Tonight: Interview with Kerlikowske predecessor Norm Stamper on Drug Czar appointment – 4:20pm

Download today’s Daily Audio Stash at 4:20pm Pacific when I discuss the potential appointment of Chief Kerlikowske as Drug Czar with his predecessor, former Seattle Police Chief and current member of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, Norm Stamper.

(Seattle P-I) Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske has accepted a job in the Obama administration, most likely overseeing the nation’s drug policies, according to sources familiar with the chief’s plans.

Kerlikowske, who has led the department for more than eight years, has told the department’s top commanders he expects to leave to take a top federal position, said the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they aren’t officially authorized to disclose the information.

Sources say Kerlikowske is expected to be named head of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, a Cabinet-level position otherwise known as the drug czar. The office, established in 1988, directs drug-control policy in the U.S. It’s subject to Senate confirmation.

Kerlikowske had also expressed an interest in the top job at the federal Drug Enforcement Administration but apparently has not been tapped for that post, one source said.

Kerlikowske won credit for stabilizing the police department after the stormy departure of Norm Stamper as chief in the wake of the 1999 World Trade Organization riots in Seattle, as well as the department’s initial failure to unearth a detective’s alleged theft of money at a crime scene. A genial Kerlikowske reached out to citizens. In addition, crime rates dipped during his time as chief, reaching historic lows in recent years.

Kerlikowske lists one of his accomplishments as the development of less-than-lethal force options for officers, equipping dozens of officers with Tasers. He also oversaw the installation of cameras in the department’s patrol cars.

He has been an advocate of gun control and fought to pass the assault-weapons ban and has championed closing the background-check loophole at gun shows.

Kerlikowske’s possible role in shaping drug policy for the Obama administration was applauded Tuesday by local medical-marijuana advocates.

In 2003, Kerlikowske opposed a city ballot measure, approved by voters, to make marijuana possession the lowest law-enforcement priority, saying it would create confusion. But in doing so, he noted that arresting people for possessing marijuana for personal use was already not a priority.

“Oh God bless us,” said Joanna McKee, co-founder and director of Green Cross Patient Co-Op, a medical-marijuana patient-advocacy group. “What a blessing — the karma gods are smiling on the whole country, man.”

McKee said Kerlikowske knows the difference between cracking down on the illegal abuse of drugs and allowing the responsible use of marijuana.

Douglas Hiatt, a Seattle attorney and advocate for medical-marijuana patients, said his first preference would be for a physician to oversee national drug policy.

But Kerlikowske would be a vast improvement over past drug czars, who have used the office to carry out the so-called “war on drugs,” Hiatt said.

Kerlikowske is a “very reasonable guy” who would likely bring more liberal policies to the job, Hiatt said.

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Download the NORML Daily Audio Stash for 2008-12-19

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We wrap up our week of discussions on cannabis and chronic pain with Dale Gierenger, coordinator of California NORML, and Doug Hiatt, a criminal defense attorney in Washington, talking about legal medical marijuana patients who are then denied narcotic painkillers when testing positive for THC.

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Judge Finds Medical Marijuana Patient Guilty in Pot-Growing Case :
Top Stories : Kitsap Sun
A Kitsap County Superior Court judge Friday found a card-carrying medical marijuana patient guilty of growing pot, saying that under the law, the Bremerton man was “not a qualifying patient.”

Judge Anna M. Laurie ruled that Robert Dalton’s use of marijuana for chronic lower back pain didn’t meet the conditions of the citizen’s initiative passed by voters in 1998, or any subsequent amendment to it by the Legislature.

His lawyers, Jeanette Dalton and Douglas Hiatt, had “failed to sustain his burden” on the point that his pain couldn’t be “unrelieved by standard medical treatments and medications,” such as opiate-based painkillers, she said, adding that marijuana for medicinal purposes should be a “drug of last resort.”

Hiatt was “very disappointed” with Laurie’s verdict, reiterating what he’d argued in court: that Laurie was “second guessing” physician Thomas Orvald, who recommended Robert Dalton use marijuana.

“If Judge Laurie wants to be a doctor, she should go to medical school,” Hiatt said. “No patient in this state is safe if she’s right.”

However, Kitsap County Deputy Prosecutor Cami Lewis called the decision “the correct result.” During closing arguments, deputy prosecutor Coreen Schnepf had argued that opiate medications were relieving his pain, and that he needed to have incurable pain by other medicines to use cannabis.

Hiatt had argued that those opiates made Dalton sick and weren’t effective at quelling his pain.

Dalton faces zero to six months in jail for the felony conviction. His lawyers will ask the judge at an Oct. 17 hearing to suspend any sentence pending their appeal.

With the conviction, Robert Dalton’s medical marijuana card is nullified, he said following the verdict. He said he’s not happy with the idea of going to opiates for pain control because of their addictive properties.

“I don’t want to be a drug addict,” he said. “That’s why I chose medical marijuana.”

