Medicinal Marijuana on Trial

By Dan Hurley
Source: New York Times

Medical marijuana is now legal in 11 states, and bills to legalize it are pending in at least 7 more. The drug is also at the heart of a case being considered by the United States Supreme Court. Yet there remains much confusion over whether marijuana in fact has any significant medical effect.

"People subjectively report benefits," said Dr. Joseph I. Sirven, an epilepsy specialist and associate professor of neurology at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine in Scottsdale, Ariz. "There's a whole Internet literature suggesting what a wonderful thing it is. But the reality is, we don't know."

In an editorial last year in the journal Neurology, Dr. Sirven pointed out that the best studies of marijuana's effects on humans have so far shown little objective evidence of benefit in patients with epilepsy or multiple sclerosis. And a growing body of research indicates that, at least in teenagers, heavy marijuana use over a period of years significantly increases the risk of developing psychosis and schizophrenia.

In the Supreme Court case, two California residents, Angel McClary Raich and Diane Monson, brought a suit against federal officials in October 2002 to defend their use of marijuana after six of Ms. Monson's marijuana plants were seized and destroyed by the Drug Enforcement Administration.

The federal government, which considers marijuana illegal under the Controlled Substances Act, asked the Supreme Court to overturn a Court of Appeals ruling that supported the two women. Oral arguments were heard just after Thanksgiving, and a ruling could come any day.

Ms. Raich's physician, Dr. Frank Henry Lucido of Berkeley, Calif., asserted in an affidavit that Ms. Raich risked death if she was denied the marijuana to treat nausea, anorexia, severe chronic pain and other disorders brought on by a variety of illnesses, including post-traumatic stress disorder, asthma and an inoperable brain tumor. On a Web site created on her behalf, www.angeljustice.org, Ms. Raich says she joined the lawsuit "in order to save my life."

While little scientific evidence supports such a lifesaving role for marijuana, many studies have found modest benefits in patients' subjective measures of pain, sleep, nausea, appetite, tremors and muscle spasms.

"There's nothing better for nerve pain than marijuana," said Phillip Alden, 41, a writer in Redwood City, Calif.

Twice a month, he spends about $200 to buy a half ounce of high-potency marijuana from one of San Francisco's medical marijuana buyers' clubs.

He smokes it three or more times a day to treat pain from a back injury, and to improve his appetite and reduce nausea associated with AIDS and the antiviral drugs he takes for it. It has even checked the progression of his peripheral neuropathy, he said.

Two recent surveys, also published in Neurology, have documented widespread use of marijuana among Canadian patients and a widespread belief in its benefits.

The first survey, of 220 patients with multiple sclerosis, found that 36 percent had used marijuana to treat their symptoms, and that 14 percent were using it at the time of the survey.

The second survey, of 136 patients attending the University of Alberta Epilepsy Clinic, found that 21 percent had used marijuana in the previous year. Just over two-thirds of the active users said it decreased the severity of their seizures and slightly more than half reported a decreased frequency of seizures.

But the lead author of the epilepsy study said it proved only that some patients believed in marijuana, not that it or its active ingredients, called cannabinoids, actually worked.

"There's not been a randomized, controlled trial demonstrating that marijuana or any cannabinoid is any more effective in controlled seizures than a placebo," said Dr. Donald W. Gross, director of the University of Alberta's adult epilepsy program.

Although doctors may now prescribe marijuana in Canada for certain disorders, including epilepsy, Dr. Gross said he had never done so. "It's terribly complicated from a physician's standpoint, and somewhat frustrating," he said. "We have a product that has been legitimized without any evidence of efficacy."

A large body of research in test tubes and animals supports the view that cannabinoids have anticonvulsive properties. But while a 2003 study of 657 patients with M.S. published in the journal Lancet found significant improvements in subjective reports of muscle spasms and pain, it found no improvement by objective measures after 15 weeks.

A follow-up report on the same group of patients did show modest benefit after 12 months, but the researchers said that the results should be interpreted cautiously, because the study had been intended to test only short-term benefits.

