cannabisnews.com: Medical Marijuana Confusing to Everyone





Medical Marijuana Confusing to Everyone
Posted by CN Staff on August 10, 2002 at 15:45:10 PT
By Mark Hedges, The Daily Journal
Source: Ukiah Daily Journal 
Mendocino County Sheriff Tony Craver agrees things are confusing when it comes to medical marijuana. "It's a nightmare," he said. "It's confusing to everybody." Craver said pot plants grown by medical marijuana ID cardholders at their homes are "left alone.""We have no statutory authority to establish guidelines as to where they have to have gardens, security measures to take, etc.," he said. "The people who are empowered and technically obligated to clean this up, the Legislature, has been unable to do this.
There's a whole myriad of issues they're stumbling around over."Craver said there have been three different attempts to try to get the Legislature to "clean up" Proposition 215 with some statewide standards. "The last attempt made it through the Senate and the Assembly and was vetoed by the governor," he added. "So you know it leaves us all in a quandary, with everyone to fend for themselves."Craver said the question is "how much can you possess? Is it unlimited? Is it whatever the court deems reasonable? Every county in California has a different philosophy on this."Craver said a California State Supreme Court decision two weeks ago regarding a medical marijuana grower in Tuolumne County upheld that California's Proposition 215 defends patients from prosecution."You can't be prosecuted if you have a documented doctor's recommendation," explained Craver.As for Mendocino County, Craver said "we were one of the front runners in coming up with standards as far as I know, we were the first county to come up with the medical marijuana card."Craver said there were some misconceptions about the ID program, that the anti-marijuana community feels the ID cards empower people to use marijuana. "No," Craver declared, "we issue the card to confirm a doctor has empowered them to consume marijuana, to readily identify them as a lawful consumer to law enforcement so they don't seize their marijuana or attempt to prosecute and spend time on something already investigated it's saving time, which is saving cost, and also it alleviates the anxiety of medical growers."Craver explained that even though the law says all a medical grower has to have is a recommendation by a physician, not an ID card, by having an ID card they avoid being hassled."The prospective medical marijuana patient gets a packet from the Sheriff's Office, the District Attorney's Office or any of the branches of Public Health, and they take that to the doctor who certifies that the above-named person has recommended this person to use marijuana to relieve pain and suffering," Craver said.The doctor then mails this to a Public Health officer who confirms the signature to be legitimate, and then Public Health notifies the Sheriff's Office."Then we contact the patient and say we've gotten approval so come on down," he continued. "We take down certain information and then issue a fertile ID card."Craver said this system has worked out quite well. Even if a person does not have his ID on him, a law enforcement officer can call the name in to an ID card data base.If a person has a "fertile" ID card, Craver said the risk most pot growing patients run is not being hassled by law enforcement, but being hassled by neighborhood kids who have often engaged in stealing marijuana."We make the recommendation of putting a big dog in the garden," Craver said. "Also, people have collective gardens which they take turns watching."But the rub on the whole program is the fact that marijuana has a high street value, and Craver's not afraid of stating that he agrees with the philosophy that eliminating that street value by legalization would stop much of the marijuana problem in terms of theft or commercial growing operations tied in with organized crime."Let me say I'm not in favor of smoking marijuana," Craver said, "but the people that consume it could care less what I think that's never stopped somebody. But I do believe that if you took the profit out of growing you're not going to see the major violence with it, the shootings and robbery, when today it's worth $5,000 a pound. People would still steal other people's marijuana, but it would be like stealing someone's tomatoes."Craver said 68 percent of California residents favor legalization "It's pretty obvious," he said. But this majority does not exist in law enforcement.Craver said he has taken "a lot of flack" from within the ranks for his views. "If you lined up every cop, 98 percent would say they hope we never legalize marijuana, that it's a horrible, evil drug. But the reality is it being illegal is not preventing significant numbers of people from using it."People say what about our kids,' but, you know what? They're using it," he continued. "Maybe if we took the resources used to eliminate marijuana and used it to deal with behavior, kids using it, people using it in the workplace, driving around stoned."Craver said the big issues his opposition in the last election campaigned on were his doing away with the DARE drug education program for kids and the 25-plant limit for medical marijuana growers which was called "excessive."As for the latter, Craver said "we don't set the limits; plant limits are set by the district attorney."As far as DARE is concerned, he said it had been in existence in Mendocino for 15 years, and that kids 7 to 10 years old who went through the DARE program when it began were now 25 year olds."They've been through a DARE program and here they are in jail," he said. "Is it effective? I say no. What you tell kids when they're 7 years old may have an impact on them when they're in their 30s, but when you're between 18 and 35 you're impacted by peers and your own associations and interpretations of what's wrong."Craver said the widespread opposition to marijuana by law enforcement officers is the result of "the people they deal with on a daily basis they're dealing with that hard criminal element, most of whom smoke marijuana or have it, so it's a direct association with dirtbags, and they're all in the marijuana culture thing. So it's an unrealistic view in the minds of a lot of officers. They don't realize the number of professional or blue collar people who are law-abiding but smoke joints regularly."Craver said the philosophy that "every junkie started by smoking marijuana" is a fallacy. "If you go to Death Row and ask how many French fries they had before killing someone, does it mean French fries cause murder?"To Craver, the reality is that some people just have a "predisposition they're prone to some sort of abuse of a substance, whether alcohol or marijuana, they're looking for something in life, and they can't find it smelling the roses or having coffee with K.C. Meadows (a reference to the Daily Journal editor's Thursday morning Meet the Editor breakfasts at Schat's Bakery)."Though Craver said the marijuana eradication efforts are not going after smaller gardens, he said he doesn't have sympathy for a "guy with 10 plants in his yard if that person has the misfortune of us stumbling onto his garden, we're not going to walk away unless he has a medical defense."Part Two: In the first part of this article, "Mary" expressed her concern about a run-in her 15 year old son had with their medical marijuana-growing neighbor, who fears his plants will be robbed. Mary expressed her concerns that there are "no real regulation.Complete Title: Medical Marijuana Confusing to Everyone, Sheriff SaysSource: Ukiah Daily Journal (CA)Author: Mark Hedges, The Daily JournalPublished: Sunday, August 04, 2002Copyright: 2002 Ukiah Daily JournalContact: udj pacific.netWebsite: http://www.ukiahdailyjournal.com/Related Articles & Web Site:Medicinal Cannabis Research Linkshttp://freedomtoexhale.com/research.htmMedical User Mistakes Neighbors for Thieveshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread13712.shtmlSheriff Protects Medical Pot Usershttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread9760.shtml
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