NJWeedman found not guilty in pot distribution case

Philly Burbs
Danielle Camilli

Ed “NJWeedman” Forchion hopes the not-guilty verdict a Burlington County jury rendered in his pot distribution trial plants a seed for other medical marijuana patients and sparks a change in the law.

“I think other patients should argue the same points. They can call it the ‘Weedman defense,’ ” he said after a jury of 10 women and two men returned the verdict Thursday following an hourlong deliberation that ended the three-day trial. “The law is wrong. My jury heard that and understood that.”

Forchion, who claims dual residency in Pemberton Township and Los Angeles, was acquitted of possession with the intent to distribute a pound of marijuana that police found in his trunk during a traffic stop on April 1, 2010, in Mount Holly.

The state contended that the sheer volume in Forchion’s possession and the $2,000 in cash he had in his pocket at the time of his arrest were tell-tale signs of distribution, despite the absence of other packaging paraphernalia.

Forchion has maintained that he is no drug dealer. He brought the marijuana from California, where he is a licensed medical marijuana patient, for his own use while on a trip to New Jersey to visit his family, he claimed.

“I don’t use it the way the state says. To me, it’s medicine, it’s food,” Forchion said in his closing argument, noting for the jury that he had been eating pot-laced cookies throughout the trial. “I feel I’m the victim of a flawed law.”

Forchion is believed to be the first defendant in New Jersey to be allowed to present his use of medical marijuana as a defense in a criminal trial, garnering his case attention statewide and beyond as the legalization debate continues.

While he was not allowed to discuss the New Jersey law, which was not in effect when he was arrested nor would it now allow him to legally possess the drug here, Forchion was able to tell the jury that he is a licensed medical marijuana user in California.

At an earlier trial last spring, he was convicted of possession, but that jury could not reach a unanimous decision on the more serious distribution charge, leading to this week’s retrial.

Superior Court Judge Charles Delehey, who presided over both trials, will sentence Forchion in January for possession. The defendant could get up to 18 months in prison, but he likely will get a probationary term.

The longtime activist and author used his criminal case, with the potential exposure of five to 10 years in prison, to rally his cause and start debate.

In pretrial motions, which were subsequently barred from being argued before the jury, Forchion challenged the constitutionality of the state’s criminal code now that New Jersey has a Compassionate Use Medical Marijuana law that recognizes the benefits of cannabis.

He said Thursday he looks forward to the state Appellate Division reviewing that motion when he appeals the possession conviction.

Forchion, who represented himself with the help of court-appointed attorney Donald Ackerman, counted on having a few “potheads” or sympathizers on his jury to keep him out of prison. He said that he thought he was in for another deadlocked jury and that the not-guilty verdict came as a surprise.

“I expected to get one juror, but I got 12,” he said. “I didn’t expect it, and I am very grateful. I think the jury sent a huge message to the state, the governor and the Prosecutor’s Office. People don’t want marijuana users hauled into court and locked up in jail.”

Forchion, who wore a “Marijuana … It’s OK. It’s Just Illegal” T-shirt for his final day of trial, said he plans to stay in New Jersey for about a week to campaign for Congress in New Jersey’s 3rd District.

NJWeedman’s case highlighted the differences in the state’s medical marijuana laws and the national debate over legalization. While Forchion was charged here and faced prison time, in California he ran a successful medical marijuana dispensary.

It was closed when the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration raided it as he awaited trial, effectively putting him out of business even though he was not charged with a crime. Forchion said Thursday that once news of his acquittal reached DEA agents in Los Angeles, he received a call that he could pick up some of his seized business equipment.

Robert Francis, the Texan judge closing America's jails

Guardian
Ian Birrell

He's the tough-on-crime Republican radically overhauling the criminal justice system – with rehabilitation programmes

I am getting the biggest bang possible for taxpayers’ bucks while
achieving something positive for society”: Judge Robert Francis. 