Dr. David Baker, a professor at the Institute of Neurology in London, has found beneficial effects of cannabinoids in mice who have an artificially induced type of multiple sclerosis. But, he said, "Showing clinical benefit in humans has been an elusive beast."

"At best there is a narrow therapeutic effect before the side effects become unacceptable for many people," he said. " What is clear is that there have been no dramatic improvements overall."

Dr. Kenneth P. Mackie, a professor of anesthesiology at the University of Washington, has devoted 15 years to studying the brain's response to cannabinoids through specialized brain receptors called CB1 and CB2.

"There's a whole bunch of theoretical reasons suggesting there would be a benefit for marijuana on a variety of conditions relating to pain and neuroinflammation," Dr. Mackie said. "But the clinical studies just aren't there."

Far stronger evidence exists for a harmful effect of marijuana in teenagers who use it early and often. "We know that cannabis is a contributory cause of schizophrenia," said Dr. Robin M. Murray, a professor at the Institute of Psychiatry in London and the co-editor of a new book, "Marijuana and Madness: Psychiatry and Neurobiology."

In a 2002 study published in the British medical journal BMJ, Dr. Murray reported that New Zealand teenagers who started smoking marijuana before age 15 and continued doing so on a daily basis raised their risk of developing psychosis and schizophrenia from about 2 percent to as much as 10 percent.

The study, he said, ruled out the possibility that the teenagers who used marijuana were also those who were more likely to develop schizophrenia, whether or not they used the drug.

Still, "You have to take a lot to go psychotic," Dr. Murray said. "But with five joints a day for five years, an amount that is increasingly common in Europe, you're seriously increasing your risk of schizophrenia."

He added that even so, the risk dropped sharply as people aged, so that most chronically ill people who used marijuana for medical purposes were unlikely to experience psychosis as a result.

Research in the United States has been greatly hampered by legal restrictions.

In 1997, Dr. Donald Abrams, an oncologist and assistant director of the Positive Health Program at the University of California at San Francisco, became the first doctor authorized by the National Institute of Drug Abuse to receive marijuana to conduct research to determine if it provided medical benefits.

Now more than a dozen California researchers are studying it under the auspices of the University of California's Center for Medicinal Cannabis Research.

"Cannabis has a 5,000-year history of medical use," Dr. Abrams said. He said he had completed three studies in patients with H.I.V. that showed no negative effects on their immune systems or on the functioning of the protease inhibitor drugs they were taking.

He is now trying to show that marijuana has a beneficial effect on immune functioning, he said.

The patients were brought into the hospital to smoke marijuana under medical supervision.

Source: New York Times (NY)
Author: Dan Hurley
Published: March 29, 2005
Copyright: 2005 The New York Times Company
Contact: letters@nytimes.com
Website: http://www.nytimes.com/
Link to article: http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread20418.shtml

 

For Immediate Release
Source: Common Dreams

Washington -- A Supreme Court ruling is imminent in the medical marijuana case Raich v. Ashcroft. Experts from the nation's leading drug policy reform organization will be available for comment on the ruling. The Drug Policy Alliance has fought and continues to fight to allow seriously ill patients throughout America to access medical marijuana to relieve their pain.

The Alliance spearheaded virtually all of the medical marijuana ballot initiatives that are now law, in California, Alaska, Washington, Oregon, Colorado, Nevada and Maine, and is currently involved in working with other state legislatures to pass medical marijuana legislation.

The Alliance has also worked on some of the highest profile legal cases related to medical marijuana access.

The Alliance served as attorneys of record in the case Conant v. Walters, which upheld the First Amendment right of doctors to candidly discuss and recommend medical marijuana to patients free from federal threats or interference.

The Alliance currently represents the city and county of Santa Cruz, seven terminally and chronically ill patients and the Wo/Men's Alliance for Medical Marijuana (WAMM) in a federal lawsuit seeking to enable a collective of seriously ill patients to grow and use medical marijuana free from federal law enforcement interference.

