cannabisnews.com: Sheriff Seeks Bill Support





Sheriff Seeks Bill Support
Posted by FoM on February 24, 2000 at 11:18:20 PT
By Maline Hazle, Record Searchlight
Source: Record Searchlight
Shasta County Sheriff Jim Pope is lobbying his backers by mail for support of a bill local law officers and state legislators are drafting to ''clarify'' medicinal marijuana law.''We need your help to obtain clarifying legislation on the medical marijuana issue!'' says a letter sent to about 50 people so far and signed by the sheriff.
A first draft of that legislation, written by state Sen. Maurice Johannessen, R-Redding, should be completed today, a Johannessen aide said Wednesday.''Your support could be an important ingredient in the success of the legislation,'' the letter says, prodding recipients to call or write to Johannessen; Assemblyman Dick Dickerson, R-Redding, or state Sen. John Vasconcellos, D-San Jose.Vasconcellos is the author of another medicinal marijuana bill that is before the Assembly in Sacramento.Pope's letters, written on county sheriff's letterhead, started going into the mail earlier this week and more will be sent out, Undersheriff Larry Schaller said Wednesday.Schaller said the mailings are ''relatively limited to some local supporters and activists'' and primarily an effort to reinforce Johannessen's proposed legislation.He said it is ''not uncommon'' for Pope to spend part of his county budget to seek support from constituents for statewide initiatives that could help law enforcement.''This isn't going to be an easy position'' for Johannessen, Schaller said, speculating that the senator will be criticized by both ''ultraconservatives and from the other side who think he wants to impede the law.''''Once it's introduced it's going to snowball statewide,'' Johannessen aide Dean McEwen predicted. ''This has really gotten a lot of attention.''Johannessen is drafting the legislation at the behest of the sheriff and District Attorney McGregor Scott, who called on him for help after a Shasta County jury acquitted Richard Levin, 49, of Redding, in December on a charge of cultivating marijuana for sale.Although Superior Court Judge Bradley Boeckman ordered Levin's pot returned, the sheriff instead handed it over to a federal agent who had obtained a seizure warrant on the grounds that possession of marijuana breaks federal law.The sheriff and other local lawmen have complained repeatedly since then that the state Compassionate Use Act approved by voters in 1996 is too vague and that they need guidelines for implementation.''The proposed legislation will recommend that medicinal marijuana patients register with the state or county department of public health,'' the sheriff's letter says.''The registration would include the name of the referring physician and patient, the illness treated and the dosage, frequency and duration of the treatment.''If marijuana is to be used as a medicine, it needs to be the responsibility of the medical community, not local law enforcement. Quantities cultivated would then need to be consistent with the verified medical use,'' it continues.That could present problems, said Michael G. Arnold, executive director of the Shasta-Trinity Medical Society, because Proposition 215, as approved by voters, requires only a physician's ''recommendation'' for medicinal marijuana use, not a prescription.Dosages and frequency of use could push marijuana ''recommendations'' into the realm of marijuana ''prescriptions,'' and ''it is against federal law, as we understand it, to prescribe marijuana,'' Arnold said.In addition, Arnold said he is hoping to convince legislators to at least consult the California Medical Association before finalizing their proposal.''If they're putting it on the medical community, they ought to get the medical community involved,'' he said. ''It's a very complicated issue.''Meanwhile, in Sacramento, Rand Martin, Vasconcellos' chief of staff, said that Johannessen's legislation isn't necessary because Vasconcellos' SBA48 already addresses the issues and is ''much more comprehensive.''The Shasta County sheriff needs to know that we're very aware of the issue,'' Martin said. ''We recognize that the sheriff has legitimate concerns and that Sen. Johannessen is responding to those concerns.''Just because that's already being done, there's no reason to fault him (Johannessen). We welcome him into the fold.''But Martin said Pope should be aware that the state Sheriff's Association helped put together the Vasconcellos bill and supports it.Pope is a past president of that association.Martin acknowledged Pope's push for legislation could be a way to deflect controversy over not giving Levin back his marijuana.''The issues law enforcement faces in Shasta County with the courts are larger,'' he said. ''We're certainly disappointed that when the court told the sheriff to give it back he called in the federales. It's really a slap in the faces of California voters.''McEwen said his boss wants to take ''a sliver of the Vasconcellos bill'' and focus on that.''We just want to help law enforcement do their job,'' he said.Reporter Maline Hazle can be reached at 225-8266 or at mhazle redding.comPublished: February 24, 2000© 2000 Record Searchlight - The E.W. Scripps Co. Related Articles:Pair Guilty of Conspiracyhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread4836.shtmlSome Patients Find Pot is an Arresting Experiencehttp://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread4285.shtml
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Comment #4 posted by kaptinemo on February 25, 2000 at 07:18:42 PT
I believe the term for that is called 'the spike'
That is, the bias shown by some editors against a certain topic. It is the basis for the Right's accusations of liberal bias in the media (while ignoring their own, of course) regarding anything they oppose. I do agree that some bias does exist - just look at the sparse national coverage that this truly historic matter. Federal suzerainity over State law, a matter supposedly settled as recently as the 1960's, is now being challenged, once again. And in an arena in which Federal law could conceivably *lose*. The implications for all other Federal laws are nothing less than shattering. This is one of the reasons why the Feds are fighting this tooth and nail; they know that a win for 'States Rights' as represented by the seemingly innocuous matter of MMJ can open a lid on what they consider a Pandora's Box. If the average American, who has lived with the idea of Federal law cancelling State law nearly all his or her life, sees a successful challenge to it, then where will it end? Needless to say, the Feds have a huge stake in maintaining the status quo.