When we have a system where only medical use of marijuana is legal, we end up with these crazy situations where judges get to play doctor and police get to play botanist.  Dalton was arrested for growing 88 marijuana plants.  Police decided that was more than a “60-day supply” as Washington’s law requires.  The cops were able to make that determination by using their ESP to determine just how much pain Dalton is feeling; their medical training to determine how much pain relief is required; their botany expertise to know how much medicine at certain potency will be produced by the strains Dalton was growing; and their crystal ball to determine how much medicine the future harvest would yield.

Then, after arrest, Judge Laurie used her magical laying-on of hands to sense Dalton’s pain to determine that the pain relief Dalton receives from marijuana is inferior to the pain-relief from opiates, despite Dalton telling her the opposite.  And with her superior medical training, the judge determined that the side effects of addiction, constipation, impotence, lethargy, and inability to work or drive are not too high a price to pay for pain relief, just so long as we keep Dalton away from that deadly dangerous “drug of last resort” that is non-addictive and makes you relax and feel better.

This is why marijuana must be made legal for all adults – healthy or sick.  As long as there is “criminal” marijuana, police and judges will constantly get between doctors and patients.

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Amid State Flip-Flopping, Judge to Call Medical Marijuana Case : Top Stories : Kitsap Sun
While state Department of Health officials continue to contemplate just what a 60-day supply for medical marijuana patients should be, attorneys in a case brought against a Bremerton man argued over that question as well.

Robert R. Dalton’s pot crop on Sand Dollar Road was deemed too big under the law by detectives with the West Sound Narcotics Enforcement Team last August. The 61-year-old’s property was raided and he was charged with manufacturing marijuana. But his lawyers contend that Dalton was growing within the limits allowed in a 60-day supply.

Deputy prosecutor Coreen Schnepf said in the trial’s closing arguments Thursday that Dalton had violated the medical marijuana law because she said he’d made remarks to WestNET detectives that he’d supply it to others. She cited a specific passage of the law that states marijuana as medicine must be for the “exclusive benefit of a qualifying patient.”

But one of Dalton’s attorneys, Douglas Hiatt, argued that under state law, Dalton can become a “primary provider” and distribute pot to other card-carrying patients.

The case will be decided without a jury by Kitsap County Superior Court Judge Anna M. Laurie on Sept. 19.

Dalton’s case comes at a time when the state Department of Health, mandated by the Legislature, is working to define just what a 60-day supply is. Earlier this year, health officials were set to recommend 35 ounces of dried pot and a 100-square-foot growing space as the limit. But Gov. Chris Gregoire said that was too much and asked the health department for a second opinion.

They countered with a maximum of 24 ounces and up to six mature plants and 18 immature plants — currently Oregon’s law — which irked medical marijuana advocates at a health department meeting in August.

How much do ten dogs weigh?

That was a question posed by Dan Monnat at the Aspen Legal Seminar this last April.  it highlights the medical marijuana laws that create an absurd distinction between patients who can use a legal herb and criminals who can be imprisoned for an illegal drug.  Such absurd distinctions force states to come up with plant and possession limits, such as Oregon’s limit of six mature plants, to separate the “medicine” from the “drugs”.

How much medicine do six plants produce?

Depends on how good a grower, what strain, indoor/outdoor, hydro/soil, mites/fungus/mold, etc.  I know a grower here who regularly produces 16 ounces per plant.  I know another who can barely get three.  So, just like you can’t know how much ten dogs weigh without knowing if they’re chihuahuas or bull mastiffs, you can’t know how much medicine six plants will produce.

Worse, though, is Washington’s “60-day supply”.  Now you have the undefinable “how much medicine does a plant produce” crossed with the undefinable “how much medicine is 60-day’s supply”.  You might as well ask “how much dog food do you need to feed ten dogs for sixty days?”

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Local News | Feds seize medical marijuana taken in Seattle raid | Seattle Times Newspaper
The federal government has gotten involved in the case of a medical marijuana patient support group that was raided recently by Seattle police.

According to the Seattle Police Department, the federal Drug Enforcement Administration has taken control of the marijuana seized during the raid on the Lifevine cooperative two weeks ago.

That raid made headlines largely because police seized hundreds of medical marijuana patient files. King County Prosecutor Dan Satterberg declined to press charges against the man who runs the group, Martin Martinez, and had the files returned to him. But Seattle police didn’t immediately return the 12 ounces of dried marijuana bud or several pounds of less-potent leaves, and the DEA took that last Friday.

Martinez’s lawyer, Douglas Hiatt, had asked the police department to return the marijuana, arguing that Martinez had a legal right to it under Washington’s medical marijuana law. However, because marijuana is illegal under federal law, U.S. Attorney Jeff Sullivan asked the DEA to take it and destroy it.

“Accordingly, the DEA has seized and processed the marijuana for destruction; that concludes this matter,” the agency said Wednesday in a statement released by Seattle-based spokeswoman Jodie Underwood.