Experts available to discuss the Supreme Court case include:

Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance, the leading organization advocating alternatives to the failed war on drugs. In July 2004, Nadelmann's National Review cover story on marijuana prohibition addressed the medical marijuana issue extensively.

Daniel Abrahamson, director of the Drug Policy Alliance's Office of Legal Affairs, who submitted an amicus brief on the current Supreme Court case, as well as submitting amicus briefs in many other landmark medical marijuana cases.

Complete Title: Supreme Court Ruling Imminent in Medical Marijuana Case; Experts from Leading National Advocacy Organization Available for Comment - Drug Policy Alliance has been Involved in Numerous State Medical Marijuana Initiatives and Major Court Cases

Contact: Drug Policy Alliance
Tony Newman, 212-613-8026
Elizabeth Méndez Berry, 212-613-8036

Source: Common Dreams (ME)
Published: March 28, 2005
Copyright: 2005 Common Dreams
Contact: editor@commondreams.org
Website: http://www.commondreams.org/
Link to article: http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread20416.shtml

 

By Neal Pierce
Source: St. Paul Pioneer Press

Bedrock American federalism - separation of powers, the basic rights of states to make their own decisions - got a big boost from the state and federal courts' refusal to bend to Congress' impetuous lawmaking in the Terri Schiavo case. Now a slump in presidential poll approval ratings suggests that the Bush White House - having forsaken ideals of states' rights and limited federal power trumpeted by conservatives for decades - is paying a political price.

But the case is hardly an exception. On issue after issue, notes former Maine Attorney General James Tierney, the Bush administration has ignored states' rights to play to its religious right and corporate constituencies.

"The president is so confident he believes he can sweep all opposition aside," Tierney says. "But that's why we have federalism and a Constitution carefully constructed to stop excessive power, whether it's a Roosevelt or a Bush."

Following in the wake of the Schiavo case, two highly emotional, medical and life-choice issues - both presently on the Supreme Court's docket- are likely to test the limits of federal power. Each involves the federal Controlled Substances Act.

First is medical marijuana, in a case challenging states' rights to allow the use of cannabis for people who are either dying or suffering severe, chronic pain. Medical marijuana use is now the law in 10 states - Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Vermont and Washington - and is currently before other state legislatures.

Apparently moved by heart-rending stories of people relieved from nightmarishly extreme pain by use of marijuana, up to 80 percent of Americans, in polls, endorse medical marijuana use. But federal policymakers, apparently still wed to the country's decades-long, clearly failed "war on drugs," remain adamantly opposed to any form of marijuana legalization.

The Justice Department, relying on Congress' right to regulate trade among the states, argues that even small amounts of marijuana obtained for free are somehow part of a national market for illicit drugs.

Advocates of experimentation in the states were encouraged when the Supreme Court, under Chief Justice William Rehnquist, a states' rights advocate, struck down two seemingly far-fetched efforts to use the interstate commerce clause to assert federal jurisdiction. One case was a federal law criminalizing the possession of guns near schools; another was national legislation giving rape victims the right to sue attackers in federal court.

Similarly, common sense would seem to say that small amounts of marijuana grown and used locally have negligible impact on interstate commerce. But when the court heard the marijuana case in November, several of the justices were skeptical about the state laws.

Later this year the Supreme Court also will hear arguments on Oregon's celebrated Death With Dignity Law, the physician-assisted suicide statute twice approved by Oregon voters. The law allows a doctor to prescribe lethal drugs for a resident who has an incurable disease, is likely to die within six months and is mentally competent to make the choice. A second physician must approve.

The Bush Justice Department has tried to overturn Oregon's law, claiming there's "no legitimate medical purpose" for prescribing drugs that could end a patient's life. But two lower federal courts have sided with Oregon's contention that regulation of medical practice has historically been a state, not a federal, prerogative. And now the Supreme Court gets to decide.

An ironic question is raised by both the medical marijuana and assisted suicide cases: Will the "activist judges" of the high court override the right of the states to experiment and make judgments on tough pain-control and end-of-life issues?

And second, shouldn't the core principle be: let states, and in turn individuals and their families, decide for themselves?