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Comment #3 posted by Mark Tide on February 25, 2000 at 00:12:36 PT:
P215 was deliberately: Broad
Hey Kapn' & all,The law was deliberately drafted to be - BROAD -. And "vague" is what the politically polarized law enforcement interests want to put on to it. They don't like 'broad' in this area, so they juggle their BS premises underneath any proper focus on that 'broad' path. Because the press / media has been SO LAZY, playing to the spoon-fed, confusion and sensationalism tilt, this BIG LIE continues.In my journalistic work covering this issue, I've had --- major newspapers' --- outstandingly fine reporters --- complain (confidentially, on fear of risking / losing their jobs) that their major press employers have this BIG LIE TILT built into their agendas. These newspapers will not let the reporters cover the real stories. They manipulate stories to suit the political power and swank. These media are not interested in anything except spinning the destructive drivel of institutional political correctness. Sad, but true.
Arcata Journal
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Comment #2 posted by kaptinemo on February 24, 2000 at 16:04:57 PT
But was it *deliberately* vague?
Perhaps I am reading too much into this. But it seems to me that the way the law was written, it was meant to be so.By doing so, the framers of that law have shown the paucity of arguments raised by law enforcement officers vis-a-vis the entire matter of cannabis ; that is, what constitutes 'legitimate use' (i.e. medical) and what constitutes proscibed recreational use. For, if the Devil Weed, and the Assassin of Youth can have a beneficial role to play in the pharmacopeia, and it can be demonstarted that it can, with no danger of addiction, then why continue with the farce of prohibition?As I said, perhaps I am ascribing too much in the way of actual motivations on their part, but by writing and passing the law as it is, (and gauging the reactions of law enforcement in their attempt to maintain their control in the face of rapidly shifting anti-prohibitionist sentiment in California) the framers of Prop215 may have begun an even more important process. They are holding up to public scrutiny the inherent pointlessness of cannabis prohibition.
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Comment #1 posted by Mark Tide on February 24, 2000 at 13:06:08 PT:
Impossible
This is a pretty good story about a fairy-tale: that Sacramento can pass legislation acceptable under the dome, yet still consistent with the language and intent of P215. It will NEVER happen, and Sens. Vasco / Johannessen both know this. But they cannot admit to it, publically or politically. It's stalemate, because as Sen. John Vasconcellos (Vasco) is often saying about this field of play, "The people are way ahead of the politicians on this one."Unfortunately, Vasco's bill (SB 848) makes none of the tough policy choices, it just postpones them while those in the real big power games attempt to find the handle / fences for this issue. The legal drug companies don't want any free medicinal cannabis (white market) in the hands of the people. While, law enforcement wants to push the Big Lie about how P215 is supposedly vague, with them determined to shrink-wrap unreasonable limitations on patients through implementation. Law enforcement interests have far too much influence on P215 in Vasco's chambers, oddly enough.P215 CAN WORK, just like its written. The problem has always been finding the good advocacy and resources to properly accomplish local implementation programs (only a few exist after 3 years). None of the drug policy reform orgs. have applied to this task. And they have been asked to do so, repeatedly. Yet, local implementation programs are the only way forward. AMR, NORML, and all the rest have basically left the relevant patients across this state in the lurch, out in the cold, by pandering fireside politics at the capitol upon this fairy-tale.
Arcata Journal
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