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CelebStoner.com Entertainment Report with Steve Bloom, co-author of Pot Culture: The A-Z Guide to Stoner Language and Life

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Cannabis Conversations

• Rick Cusick, HIGH TIMES Associate Publisher, on “Cannabis Philosophy for Everyone: What Were We Just Talking About?“

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1. T-Mobile sued for denying their network to text-messaging service that serves WeedMaps.com
2. Missoula man commits suicide when pushed by the local police to snitch on other medical marijuana growers
3. Arizona Cardinals owner ponies up $10,000 to defeat Prop 203, Arizona’s medical marijuana initiative

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• Roots Monday: Entire Cities – “Cop Song”

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• San Francisco State University Associate Professor Martin Carcieri discusses the constitutionality of marijuana prohibition

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• Live audio from Saturday’s Boston Freedom Rally with HIGH TIMES editor Rick Cusick, NORML New Jersey’s Anne Davis, and PhillyNORML’s Chris Goldstein

Chris Goldstein (far L) and the board of NORML NJ

Toms River 7/2/09:  NORML-NJ, the New Jersey Chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, held a series of activist gatherings on June 27, 2009 that included an official meeting of the Board of Trustees followed by a well-attended Open Meeting. The non-profit group filled its governing Board, created new committees and initiated new campaigns to increase cannabis reform activity in the Garden State.

NORML-NJ is pleased to announce the installation of an Executive Director and the addition of the following new Board Members as of 6/27:

William Buckman, Esq. – Mr. Buckman is a criminal defense attorney based in Moorestown who also specializes in civil rights litigation. Mr. Buckman won a landmark case involving racial profiling of drivers by the NJ State Police.

Rick Cusick – Mr. Cusick is the Associate Publisher of High Times Magazine; his writing on the topic of cannabis is known around the world. He plans to be very active on the NORML-NJ Board.

Chris Goldstein – A longtime marijuana advocate and founder of NORML’s Daily AudioStash podcast. He has been very active with the medical cannabis effort in NJ and PA. Mr. Goldstein was selected to serve as Executive Director of NORML-NJ.

These new additions join the standing NORML NJ Board Members, a distinguished group of attorneys and advocates:

Frederic DiMaria, Jr., Esq., Chairman of the NORML-NJ Board, is a Lodi based criminal defense attorney. Mr. DiMaria has handled hundreds of marijuana violation cases and plans to begin blogging about marijuana legal issues on the NORML-NJ website.

Nicole DiMaria, Esq. is a corporate attorney specializing in Health Law.

Georgine DiMaria is a patients’ rights and health advocate and former Miss New Jersey.

Anne Davis, Esq., Chair of the NORML-NJ Development Committee, is an attorney specializing in Family Law. Ms. Davis has instructed at Farleigh-Dickinson University in New Jersey and has been active on the National NORML Legal Committee.

Allan Marain, Esq. is a New Brunswick based criminal defense attorney who is an expert in defending cannabis consumers against prohibition laws.

Paul Schroeder, M.P.T. is a licensed physical therapist who takes a keen interest in the medical aspect of cannabis reform.

Jeffrey Glock brings his marketing and web design skills to the organization to assist with web-based advocacy.

Ken Wolski, R.N. and Jim Miller: Mr. Wolski is a Registered Nurse who, with fellow NORML-NJ Board Member Jim Miller, co-founded the Coalition for Medical Marijuana – New Jersey. Both Mr. Wolski and Mr. Miller have been instrumental to NJ medical marijuana legislative efforts.

Delia Pratico is a paralegal and future attorney who has participated in National NORML Conferences and Legal seminars.

During the June 27 meetings, NORML-NJ also solidified several new activism campaigns, including initiatives to pursue Lowest Law Enforcement Priority ordinances in targeted cities and towns. The organization is planning several NORML-NJ Open Meetings and awareness events in locations around the state to recruit residents into the cannabis reform effort.

“Our common cause of reforming marijuana laws has never been so seriously considered than right now in 2009.” NORML-NJ Executive Director Chris Goldstein noted. “Elected officials and the public are not only realizing the benefits of cannabis reform in place around the country but want these concepts integrated into their local communities soon. NORML-NJ will help make that happen,” he said.

Download the NORML Daily Audio Stash for 2008-10-02

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More retrospectives today with NORML CON panelists.  High Times Associate Publisher Rick Cusick talks about the passing of George Carlin and NORML Board Member Norm Kent talks about Pushing 60 with Pot.

Download the NORML Daily Audio Stash for 2008-07-03

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It’s a special comedy edition of the Daily Audio Stash!  Tere Joyce (Last Comic Standing, Hollyweed Live) is joining us now on Thursdays as our Cannabis Comedy Correspondent.  Each week she will put us in touch with the best up-and-coming comedians who are on the cutting edge of reefer comedy.

Tere kicks off the segment by describing the incident that turned her from being just another stand-up to being a committed cannabis crusader – a DEA raid at the first medical marijuana dispensary she ever visited!  Now she works with the Patients Advocacy Network and performs benefits for those who have been victimized by the War on Marijuana.  You can see her next at the Castle Inn in Landers, California, on July 12th (a week from this Saturday).

