Let’s face it, the war on Marijuana in this country is a bloody war on the citizens of the United States, many of whom have nothing to do with Marijuana. They are simply caught in the cross fire of oppression and heavy handed tactics by unscrupulous law enforcement and run-away policies fueled by ignorant politicians who don’t really care about their own constituents.

On July 22, 2008 in Berwyn Heights, MD, the mayor of Berwyn Heights and his family were attacked by armed assailants, salaried by the sheriff’s office. They burst into their home, shot their two Labrador retrievers, Chase and Payton, even though these agents of the law knew this family had nothing to do with the Marijuana that was just delivered to their house by an overnight express company. It was part of a larger elaborate scheme they had been aware of for quite some time.

After the incident, the department investigated itself and not surprisingly, had found nothing wrong with breaking in a home that was not complicit with the marijuana deal, with guns drawn and shooting innocent family members. From their paradigm, it’s ethical, moral, and legal to break into someone’s home and shoot them.

On Monday, June 22, the mayor held a press conference and asked the federal government to intervene.

“They’ve said they’ve done nothing wrong,” Calvo said. “I didn’t sign up for this fight, but I think what we have to do now is make changes to how Prince George’s County police and Prince George’s County sheriff’s department operate.”

What happens when you catch a criminal outside of a TV store holding a television in his hand and a gun in his back pocket? He is going to say, “I didn’t do anything wrong”. These agents of the law are nothing more than a bunch of armed redneck wannabe criminals who enjoy busting into people’s houses and shooting their family members for the simple sake of a killer adrenaline rush.

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This is exactly the kind of news that prohibitionists use to convince law makers to keep funneling money to Law Enforcement so the perpetual war on American citizens can continue.

The Georgia Bureau of Investigation is looking into a fatal shooting that occurred last night in Columbus.

Shortly before 9 p.m. deputies with the Muscogee County Sheriff’s Office were executing search and arrest warrants at a home on Gettysburg Way when the owner of the residence opened fire on the officers, said Sheriff John Darr. One deputy was shot, the sheriff said. Another deputy returned fire, mortally wounding the suspect.

Muscogee County Coroner Bill Thrower confirmed that a man had been shot to death last night in Columbus. He said early this morning he could not release the identity of the victim because he was unsure if next of kin had been notified. He said he should be releasing that information some time today.

Darr said his deputies did arrest the man for whom they had an arrest warrant for sale of marijuana. He is in the Muscogee County Jail.

“Serving warrants you always know there’s that danger,” Darr said. “That’s from a search warrant to an arrest order to a pick-up order. It just goes to show you never know what’s going to happen in this line of work.”

The injured deputy was taken to a local hospital where he was treated and released.

In a society where Cannabis is legal, I believe these two people would still be alive. In this fictitious society, there would not be drug cartels; our economy would be in pretty good shape because our farmers would have something to grow to supply our country with sustainable bio fuel, medicine, green housing, textiles, food, green-plastics, and thousands of other products. Our country could (FINALLY) be manufacturing something again.

Instead, we live in a very different world. We live in a world where soldiers from the state and federal government armed with tactical weapons in paramilitary gear kick in doors and shoot people, pets, and destroy lives, and get themselves killed doing it. In the United States, we’ve gone from about 3000 tactical swat raids in 1980 to more than 50,000 every year since 2006.

It’s truly a shame that anyone had to die in this incident, and my thoughts and prayers go to the officer and the victim.

Let’s work together and see if we can’t change these statistics, our lives depend on it.  [Check out Americans for Swat Reform at www.swatreform.org for more information. -- "R"R]

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GRAND RAPIDS — Police found only “tablespoons” of marijuana in Grand Valley State University student Derek Copp’s off-campus apartment the night he was shot by police during a drug raid, his lawyer said this afternoon.

“To my knowledge, the raid resulted in the seizure of a few tablespoonfuls of marijuana, and nothing more,” attorney Fred Dilley said in a statement.

He said his concern is the manner of the search carried about by the West Michigan Enforcement Team, or WEMET, on Wednesday night. Copp was shot in the chest, and is recovering after suffered injuries to his ribs, lung and liver.