The motley gaggle of miscreants shuffles into the court, lining up silently in three rows on the benches. There are some 20 of them, men and women of all ages, most with long records of theft, violence and weapons misuse, and all with hardcore drug problems. I am passed their court biographies; the top one describes a man who has spent 12 years in jail, has 26 convictions over two decades and lists his "drugs of choice" as cocaine and heroin.

While Felin Bell's fellow convicts look like they have walked straight off the set of a Hollywood crime caper, he is a portly man in a smart check shirt who could pass as a middle manager. Almost before he has sat down, he is picked out by the judge as the week's shining star, commended for his positive attitude and sent home as a reward. "You look surprised – you shouldn't be," he is told.

Already it is clear this Dallas court for drug offenders is no normal court. As proceedings unfold, it seems like therapy crossed with a reality television show. The judge doesn't wear a robe, seldom sits on the bench and swears a lot. His name is Robert Francis, a fast-talking 52-year-old Republican, a rock fan and a keen hunter who proudly showed me, in his office before proceedings started, the heads of huge hogs he has shot.

As the offenders troop in, he warns if anyone lies or bullshits he will go "fucking ballistic". Then he discusses the difficulties of staying straight as he dissects their jobs, their families, their desires for the future. He responds to their comments with bawdy jokes, short homilies or sharp threats. "Stay positive, brother," one man is told, while another is warned: "You might think I'm crazy but I'm the crazy bastard who can put you back in jail."

There are outbursts of applause, then cheers for a young man who looks embarrassed as he reveals he got married two days earlier. The judge tells a woman who has started helping her mother around the home that she makes him proud. "You gotta be proud, too," he says.

Until recently, these people would have been discarded in overcrowded prisons. After all they were caught in Texas – the toughest state of a nation that locks up more offenders than any other in the world, with more than one in every 100 adults behind bars. Instead they receive counselling and assistance with housing and employment, although they can be sent back to jail if they fail drug tests, abscond or reoffend. One woman, a crystal meth addict, tells me the sessions in court are like walking on eggshells. But there are small incentives for those doing well, such as $10 gift vouchers or – on the day I visited – barbecue lunch out with Francis. "These people have to believe we care and want them to succeed," he tells me later. "Once they believe in me they can start to change."

They are beneficiaries of a revolution in justice sweeping the United States, one with illuminating lessons for Britain. It is a revolt led by hardline conservatives who have declared prison a sign of state failure. They say it is an inefficient use of taxpayers' money when the same people, often damaged by drink, drugs, mental health problems or chaotic backgrounds, return there again and again.

Remarkably, this revolution was unleashed in "hang 'em high" Texas, which prides itself on its toughness and still holds more executions than other states. But instead of building more prisons and jailing ever more people, Texas is now diverting funds to sophisticated rehabilitation programmes to reduce recidivism. Money has been poured into probation, parole and specialist services for addicts, the mentally ill, women and veterans. And it has worked: figures show even violent crime dropping at more than twice the national average, while cutting costs and reducing prison populations.

In the process, right-wingers have allied with liberals who long advocated such an approach, detoxifying one of the most poisonous political debates at a time when US party divisions have never been sharper. "This used to be one of the most emotive and ideologically divisive issues in the country," says Adam Gelb of the Pew Center on the States, a social-policy research charity which is backing the initiative. "We are starting to see the triumph of sound science over soundbites.

"There is not agreement on the causes of crime or even the purpose of punishment," Gelb continues, "but there is agreement on the solutions. Liberals and conservatives are getting to the same destination from very different routes." Now the Texan tactics are being adopted in other "deep red" republican states such as Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, Oklahoma and South Carolina, while well-known conservatives flock to promote the cause, including Newt Gingrich, Jeb Bush, Bobby Jindal and Grover Norquist. It is a Nixon in China moment. "The fact that it began in Texas has resonated around the country," says Gelb. "We hear again and again that if Texas can do it, then it cannot be soft on crime."