Then we visit with the Associate Publisher of High Times Magazine (and co-defendent in the Keith Stroup Massachusetts Joint-Smoking trial) Rick Cusick.  Rick remembers his conversations with the late George Carlin and how Carlin was instrumental in getting Cusick his job at High Times.

Light your fireworks tomorrow – light a doobie now and enjoy your NORML Daily Audio Stash…

[The latest upgrade to WordPress 2.5.1 has wiped out my style sheets.  So that’s why the Stash site looks funny today.  I’m working hard on getting it fixed, please be patient.]

The Harvard Crimson :: News :: Law Prof Argues Marijuana Trial
Most marijuana users who get caught smoking a joint summarily pay a fine, but when an undercover police officer detained Richard E. Cusick and R. Keith Stroup, the two chose instead to challenge the constitutionality of Massachusetts laws banning marijuana for the first time in 30 years.

Arrested for sharing a marijuana cigarette at the annual Boston Freedom Rally in September, Cusick and Stroup turned to Harvard Law School professor Charles R. Nesson for legal counsel. Nesson and his clients acknowledged that they had used the illegal drug, and decided upon an unusual defense: they argued that the statute outlawing marijuana in Massachusetts has no “rational basis,” and that the jury has the power of jury nullification, or ruling a defendant innocent while recognizing that he or she had violated a law.

Both co-defendants built their careers around marijuana: Cusick is associate publisher of the well-known marijuana magazine, High Times, and Stroup is the founder of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. They said that they do not believe marijuana to be a social ill.

Nesson said he had hoped that several experts—including Lester S. Grinspoon, an associate professor emeritus at Harvard Medical School, and Jeffrey A. Miron, director of undergraduate studies in economics—would be allowed to testify to the harmlessness of marijuana.

But the defendants were not granted an evidentiary hearing, and the jury found them guilty of marijuana possesion after deliberating briefly. The judge sentenced them to one day in prison, which they had already served the day they were arrested.

“The idea that they were found guilty of a crime was just crushing to me,” Nesson said in an interview yesterday.

Although Nesson plans to file an appeal, it is unlikely that an appellate court will rule to change the verdict.

Be sure to download today’s Daily Audio Stash for my conversation with Keith Stroup about his sentence and conviction.

More video from Rick Cusick, Dr. Lester Grinspoon, and Steve Epstein follow after the jump…

NORML Blog » Blog Archive » High Times Publisher and NORML Founder Mount Legal Challenge to Massachusetts Pot Laws!
On Saturday, September 15, 2007, NORML Founder Keith Stroup and High Times associate publisher Rick Cusick were arrested for smoking a joint at the 18th annual Boston Freedom Rally on the Boston Common. This is an event held each year to protest the continued arrest of responsible cannabis consumers in that state, and depending on the weather, it attracts from 15,000 to 50,000 supporters to the Common.

Keith and Rick have candidly acknowledged that they were sharing a joint, but they have pleaded not guilty and announced their intentions to challenge the constitutionality of the Massachusetts marijuana laws, and to argue for a jury instruction informing the jurors of their common law power to refuse to convict an individual, if they do not believe the offense should be a criminal matter. This long-held power of jurors is generally called jury nullification.

Keith and Rick are some of the very few people in this country who have nothing to fear from the government, as their livelihoods are not affected by the publicizing of their marijuana use. To them, the potential of six months in jail is well worth the prospect of potentially changing the law and setting good precedent at the appellate level. They are represented by an all star legal team, including famous Harvard Law professor Charlie Nesson, who represented Daniel Ellsberg in the famous Pentagon Papers case during Watergate.

There were nearly 830,000 Americans arrested on marijuana charges last year, and more than 88% of those were for personal use. In Massachusetts there were more than 8,900 marijuana arrests last year, with more than 7,300 for personal use. It is time we stopped treating responsible cannabis consumers like criminals.

Please consider making a generous contribution to help us cover the necessary costs of bringing this legal challenge to Massachusetts’ marijuana laws. We must have the courage to stand up and demand our rights.

On March 20, 2008, Keith Stroup, founder of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML), and Rick Cusick, associate publisher of High Times magazine, will discuss the constitutional challenge they are mounting to the marijuana laws of Massachusetts. This challenge is part of their defense against the charge of possessing a joint on Boston Common last fall at a public gathering to protest marijuana’s prohibition. Stroup and Cusick will also discuss their plans to request a special jury instruction on the right to jury nullification.

Their attorneys — Professor Charles Nesson of Harvard Law School, Matthew Feinberg of Feinberg and Kamholtz, and Steven Epstein from Georgetown, Massachusetts — will join Stroup and Cusick at the press conference. Retired Harvard Medical School Professor Lester Grinspoon, M.D., who is providing expert medical testimony in support of the constitutional challenge to the state’s marijuana laws, will also be available to answer questions.

WHEN: Thursday, March 20, 2008 — at the conclusion of the pre-trial motions hearing, which is scheduled to begin at 9:00am in Courtroom #10 at the Boston Municipal Court, 24 New Chardon Street, Boston, MA 02114.

WHERE: The press conference will take place less than a mile from the Courthouse, at the Batterymarch Conference Center, 60 Batterymarch Street (inside the Hilton Financial District Hotel), Second Floor, Boston, MA 02110.