Results of the Oregon law show what may happen. Fears of thousands of assisted suicide decisions haven't materialized: Over seven years, just 208 Oregonians have elected to end their lives under the law.

And a culture of end-of-life death with thoughtfulness and care has developed. Among the states, Oregon has one of the highest rates of people dying at home, the lowest percentages dying in hospitals. Morphine use for control of extreme pain is the highest of any state. Oregon medical schools and doctors are focusing on comfort care for the dying.

What's to dislike - or illegal - about that?

Peirce is a national columnist who writes about state and local affairs.

Source: St. Paul Pioneer Press (MN)
Author: Neal Pierce
Published: March 30, 2005
Copyright: 2005 St. Paul Pioneer Press
Contact: letters@pioneerpress.com
Website: http://www.pioneerplanet.com/
Link to article: http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread20424.shtml

 

By David Edwards, The Daily Journal
Source: Ukiah Daily Journal

California -- As medical marijuana proponents nationwide hold their breath in anticipation of a Supreme Court ruling, the city of Ukiah is plunging ahead with a groundbreaking marijuana ordinance. The Ukiah Planning Commission has scheduled a public hearing on the proposed ordinance for April 13. That will bring renewed attention and scrutiny to the multifaceted law.

Local lawmakers want to nudge pot growers into parts of the city specifically zoned for commercial activity. If the ordinance passes, backyard and other outdoor residential marijuana gardens would be illegal.

Several citizens have complained to the council about abuse of Proposition 215, the California law that permits the cultivation and use of marijuana for medicinal purposes. Council members have heard examples of Ukiah residents who flout the law for profit.

The business potential of growing marijuana might explain the city's efforts to restrict cultivation to commercial zones. But representatives of the Northern California chapter of the National Organization for Reform of Marijuana Laws have countered that the ordinance goes too far.

They say the city has not struck a balance between providing for patients and pulling the plug on profiteers. At the last public discussion of city marijuana policy, two Northern California NORML representatives hinted that a lawsuit would follow if the city enacted the ordinance as currently written.

But with Supreme Court justices preparing to rule in a Bay Area pot case, the Ukiah ordinance could be magnified in the wake of a landmark decision. An organization called the Drug Policy Alliance issued a press release Monday saying a ruling is imminent in the case of Raich v. Ashcroft.

That case was brought by two California patients, and it challenges the federal government's refusal to recognize marijuana as medicine. In essence, federal drug laws conflict with those in the 10 states that permit medical marijuana.

If the Supreme Court rules for the two California patients, "their victory may dramatically redraw the lines of federal police powers and further empower states and their individual citizens," the Drug Policy Alliance's Daniel Abrahamson wrote.

On the other hand, if the justices reject the patients' argument, "the status quo will almost certainly prevail," and "as a practical matter, the average medical marijuana patient in compliance with their state law will have little to fear from the federal police."

The status quo may not prevail in Ukiah, however. A handful of local medical marijuana users have told The Daily Journal they support the city's proposed ordinance.

City Attorney David Rapport said regulating the cultivation of marijuana in California is a tricky proposition. He does not know of any other city that is trying to use zoning laws to put growers in their place, wherever that happens to be.

Because the ordinance involves land-use decisions, the Planning Commission gets a look at it. Commissioners can make changes or suggestions, and in two weeks the public will have another chance to comment on the ordinance. Ultimately, though, the buck stops at the council.

At the urging of one of the council members, Rapport wrote a provision into the ordinance that absolves the city from responsibility if an otherwise compliant grower falls victim to federal prosecution.

"We've kind of built an out into the ordinance," he said. "The ordinance is not intended to authorize anything that's prohibited under federal law."

As for the built-in lawsuit potential, Rapport said the dearth of applicable case law in California clouds interpretation of a crucial part of Proposition 215. That means Ukiah's ordinance could inspire a test case of state law.

Not until the medical marijuana spotlight leaves the nine robed figures in Washington, D.C., though.

