By: Stephen Buel | 03/28/12 5:11 PM, Editor-In-Chief

San Francisco District Attorney George Gascón said marijuana prosecutions are not a priority of his office.
San Francisco District Attorney George Gascón disagrees with a legal brief in which his office argued that marijuana sales are illegal, and he said Wednesday that prosecuting marijuana cases will not be a priority for his administration.

The brief, filed this month in the case of a woman arrested on suspicion of possessing and attempting to sell cannabis products, argued that any sale of marijuana is illegal under state law.

But Wednesday, following publication of a story in The San Francisco Examiner, Gascón said the argument was made without his knowledge or approval. And he pledged that his office will no longer advance that position.

“I support medical marijuana and I have said that very many times,” Gascón said. “This particular brief was crafted three years ago and has been used from time to time by our attorneys. … I have already taken steps to take that memo out of circulation.”

Although the legality of medical marijuana is far from clear under federal law, operators of The City’s numerous dispensaries generally view state and local as protective of their right to operate.

Gascón said his office recently met with the attorney for the arrested woman, former District Attorney Terence Hallinan, and agreed to a two-week continuance for the purpose of reassessing the appropriate next step.

Prosecutors and Hallinan disagree about the facts of the case, but Gascón said if the woman truly was working on behalf of a registered dispensary and selling marijuana to licensed patients, the charges against her would probably be dismissed.

The district attorney said he disagreed with some of the legal arguments made in the now-disavowed legal brief, which he said failed to take into account how medical marijuana law has evolved locally.

“Dealing with marijuana is not a priority for this office,” he vowed.

Read more at the San Francisco Examiner: http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/2012/03/sf-district-attorney-george-gasc-n-says-he-supports-medical-marijuana#ixzz1qX21TLnf

OLYMPIA – Marijuana activists say 2012 is the year they have been waiting for.

Citing growing national support for marijuana legalization, activists appear confident that young voters, their key demographic, will turn out to support a reform measure — or measures.

The potential problem: activists continue to dispute how laws for recreational and medical use should be changed. So far, several competing initiative campaigns have emerged.

One measure is already headed for the November ballot. Initiative 502 has gathered enough signatures.

The initiative would make Washington the first state to legalize the recreational use of marijuana for adults 21 and older. The caveat: any use of the drug would still be considered illegal under federal law.

Under the initiative, adults 21 and older could possess no more than an ounce of dried marijuana, 72 ounces of liquids containing marijuana, or 1 pound of a solid product infused with marijuana, such as brownies or cookies.

The measure would not change Washington’s medical marijuana law, which allows doctors to recommend but not prescribe the drug to treat intense chronic pain and complications related to cancer and a number of other diseases. But proponents say the initiative would create new arrest protections for patients seeking medical marijuana.

A private chain of supply regulated by the state would be set up under the initiative. It would create a license system for growers, processors and retailers who would pay a 25 percent excise tax on their sales to raise revenue for substance-abuse prevention, research, health care and education. The Liquor Control Board would be in charge of regulation and licensing.

“I-502 would be a more comprehensive response to our state’s marijuana laws,” said Campaign Director Alison Holcomb, comparing the initiative to other marijuana measures.

Holcomb’s initiative rivals disagree. An alternative measure called the “Cannabis Child Protection Act” was recently filed with the Secretary of State’s Office. Proponents call the measure a more reasonable alternative to I-502.

“It doesn’t harm the public in the way that I-502 would,” said campaign spokesman Don Skakie.

Skakie sees a number of shortcomings for marijuana users under the I-502 plan.

Perhaps the most glaring problem, Skakie said, is the limit I-502 would impose on the concentration of THC — the drug’s active chemical substance — in a driver’s bloodstream. That limit would be 5 nanograms of THC per milliliter of blood.

Heavier users have a higher tolerance and can drive just fine under levels beyond the limit established in I-502, he said. In contrast, Skakie said the initiative he backs would not establish a limit for THC levels in a driver’s bloodstream.

“There’s no per-se limit because there’s no science to back it,” he said.

The “Cannabis Child Protection Act” would allow adults 21 or older to grow or possess marijuana at home for medical or recreational use. Anyone younger than that would be barred from access to the drug except for medical or spiritual use with the approval of the person’s parent or guardian.

“There’s no age limit on health,” Skakie said.

Modeling marijuana policy after laws regarding alcohol possession, the initiative imposes no limitations on how much marijuana a person 21 or older could possess.

It also creates a series of graduated misdemeanor penalties for minors in unlawful possession of marijuana. Holcomb said she suspects this would find hard opposition from voters.
“Philosophically, I don’t think anyone should be treated as a criminal for using marijuana,” she said. But she added that voters would be concerned that the graduated system would open the door for greater risk of marijuana use among youth.

Going in a different direction, Mimi Meiwes, a former registered nurse, also recently filed a counter-initiative to I-502 called the “Safe Cannabis Act.”

