Cannabis Hemp News

We have detectives flying around in helicopters looking for pot in your backyard, while child molesters are in the playground NOT being arrested. Road officers are looking for a baggie under the front seat, while drunk drivers sail on by and kill people. Public Safety is greatly diminished as The Thin Blue Line wastes precious resources going after pot...Off. Howard J. Wooldridge (retired), member Law Enforcement Against Prohibition www.leap.cc

Burke fuels dope fire February 08, 2003 Opposition Leader Denis Burke said yesterday Territorians should be allowed to decide for themselves whether they smoke marijuana. He said the Government was misguided in its determination for police to target marijuana use. "The vast majority of marijuana use is recreational use," Mr Burke said. "It's harmless and the Government should concentrate on issues that are a concern to the community." As the former commander of 2nd Cavalry Regiment based at Robertson Barracks, Mr Burke said he tolerated marijuana consumption by his troops. "There are many people that will not drink alcohol, but will have the occasional smoke,…

By Ann Harrison, AlterNet February 5, 2003 In an extraordinary condemnation of federal drug war tactics, five jurors who convicted medical cannabis grower Ed Rosenthal of federal marijuana cultivation and conspiracy charges, held a press conference yesterday (Tuesday, Feb. 4) to apologize and to call for a new trial. The jurors said they were outraged to discover that Rosenthal had been deputized by the city of Oakland, Calif. to grow medical cannabis for patients under California's Compassionate Use Act (Prop. 215). The judge denied all but two of Rosenthal's defense witnesses, including the Oakland city attorney who drafted the legal immunity provisions for the city…

New Dutch Regulations To License Prescription Pot Growers, Will Allow Pharmacies To Stock Medical Cannabis February 6, 2003 - The Hague, Netherlands The Hague, the Netherlands: Pending changes in Dutch law will allow federal health officials to license medicinal marijuana cultivators, and permit pharmacies to provide prescription-grade cannabis for medical use. The new regulations, which were first announced last April, are expected to be enacted by March 17, 2003, according to a spokesman from the Dutch Ministry of Health. Licensing will be overseen by the Netherlands’ Office of Medicinal Cannabis (BMC) of the Health Ministry, which was established in 2000 to stu…

By ELISSA HUNT, Magistrates' Court reporter February 05, 2003 FOUR detectives were charged yesterday with drug trafficking in the latest corruption claim to hit Victoria Police. Drug charges: from left are Det-Sgt Glenn Saunders, Sen-Det Peter Alexander, Sen-Det Stephen Campbell, and former Det-Sgt David Waters. Picture: John Hart The four policemen, including two detective sergeants, were all based at St Kilda. They are accused of trafficking $100,000 worth of cannabis. Charged are Det- Sgt David John Waters, 42, who was discharged last month, and serving officers Det-Sgt Glenn Saunders, 33, Sen-Det Peter John Alexander, 36, and Sen-Det Stephen Russell Campbe…

by Simon O'Brien Printed in Issue:20 April 2002 Simon O'Brien, Western Australian Legislative Council member for the South Metropolitan Region and Shadow Minister for Drug Abuse Strategy, recently visited South Australia to investigate that State's experience with liberalised cannabis laws. His visit to South Australia was prompted by the WA Labor Government's announcement that it would pursue the decriminalisation of the possession of small amounts (up to 25g) of cannabis, and the cultivation of up to two plants. A summary of his report follows. South Australian experience The decriminalisation of cannabis in South Australia, in particular, its cultivation, has…

Cannabis smokers just want to stay on the sofa and snack, spending hours engrossed in home entertainment. Red Bull and smoothies, 'Munchie' snacks such as Mars bars and Haribo jellies. Pizza chains. Video stores. Games consoles. Multichannel TV. And what scares them... Shiny, noisy places with too many choices such as Starbucks and McDonald's High-alcohol drinks and strong lagers such as Stella Artois Pubs with bouncers on the door: Businesses alerted to huge profits as study shows dope users have money to burn Ben Summerskill Sunday February 2, 2003 The Observer The stock market is faltering and house prices are on the edge of a precipice. Could cannabis smokers be t…