The city of Seattle has voted to make enforcement of marijuana laws the lowest priority for law enforcement, and yet Seattle police raided a legal medical marijuana group.  The state of Washington has voted to make medicinal use of marijuana protected under law and yet Seattle police turns over patients’ medicine to the DEA for destruction.

What’s the point of having a representative democracy if the local police force feels it can overrule the will of the people?

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Download the NORML Daily Audio Stash for 2008-06-13

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Egads, it’s Friday the 13th!  Where’s my hockey mask?

Today on your Friday Stash I wrap up the highlights from the NORML Aspen Legal Seminar last weekend.  A friend of the Stash, attorney Doug Hiatt from Seattle, Washington, gave an excellent presentation on medical use issues in Washington State.  He particularly described the cases he’s worked on where medical marijuana patients are denied spots on the organ transplant lists because they are “illegal drug users”.  Hiatt also looks at the strange battle to determine what Washington’s “60-day supply” of usable marijuana really means.

I’ve also got a true story to tell of a middle aged couple living in a tropical paradise whose world is turned upside-down by the DEA for one 6-inch pot plant.  Get in on the true crime drama with Agent Joe Monday in this episode of “Drugnet”.

We’ve got some laid-back groovy rap from Jet Baker, who is going to take us to this weekend’s Pot Party.

Finally, I got word through the latest ONDCP potency report that there was a record seizure of a strain in Vista, California, that came in at a 37.20% THC potency.  The record until this quarter was a seizure in my home state of Oregon that came in at 33.12% THC.  While you Californians are going to claim you’ve got the better bud, I’ll believe it when I smoke it.  We Oregonians are just better at hiding our good stuff from the feds…  ;-*<\\\\\\\\\\@~~~

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Medical marijuana and organ transplants don’t mix – Los Angeles Times

SEATTLE — This month, Timothy Garon, 56, a Seattle musician, died after being turned down for a liver transplant. He was rejected partly because he had used medical marijuana.

Now, a second critically ill patient in Washington state says he has been denied a spot in two organ transplant programs because he uses doctor-prescribed marijuana.

Jonathon Simchen, 33, of Fife, a town south of Seattle, is a diabetic whose kidneys and pancreas have failed.

He said he was removed from the transplant program at Virginia Mason Hospital in Seattle because he admitted using medical marijuana. Later, he said, University of Washington Medical Center transplant officials refused to accept him because of the medical marijuana issue.

The lawyer who represented Garon has taken on Simchen’s case.

Douglas Hiatt argues that his clients are the victims of a loosely defined transplant policy, one not based on science.

University of Washington officials, citing privacy laws, declined to discuss specifics of individual cases, but issued a statement acknowledging that they took marijuana use into consideration.

“Although medical marijuana may be an issue in rare cases, it is never the sole determinant in arriving at medical decisions about candidates for organ transplants,” the statement said.

A spokeswoman for Virginia Mason Hospital said smoking of any kind could “lead to patient-safety and transplant-effectiveness issues” and was precluded. She said the hospital’s transplant committee would also weigh a patient’s use of medical marijuana in pill form.

At the University of Washington, the transplant committee said it reviewed “behavioral concerns such as a history of substance abuse or dependency. If such a history exists, then the committee looks at the period of abstinence the candidate has demonstrated to date,” as well as the patient’s efforts to maintain abstinence and potential to abuse again.

Asked why the committee considered marijuana use under a doctor’s supervision “a history of substance abuse,” a hospital spokesman cited the federal law categorizing marijuana as an illegal drug.

Peggy Stewart, a clinical social worker with the liver transplant program at UCLA Medical Center, said bias existed in the medical community against marijuana because of the federal law.

Some transplant committee members see it as an illegal substance and as grounds for automatic rejection.

She said many other addictive prescriptions, particularly pain medications, did not automatically disqualify patients from transplant lists because they were not illegal substances under federal law.

It’s bad because it’s illegal because it’s bad because it’s illegal because it’s bad because it’s illegal…

It is simply beyond my ability to process the outrage of this ignorant cowardice!  Medical professionals will knowingly divert the frailest patients from the safe non-toxic herb and onto the dangerous addictive pharmaceuticals, and then hide behind the government’s skirts?  Ooh, it’s against federal law?  Your state doesn’t think so, members of your profession are recommending it, and your oath is to first do no harm!

Furthermore, that one official says they’d even “weigh” use of medical marijuana in pill form.  That’s called Marinol, and it isn’t against federal law.

As for the “patient safety and transplant-effectiveness” issues, you don’t have any evidence to back that up.  Vaporization or edibles eliminate the problems with smoking.  Post transplant there is no “addictiveness” in the serious physical sense of the word to jeopardize transplant-effectiveness.

This is nothing more than institutionalized discrimination against a disliked minority, only this isn’t about the color of their skin but rather the color of their medicine.

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