postal scales taken from Pandora's Box will be named in a non-criminal petition to be filed in Kennebec County Superior Court, he said. "A civil petition for forfeiture under state Title 15 will allow us to forfeit drug contraband," Fowle said. "We haven't had many cases like this before." [continues 493 words]
WATERVILLE -- An agreement to order a pipe for smoking marijuana coupled with the proximity of about 250 smoking pipes to the other drug-related items was enough to get a search warrant that led to the raid of Pandora's Box on Main Street in Waterville. The Morning Sentinel obtained a copy of the search warrant Friday. It outlines an undercover trip for Somerset County Detective Tom Rourke on Wednesday to the store. "Detective Rourke stated that he talked to a clerk and told the clerk that he had a pipe that was capable of holding a couple of grams of weed (marijuana) in it," the warrant, written by Waterville police Detective David Caron states. "Detective Rourke told the clerk that the pipe had been taken by the police and he was looking to get another one similar to the one he had." [continues 506 words]
Police Seize Items From Maine Street Shop WATERVILLE — Waterville police raided a Main Street specialty shop Thursday afternoon, seizing smoking pipes, T-shirts, postal scales and stickers advocating marijuana use. Pandora's Box had been open less than two weeks. "We're seizing any and all drug paraphernalia items," Police Chief John E. Morris said from the sidewalk as detectives and uniformed police officers executed a search warrant inside the shop. "We're seizing anything that has to do with drugs — pipes, bongs, signs, T-shirts," Morris said. "Anything made for or advocating the consumption and ingestion of illegal drugs." [continues 655 words]