A federal jury Friday found Ed Rosenthal, the author of how-to-grow books on marijuana and how to avoid the law, guilty of marijuana cultivation and conspiracy charges. Deliberating for a day, the 12-member jury concluded that Rosenthal, the self described "Guru of Ganja," was growing more than 1,000 plants, conspiring to cultivate marijuana and maintaining a warehouse for a growing operation. He faces a maximum life term when sentenced June 4. Several people in the courtroom, including Rosenthal's wife and daughter, wept as the verdicts were read by a court clerk. The verdicts were a victory in the federal government's battle against California's 1996 voter-approv…

Rosenthal's Federal Drug Trial Turns Surreal By Ann Harrison, AlterNet January 27, 2003 They viewed the glossy color photographs of meticulously tended marijuana mother plants flourishing under timed lights inside an Oakland, Calif. warehouse. Then they watched a videotape showing DEA agents uprooting nearby marijuana cuttings to determine which had roots, and could thus be considered "plants" under the federal sentencing guidelines. It was all in a day's work for jurors in the ongoing, and often surreal, federal drug trial of former High Times advice columnist ''Ask Ed'' Rosenthal, who is facing 20 years in prison for cultivating medical cannabis. Federal prosecuto…

"I thought, you know, hallucinogens were fun things to do on a Friday night," says a young man, who does not want to be identified. The drug overdose that almost killed him came from an exotic combination of chemicals and plants that promised the high of his life. He says the recipe for how to mix what he took came from an Internet site called: http://www.erowid.org Erowid.org is just one of a growing group of Web sites devoted to recreational drugs. There are links to everything, from how to make GHB to how to test ecstasy for purity. But, as CBS News Correspondent Wyatt Andrews reports, Erowid's reports on side effects, on precise doses and its long list of recip…

VICTORIANS driving into New South Wales may have their cars randomly searched with sniffer dogs. NSW Police Minister Michael Costa will today announce a 12-month trial giving officers sweeping powers to pull over cars and conduct random drug searches on cross-border highways. Police have been concerned about the amount of South Australian cannabis being trafficked into Sydney along the Sturt and Barrier highways. Mr Costa said the trial would also help fight the trade in heroin between Sydney and Melbourne via the Hume. Police would be required to get Supreme Court approval to mount operations of up to 72 hours. The operations must be within 100km from the b…

The U.S. government's attempt to silence marijuana-cultivation expert and author Ed Rosenthal, as well as his attorneys, was thwarted today in federal court, but those assembled to hear the outcome of the latest twist in what was already a Kafkaesque legal saga had to wait to the end of the day for the judge's decision. Fear of pervasive media reports on the trial "contaminating the jury" had yesterday prompted Assistant U.S. Attorney George Bevan, Jr. to ask the judge to put a stop to all press interviews until the conclusion of Mr. Rosenthal's federal trial. U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer responded yesterday by asking Mr. Rosenthal to agree not to speak to the …

BY J.K. DINEEN Of The Examiner Staff To the federal government, Bob Martin is a key witness against medical marijuana advocate Ed Rosenthal: on Thursday, he testified Rosenthal once carted two boxes of plants into a Sixth Street pot dispensary in the outer Tenderloin. But to hundreds of patients who regularly pick up their herbal medicine at his 10th Street Compassionate Care Center, Martin remains one of The City's most active distributors of medicinal pot. The apparent contrast between Martin the government witness and Martin the proud purveyor of medical marijuana was one of the most interesting things to emerge Thursday in the trial of Rosenthal, a h…

Global Drug Reformers Hold First Legalization Summit, February 12-15 in Merida, Yucatan, Mexico. An international drug legalization summit hosted by the Autonomous University of the Yucatan -- "Out from the Shadows: Ending Drug Prohibition in the 21st Century," will feature leaders from throughout Latin America and the world, beginning on February 12 in the Mexican city of Merida. Among the confirmed participants -- who will also be available for press interviews -- are former Prosecutor General Gustavo de Greiff (Colombia) and former Solicitor to the Supreme Court Jaime Malamud Goti (Argentina), Bolivian congressmen and coca growers' leaders Evo Morales and Felipe Q…