Just as in BRITAIN, it has been an iron rule in US politics that candidates win elections by talking tough on crime. The result has been a wave of stiff sentencing laws which, combined with the backfiring "war on drugs", mean that the prison population is currently growing 13 times more quickly than the general population. As a result, a nation with 5% of the global population accounts for 25% of prisoners worldwide – and is spending £43bn a year keeping them there. The criminal justice system also stands accused of worsening racial inequality, with Hispanic men three times as likely to be locked up as white men and black men nearly seven times more likely. According to a landmark Pew report, one in nine black men between the ages of 20 and 34 is behind bars.

'War on drugs' has failed, say Latin American leaders

Guardian
Jamie Doward

Watershed summit will admit that prohibition has failed, and call for more nuanced and liberalised tactics

Guatemala's president Otto Perez Molina believes a new
approach to Latin America's war on drugs is urgently needed.

A historic meeting of Latin America's leaders, to be attended by Barack Obama, will hear serving heads of state admit that the war on drugs has been a failure and that alternatives to prohibition must now be found.

The Summit of the Americas, to be held in Cartagena, Colombia is being seen by foreign policy experts as a watershed moment in the redrafting of global drugs policy in favour of a more nuanced and liberalised approach.

Otto Pérez Molina, the president of Guatemala, who as former head of his country's military intelligence service experienced the power of drug cartels at close hand, is pushing his fellow Latin American leaders to use the summit to endorse a new regional security plan that would see an end to prohibition. In the Observer, Pérez Molina writes: "The prohibition paradigm that inspires mainstream global drug policy today is based on a false premise: that global drug markets can be eradicated."

Pérez Molina concedes that moving beyond prohibition is problematic. "To suggest liberalisation – allowing consumption, production and trafficking of drugs without any restriction whatsoever – would be, in my opinion, profoundly irresponsible. Even more, it is an absurd proposition. If we accept regulations for alcoholic drinks and tobacco consumption and production, why should we allow drugs to be consumed and produced without any restrictions?
"
He insists, however, that prohibition has failed and an alternative system must be found. "Our proposal as the Guatemalan government is to abandon any ideological consideration regarding drug policy (whether prohibition or liberalisation) and to foster a global intergovernmental dialogue based on a realistic approach to drug regulation. Drug consumption, production and trafficking should be subject to global regulations, which means that drug consumption and production should be legalised, but within certain limits and conditions."

The decision by Pérez Molina to speak out is seen as highly significant and not without political risk. Polls suggest the vast majority of Guatemalans oppose decriminalisation, but Pérez Molina's comments are seen by many as helping to usher in a new era of debate. They will be studied closely by foreign policy experts who detect that Latin American leaders are shifting their stance on prohibition following decades of drugs wars that have left hundreds of thousands dead.

Oaksterdam University Raid 'Payback' For California's Marijuana Legalization Effort?

LA Weekly
Dennis Romero

The man who bankrolled California's closest shot yet at fully legalizing marijuana, Prop. 19, saw his Oaksterdam University cannabis college in Oakland raided by federal authorities yesterday.
And pot advocates are fuming.

The Drug Policy Alliance suggests the raid by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and Internal Revenue Service might have served one possible goal:


"Payback" for the 2010 legalization effort that failed but made a good try of it. The ballot effort was backed by Richard Lee, the millionaire owner of Oaksterdam.

During the campaign surrounding the initiative, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder announced that even if it passed, feds would still crack down on what they consider to be a nationally outlawed drug.




Federal officials raided the school, which focuses on the business of cultivating and peddling medical marijuana, via a search warrant that remained sealed. That means we don't get to know why the bust took place or what allegations were being claimed.

Also, our sister publication, SF Weekly, reported that other locations tied to the Oaksterdam might also be targeted by the feds.