Dilley is also concerned about “the apparent lack of justification whatsoever for the use of force much less deadly force in executing a search warrant. The campus and Allendale communities are asking why? Why burst into a college student’s apartment with a gun drawn for a few tablespoonfuls of pot.”

via ‘Few tablespoons’ of pot found in Derek Copp’s off-campus apartment, lawyer says – Grand Rapids News – The Latest News, Blogs, Photos & Videos – MLive.com.

Why?  Because it is standard operating procedure, that’s why!  But usually the suspects aren’t shot.  Usually their lives are ruined, their kids traumatized, their pets killed, and their property destroyed, and you never hear another word about it.

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ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) – A former police officer tearfully apologized Monday for his role in an elderly Atlanta woman’s shooting death during a botched drug raid, and another told a judge he prays daily for the victim. 

“I used to think I was a good person,” ex-cop Gregg Junnier said before breaking down on the witness stand during a sentencing hearing in a federal courtroom in Atlanta, CNN affiliate WXIA reported.

Junnier and two other ex-officers, Arthur Tesler and Jason Smith, face prison in connection with the November 2006 drug raid that left 92-year-old Kathryn Johnston dead in a hail of gunfire.

Smith, Junnier and Tesler pleaded guilty to federal charges of conspiracy to violate civil rights resulting in death. Smith and Junnier also pleaded guilty to state charges of voluntary manslaughter and making false statements, and Smith admitted to planting bags of marijuana in Johnston’s house after her death.

Tesler was convicted on one state count of making false statements for filling out an affidavit stating that an informant had purchased crack cocaine at Johnston’s home in a crime-plagued neighborhood near downtown Atlanta. The informant denied having been to Johnston’s home, leading to investigations by local authorities and the FBI, and the breakup and reorganization of the Atlanta police narcotics unit.

Police said Johnston fired at them with an old pistol during the raid, and they shot back in self-defense. Johnston’s one shot went through her front door and over the officers’ heads; they responded with 39 shots, hitting Johnston five times.

“Her death was the foreseeable culmination of a long-standing conspiracy in which the officers violated their oaths of office,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Jon-Peter Kelly said, according to CNN affiliate WSB. The officers “regularly swore falsely” to get warrants and make cases, he said.

Federal prosecutors said officers cut corners to make more time for lucrative side jobs providing additional security to businesses, often while on duty and for cash payments.

Excuse me, CNN and other mainstream media outlets – this was no BOTCHED DRUG RAID!  That makes it sound as if the police were executing a lawful warrant for a serious crime and, whoopsie, somebody made a typo on the address on the warrant.  Kathryn Johnston was shot to death during a premeditated fraudulent raid by crooked cops enabled by drug war corruption.

This is the natural result of domestic militarization of police and the inevitable corruption prohibition generates.  Kathryn Johnston is one of many citizens who’ve been killed or had their lives drastically altered from an unnecessary SWAT-style raid.  Some are innocent victims, like John Adams, Willie Heard, and Rev. Accelyne Williams, who die in drug raids at honestly mistaken addresses.  Some are guilty victims, like Bruce Lavoie, Scott W. Bryant, and Delbert Bonar, whose doors are kicked down by black-body-armor-clad disguised police with automatic weapons throwing flash-bang grenades in the middle of the night, only to find a few grams of marijuana for personal use.

There is no need to kick down citizens’ doors.  A suspect can be watched, tailed, and apprehended in broad daylight, away from the suspect’s family.  Even if a suspect is known to be armed and dangerous, coming at him full force in his lair just endangers the neighborhood.  The only purpose in these no-knock paramilitary drug raids is to instill terror in the population.  It’s all about “sending a message” that we’re “tough on drugs” and showing the criminals who control the market that the cops are the baddest gang on the street.

I’m happy to report these low-lifes who found their rent-a-cop moonlighting gigs more important than civil rights and an old woman’s life will be spending the next few months behind bars learning important lessons of respect and empathy:

ATLANTA — A federal judge has sentenced three former Atlanta Police officers to prison terms in connection with a botched drug raid that left a 92-year-old woman dead.

