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Inmate in ’severe pain’ without medical marijuana | KOMO-TV - Seattle, Washington | News
SNOHOMISH COUNTY, Wash. — A 35-year-old Shelton man is fighting for the right to use medical marijuana. The problem is that Alex Morris is in the Snohomish County Jail. The state’s Medical Marijuana Act does not cover inmates of jails or prisons. Alex is in jail for 30 days.

His wife says those 30 days will make him very, very sick.

“He’s in severe pain, unbearable excruciating pain because he’s not able to eat to keep things down,” said Kim Morris. “He’s lost ten pounds in the last eight days.”

Alex has Crohn’s disease and as a result suffers severe headaches. The law covers that and Alex has his doctor’s permission; he’s registered as a user of medical marijuana.

“It allows me to eat, to hold food down, to come out of my dark hole I’m in,” said Alex, speaking from jail.

“Alex has tried all the other medications for Crohn’s and, for him, they don’t work,” said Kim.

But jail officials say Washington law clearly states that permission to use medical marijuana does not include correctional facilities.

“At this point in time we do not allow people to have medical marijuana in the jail,” said Deanna Dawson, executive director for corrections in the Snohomish County Executive’s Office.

Dawson says it would take an act of the Legislature to approve use of a drug not available in the jail pharmacy, specifically marijuana. The present law does not actually authorize prescriptions; it authorizes medicinal use.

“I don’t have a problem with people being in custody, the question is: is it cruel and unusual punishment to keep a person incarcerated and not provide them with the vital medications they require?” said Alex’s attorney James Kovac.

This is a story that has been told before, regrettably ending in the deaths of patients like Peter McWilliams.  No operational state medical marijuana law allows the prescription for marijuana (cf. Arizona), because that runs afoul of the federal government’s regulations regarding drug scheduling and any doctor who prescribes marijuana will lose his license to prescribe any drug.

So states have set up recommendations for marijuana, and the Clinton administration tried to intimidate doctors to not even recommend marijuana, but the Supreme Court ruled that would violate doctors’ right to free speech.