Meiwes’s initiative focuses only on medical marijuana by decriminalizing the drug for patients, providing them and health care providers with arrest protections related to the use of medical marijuana.

“People’s health should come first,” she said.

Meiwes suffers from chronic nausea and vomiting as a complication of focal segmental glomerulosclerosis (FSGS), a disease that causes kidney failure. Medical marijuana settles her system enough to let her eat. However, being on the drug prevents her from getting the critical kidney transplant she needs to survive, she said.

“Basically, I’m going to die because I’m a cannabis patient,” Meiwes said.

But the initiative could be a life saver for people like her, Meiwes said. In addition, it would also create a legal separation between marijuana and hemp to redefine hemp as an agricultural product.

Another initiative called the “Medical Cannabis Reform and Control Act” was recently filed by former Seattle Weekly contributor Philip Dawdy, a co-author of the initiative.

His measure would create a state-licensed system of private medical marijuana growers and cooperatives to sell medical cannabis. Dawdy said the initiative is not meant to compete with I-502.

State laws on medical marijuana access and arrest protection for medical marijuana patients are unclear, Dawdy said. The initiative will clarify the laws to ensure that the federal government will see that medical cannabis users in the state are following state law, he said. However, the ultimate solution is for the federal government to reclassify marijuana as a drug with accepted medical use.

These last three initiatives are still early in the process, but signature gathering should begin soon.

Dawdy said he is unsure whether his will pick up enough support to go on the ballot. If it does, he has some concerns about how successful it would be if juxtaposed with one or more other marijuana initiatives.

“Traditionally, when you have two loosely related initiatives on the ballot at once, they tend to pull each other down,” Dawdy said.

If more than one of the initiatives goes on the ballot and passes in November, the final decision on which one would become law would be settled in court or in the Legislature by a two-thirds vote of support for one of the measures, said David Ammons, the communications director for the Secretary of State’s office.

To get their initiatives on the ballot, sponsors need to submit at least 241,153 signatures from registered voters by July 6.

– Justin Runquist

By Associated Press,
Updated: Thursday, March 8, 12:56 PM

RICHMOND, Va. — Religious broadcaster Pat Robertson says marijuana should be legalized and treated like alcohol because the government’s war on drugs has failed.

The outspoken evangelical Christian and host of “The 700 Club” on the Virginia Beach-based Christian Broadcasting Network he founded said the war on drugs is costing taxpayers billions of dollars. He said people should not be sent to prison for marijuana possession.

The 81-year-old first became a self-proclaimed “hero of the hippie culture” in 2010 when he called for ending mandatory prison sentences for marijuana possession convictions.

“I just think it’s shocking how many of these young people wind up in prison and they get turned into hardcore criminals because they had a possession of a very small amount of a controlled substance,” Robertson said on his show March 1. “The whole thing is crazy. We’ve said, ‘Well, we’re conservatives, we’re tough on crime.’ That’s baloney.”

Robertson’s support for legalizing pot appeared in a New York Times (http://nyti.ms/zMys8R) story published Thursday. His spokesman confirmed to The Associated Press that Robertson supports legalization with regulation. Robertson was not made available for an interview.

“I really believe we should treat marijuana the way we treat beverage alcohol,” Robertson was quoted by the newspaper as saying. “If people can go into a liquor store and buy a bottle of alcohol and drink it at home legally, then why do we say that the use of this other substance is somehow criminal?”

Robertson said he “absolutely” supports ballot measures in Colorado and Washington state that would allow people older than 21 to possess a small amount of marijuana and allow for commercial pot sales. Both measures, if passed by voters, would place the states at odds with federal law, which bans marijuana use of all kinds.

While he supports the measures, Robertson said he would not campaign for them and was “not encouraging people to use narcotics in any way, shape or form.”

“I’m not a crusader,” he said. “I’ve never used marijuana and I don’t intend to, but it’s just one of those things that I think: this war on drugs just hasn’t succeeded.”

In a statement Thursday, Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance, said Robertson’s “clearly stated and well-reasoned comments throw a curve ball into the growing debate over legalizing marijuana.”

“Defenders of marijuana prohibition … must be wondering if it’s only a matter of time before theirs proves to be a lost cause,” he said.

Christian advocacy group Focus on the Family opposes legalization for medical or recreational use, Carrie Gordon Earll, the organization’s senior director of government and public policy, said in a statement. The group would not comment specifically on Robertson’s statements.

Sixteen states and the District of Columbia have legalized the medical use of marijuana. Fourteen states also have some kind of marijuana decriminalization law, which removes or lowers penalties for possession. Legalization, however, would eliminate penalties and pave the way for regulated sales similar to alcohol.

Robertson’s comments will likely help drive cultural conversations on the issue, said Allen St. Pierre, executive director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

“Whenever somebody of substance and notoriety in this country … comes out in favor of changing the status quo regarding marijuana, for us and for the reform community, as the kids say, ‘It is all good,” St. Pierre said.

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Michael Felberbaum can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/MLFelberbaum.