"If Raich goes (in favor of) the feds, the city could argue the ordinance is still more flexible than federal law," Rapport said. "There hasn't been any test of using zoning authority to regulate cultivation. We'll see. It would be a real interesting lawsuit."

Note: Public hearing scheduled for April 13.

Source: Ukiah Daily Journal (CA)
Author: David Edwards, The Daily Journal
Published: Wednesday, March 30, 2005
Copyright: 2005 Ukiah Daily Journal
Contact: udj@pacific.net
Website: http://www.ukiahdailyjournal.com/
Link to article: http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread20427.shtml

 

It's more about the existing prescription drugs, and the incredible amount of money that goes along with them. Read this to get a better understanding of what I mean:

http://forum.grasscity.com/showthread.php?t=57186

There's many a factor, that's just one. Another big one is the Government would have to admit that what they've been saying for years is wrong. Don't expect to see that happening soon.

 

By Alex Koppelman
Source: Daily Pennsylvanian

Despite the fact that Angel McClary Raich has committed no crime, former Attorney General John Ashcroft, as the representative of the Bush administration, wants to kill the 38-year-old mother of two. And so, in a landmark case whose outcome is expected to be decided by the Supreme Court within the next few weeks, she is suing him. Raich won't be strapped down in an electric chair or on a gurney for lethal injection; she won't be facing a firing squad if the administration has its way. But she will have medicine that her doctors have testified is the only thing keeping her alive -- testimony that government lawyers do not dispute -- taken away from her.

Raich has an inoperable brain tumor. According to an affidavit written by her primary care physician, Dr. Frank Lucido, voted 1993's "Best Doctor in Berkeley" by The Daily Californian, she suffers from life-threatening weight loss and nausea, as well as severe chronic pain caused by scoliosis, joint dysfunction, endometriosis and uterine fibroid tumors, among other things. Without her medicine, he says, she could suffer "imminent harm" and die. She has tried over 35 different medicines; only one has worked without potentially fatal side effects. And because Angel Raich's medicine is marijuana, the Bush administration wants to take it away.

Eleven states allow some form of medical marijuana use, but the federal government argues that all those laws are superseded by the federal Controlled Substances Act, which prohibits any use or possession of marijuana except in federal research studies. Previously, medical marijuana users have sued on the basis of medical necessity, but Raich and her co-plaintiff, Diane Monson, tried a different approach. Raich and Monson are arguing that any application of the Controlled Substances Act to their case is unconstitutional. Congress' power to regulate things like the medical use of marijuana is limited, they say, by the Commerce Clause of the Constitution, which gives Congress power over interstate trade. The two argue that because their marijuana is used in California and grown in California -- Raich's marijuana is donated by two growers who use only Californian seeds, soil and water and Monson's is homegrown -- the federal government has no constitutional authority to intercede. In December of 2003, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed.

Raich and Monson stand a fair chance of winning their case, but the debate over medical marijuana should not be limited to constitutional power. What this country should be debating instead is the rationality, the efficiency and above all the humanity of its marijuana laws.

In the fall of 2003, for 34th Street Magazine, I interviewed a man named George McMahon who is alive today solely because of marijuana that, for the past 13 years, has been provided to him by the federal government. In fact, McMahon is one of a handful of people who, over the years, have been able to argue medical necessity to obtain federally grown marijuana through a Compassionate Investigational New Drug program. Shut to new patients by the first Bush administration, the program was a victim not of failure but of its own success: The government worried that the sight of so many patients successfully treated with marijuana might send a message to the country that the drug could be a real medicine.

But the truth is that marijuana has at least the potential to be a real medicine. The American Medical Association said as much when it opposed the 1937 Marijuana Tax Act, which effectively banned the drug, writing in a letter to Congress that "the prevention of the use of the drug for medicinal purposes can accomplish no good end whatsoever." In his 1993 book Marihuana: the Forbidden Medicine, Dr. Lester Grinspoon, a professor emeritus of psychiatry at Harvard, argued that marijuana could be a "miracle drug," suitable for treating glaucoma, epileptic seizures, asthma attacks, migraine headaches, chronic pain and the nausea which often accompanies chemotherapy.