Jason Smith, Gregg Junnier and Arthur Tesler pled guilty to a charge of conspiracy to violate civil rights resulting in death.

U.S. District Judge Julie Carnes sentenced Smith to 10 years in prison, 3 years probation and a $100 fine.

Judge Carnes sentenced Junnier to 6 years in prison, 3 years probation and a $100 fine.

Judge Carnes sentenced Tesler to 5 years in prison and 3 years of supervised release.

The judge also ordered all three men to split the funeral costs of nearly $8200 for Kathryn Johnston, who was killed by police gunfire in the November 2006 raid.

In the sentencing hearing, Judge Carnes said, “The sentence must be tough to send a message to other police and also mend the confidence of the community.” While she indicated the three men did eventually cooperate with authorities, she said “This is a wrenching process for everybody.”

Judge Carnes was also very critical of the Atlanta Police Department and indicated the shooting was due in part to pressure on police officers to make drug arrests.

The U.S. Attorney’s office had recommended that Smith serve about 12 1/2 years in federal prison, and Junnier and Tesler serve about 10 years. Prosecutors recommended that Smith and Junnier receive reduced sentences because they cooperated with authorities.

I’m sad to report these lowlifes will be spending less time behind bars than most federally convicted growers tending large legal medical marijuana crops in California.

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Thanks to MrSpof for the tip!

Many stoners are far too complacent because they think “it can’t happen to me.”  Most non-stoners don’t care much about the issue because they don’t smoke pot.

This interactive map from the CATO Institute should give both groups more reason to become involved in marijuana law reform.  The scourge that is the war on marijuana has shredded our civil liberties and affected more innocent victims — many who do not use cannabis at all — than most people realize.

The map allows you to drill down to see “death of an innocent”, “death or injury of a police officer”, “death of a nonviolent offender”, “raid on an innocent suspect”, “other examples of paramilitary police excess”, and “unnecessary raids on doctors and sick people”. You can zoom in to populous areas to see more of the offenses and you can click on any tag to get the story and the source about the raid… like this one in my birthplace of Nampa, Idaho:

John Simpson

Police in Nampa, Idaho serving a drug warrant toss a flashbang grenade into the home of Vietnam veteran John Simpson.

The frightened Simpson first takes cover, and attempts to protect his wife. He then composes himself, assumes he’s being attacked by intruders, and immediately ventures out with the only weapon he can find, the hose from a vacuum cleaner.

The police had targeted the wrong side of Simpson’s duplex. “I guess we’re going to have to seek psychological help, I hate to say that,” Simpson would later tell theAssociated Press. “I’m not nuts or anything, but I’m still shaking. Put a shotgun next to your ear and pull the trigger to get an idea of the noise.”

Police later pick up Simpson’s neighbor with four ounces of marijuana.

Source: ”Cops Raid Wrong Duplex With Noise Device,” Associated Press, June 17, 2005.

June 15, 2005

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“You express a great deal of anxiety over our willingness to break laws. This is certainly a legitimate concern. Since we so diligently urge people to obey the Supreme Court’s decision of 1954 outlawing segregation in the public schools, at first glance it may seem rather paradoxical for us consciously to break laws. One may well ask: “How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?” The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that “an unjust law is no law at all.”

Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust.”

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Letter from a Birmingham Jail
April 16, 1963

Today our nation honors what would’ve been this week the eightieth birthday of the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr., on the eve of the inauguration of Barack Hussein Obama as the 44th president of these United States.  I was sixty-four days old when an assassin’s bullet cut down Dr. King in the prime of his life.  Today I am six-hundred forty days older than Dr. King when he was killed.  Tomorrow I will see something few people my age and older thought we’d ever see, yet something Dr. King had dreamed from the start.

There remains a grave injustice to be battled, the most unjust of laws to be disobeyed, a law that by its definition is not rooted in eternal law and natural law: the man made code that declares nature itself to be illegal, the prohibition on cannabis.  Yet when I mention marijuana law reform in the context of the great civil rights struggles in America, so many are quick to dismiss me with snickers of derision.  ”You just want pot legal so you can get high!” is a common refrain.

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