And then there is the experience of the hundreds of people who, like Raich and McMahon, would not be alive today if not for marijuana. But that hasn't mattered to the Bush administration or the administrations that preceded it.

The War on Drugs has never been based on good science. It has never been effective in stopping the problem of drug use and abuse in this country, and it has hurt countless individuals who might otherwise have benefited from medical treatment with drugs like marijuana. It's time for our government to admit that -- to step back from its untenable position and allow Angel Raich to live.

Alex Koppelman is a senior individualized major in the College from Baltimore and former editor-in-chief of 34th Street Magazine. Rock the Casbah appears on Thursdays.

Complete Title: The Wrong Fight: Meet The Real Victims in The Government's War on Drugs

Source: Daily Pennsylvanian, The (PA Edu)
Author: Alex Koppelman
Published: March 31, 2005
Copyright: 2005 The Daily Pennsylvanian
Contact: letters@dailypennsylvanian.com
Website: http://www.dailypennsylvanian.com
Link to article: http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread20429.shtml

 

By Naomi Kresge, Staff Writer
Source: Daily Bulletin

Ontario, Calif. -- Supporters of medical marijuana asked the city Tuesday night to reconsider the temporary ban it placed recently on cannabis clubs, co-ops and dispensaries. They asked the City Council to study the needs of patients who use marijuana, decrying the decision as hasty and ill-informed. "We need medical cannabis to survive. Why this is such a difficult issue is beyond me," said Linda Lane, of Yucca Valley, who used a crutch to walk and said marijuana helped her recover from a stroke 33 years ago. "This is a God-given plant."

Councilman Alan Wapner told the group the city's temporary ban was set so it can study the issue further before setting a permanent rule.

"I feel very comfortable with the decision we made," said Wapner, comparing marijuana dispensaries to adult businesses, which are legal under state law but which cities may regulate through zoning codes.

Wapner has said in the past that, like adult businesses, he would prefer not to have marijuana dispensaries in the city at all.

The four-person council approved the 45-day moratorium March 15. The move coincided with an apparent trend in cities around the state toward setting temporary bans on marijuana dispensaries.

Marijuana Anti-Prohibition Project Director Larry Swerdlow argued that Ontario went a step too far, however, by banning co-ops as well.

"I don't think they knew what they were doing," he said, arguing that Senate Bill 420, passed in 2004 to govern medical marijuana, explicitly allows for co-ops and collectives.

The bill, which set up a voluntary ID program for medical marijuana users, states an intent to "enhance the access of patients and caregivers to medical marijuana through collective, cooperative cultivation projects."

Swerdlow told the City Council that his group plans to start medical marijuana co-ops around the Inland Empire to give patients help in growing the drug.

Planning Director Jerry Blum said the city is not aware of language in the state law allowing co-ops. He said city staffers are preparing to ask the council to extend the 45-day moratorium to roughly two years.

The conflict between California state law, which allows patients with a prescription to smoke marijuana for medicinal use, and federal law prohibiting the drug will likely get a hearing on a national stage this spring. The Supreme Court is expected to rule on a case brought by medical marijuana patients from Northern California against the federal government.

Blum said the city hopes to see the outcome of the high court case before making a final decision on the dispensaries.

And in the meantime, officials are surveying cities around the state to find out what studies of medical marijuana dispensaries are available.

"(The moratorium is) just until we've made the study," Blum said. "It's kind of doing a stop-gap measure to allow us to adequately review the matter until we determine if and where these businesses should be located."

Source: Inland Valley Daily Bulletin (CA)
Author: Naomi Kresge, Staff Writer
Published: Tuesday, April 05, 2005
Copyright: 2005 Inland Valley Daily Bulletin
Website: http://www.dailybulletin.com/
Contact: naomi.kresge@dailybulletin.com
Link to article: http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread20464.shtml

 

By Michael Krawitz, Columnist
Source: Collegiate Times

As I write this column the United States Supreme Court is deliberating on the fate of over 32 individuals directly and many millions more by extension. I will dedicate my next column to my opinion of the legal aspects of the case and it's meaning within the overall debate on the use of marijuana as a medicine but for now I want to just introduce a few more facts. The case before the court is one stemming from a 2002 lawsuit filed by two medical cannabis patients, Angel McClary Raich, Diane Monson, and two caregivers, John Doe Number One, and John Doe Number Two who filed a complaint and motion for preliminary injunction against Attorney General John Ashcroft and former DEA Administrator Asa Hutchinson.

They asked Judge Martin Jenkins to issue a preliminary injunction during the pendency of this action and a permanent injunction enjoining defendants from arresting or prosecuting plaintiffs, seizing their medical cannabis, forfeiting their property, or seeking civil or administrative sanctions against them for their activities.

Case info may be found at: http://www.angeljustice.org/

A decision in Ashcroft v. Raich is expected before the end of June 2005.

The following lives hang in the balance of this case:

Medical marijuana growers Bryan Epis and Keith Alden were released pending the Raich ruling. The Raich case will also affect three California medical cannabis dispensaries with cases in the 9th Circuit: the Oakland Cannabis Buyers' Cooperative, the Marin Alliance for Medical Marijuana and the Ukiah Cannabis Buyers Club. The three cases have been bundled together as a single case, but they have different implications for the dispensaries involved.

The Wo/Men's Alliance for Medical Marijuana (WAMM) has a high stakes interest in the outcome of the Raich case. On Sept. 5, 2002, 30 armed DEA agents raided WAMM's Davenport marijuana garden and the home of its founders, Valerie and Michael Corral. Agents chainsawed 167 marijuana plants while holding the Corrals and a patient at gunpoint. But the DEA's exit was blocked by patients who successfully negotiated for the Corrals release. No charges were ever filed.

Ed Rosenthal says if the Raich outcome is favorable, charges against him for possession and maintaining a place for cultivation would not be crimes because he was never charged with sales.

Eddy Lepp, a 57-year-old Vietnam veteran, says he and his wife, Linda Senti, were growing medical cannabis for about 4,000 patients. If Raich-Monson wins a ruling that says non-commercial, intrastate medical-marijuana transactions are not subject to federal law, it will clearly benefit Lepp.

Leroy Stubblefield, a quadriplegic Vietnam veteran from Portland, Ore., had 12 marijuana plants seized from his home in September 2002 by DEA agent Michael Spasaro.

The criminal appeals of Judy and Lynn Osburn and the related civil forfeiture action against their Ventura County ranch home of 28 years turns on the disposition of the Raich case. Judy Osburn is the former director of the Los Angeles Cannabis Resource Center, which was raided and shut down by the DEA in October 2001.

In March 2004 Anna and Gary Barrett became the first federal defendants permitted to tell a jury that the marijuana they grew was for medical purposes. If a jury finds that the Barretts were in compliance with California's medical marijuana laws, U.S. District Judge Nora Manella said she would direct jurors to acquit the couple. Before the Raich preliminary injunction patients who went to trial and their witnesses could not mention medical marijuana under threat of contempt charges.

When the home and offices of Marian “Mollie” Fry, M.D., and her husband, attorney Dale Schafer, were raided in 2001, the DEA took some 6,000 patient files. Fry has not yet been indicted.

San Diego activist Steve McWilliams was arrested in 2002 on cultivation charges after displaying marijuana outside City Hall.

“If we lose Raich and our own private acts are interstate commerce and the states don't have the right to define medical practice then states don't have much value for what they can do for citizens. The feds have taken over,” McWilliams said.

Read more about those affected by the upcoming Raich/Monson Supreme Court decision by visiting Ann Harrison's great article in O'Shaughnessy's, the Journal of the California Cannabis Research Medical Group, at: http://www.ccrmg.org/journal/05spr/riding.html

Source: Collegiate Times (VA)
Author: Michael Krawitz, Columnist
Published: April 08, 2005
Copyright: 2005 Collegiate Times
Website: http://www.collegiatetimes.com/
Contact: comments@collegiatetimes.com
Link to article: http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread20486.shtml