L.A. has a branch of the school in Atwater Village. (Read more about the L.A. campus here).
Drug Policy Alliance executive director Ethan Nadelmann:

I don't know whether this morning's raid represents some form of 'payback' for Prop 19. But I suspect and hope that the principal impact of such heavy-handed police actions by federal authorities will be to increase support for the broader legalization of marijuana, especially among Republicans and conservatives who care strongly about states' rights.

He called out the Obama administration for, on the one hand, asking federal law enforcement to show restraint in states where medical marijuana is legal and, on the other, standing by as these raids seem to happen with increasing frequency:

... The current situation reflects a failure of leadership by President Obama, Attorney General Holder and the U.S. Congress.

Interviews at the time of the raid conducted by Dennis Bernstein for Flashpoint Pacifica Radio




[@dennisjromero / djromero@laweekly.com / @LAWeeklyNews]

Towards the Creation of the US-Canada Police State. "Counterterrorism" and War on Drugs used to Justify Sweeping Reforms

Global Research
Dana Gabriel

In a move that went largely unnoticed, the U.S. government unveiled a new counter-narcotics strategy for the northern border which will work towards closer cooperation with Canada in the war on drugs. This includes both countries strengthening integrated cross-border intelligence sharing and law enforcement operations. Canada has also released a comprehensive counter-terrorism plan aimed at combating the threats of domestic and international violent extremism. The separate U.S.-Canada undertakings are both tied to the Beyond the Border deal and efforts to establish a North American security perimeter.

In January, the Obama administration announced the National Northern Border Counternarcotics Strategy. A press release by the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) described how the plan seeks, “to reduce the two-way flow of illicit drugs between the United States and Canada by increasing coordination among Federal, state, local, and tribal enforcement authorities, enhancing intelligence sharing between counterdrug agencies, and strengthening ongoing counterdrug partnerships and initiatives with the Government of Canada and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP).” Senator Charles Schumer proclaimed, “I pushed so hard for this strategy to be finalized because we have to immediately stop the flow of drugs from Canada into New York, and it’s going to take an inter-agency and international effort.” He added, “I’m pleased that this agreement lays the groundwork for Canadian and American law enforcement to work hand-in-glove to fight the drug trade.” Schumer has also endorsed the new cross-border action plan. In addition, he is pushing to establish a Northern Border Intelligence Center in Franklin County, NY to better coordinate efforts to fight drug smuggling and other cross-border criminal activities.

While commenting on the new plan to disrupt the flow of drugs over the U.S.-Canada border, ONDCP Deputy Director of State, Local and Tribal Affairs, Ben Tucker explained that, “By strengthening integrated cross-border law enforcement between our two countries, the Strategy supports a key area of cooperation outlined by President Obama and Prime Minister Harper in the Beyond the Border declaration.” In December of last year, the leaders issued the follow up Perimeter Security and Economic Competitiveness Action Plan. The deal focuses on addressing security threats early, facilitating trade, economic growth and jobs, integrating cross-border law enforcement, as well as improving infrastructure and cyber-security. As part of the agreement, both countries will, “create integrated teams in areas such as intelligence and criminal investigations, and an intelligence-led uniformed presence between ports of entry.” The U.S. and Canada continue to expand the nature and scope of joint law enforcement operations, along with intelligence collection and sharing.

The new northern border drug strategy also called for increasing judicial cooperation, improving information-sharing and extradition arrangements, as well as better coordinating cross-border undercover operations and investigations with Canada. It recommended working towards, “operational fusion with Canadian partners in interoperable communications, technology, and activities. The ability to integrate Canadian and U.S. technology, including sensors, videos, radio communications, and radar feeds, will permit automated sharing of timely information.” The document also argued that, "It is imperative that Canada and the United States work together to expedite the sharing of information from electronic communication service providers; and share information necessary to lay the foundation for intercepting internet and voice communications.” While various new measures are being put in place to thwart illegal drug, terrorist and other criminal activity, they could easily be used to target anyone else the government deems a threat.

Peru suspends coca eradication programme

Al Jazeera

Minister says country will focus on catching major drugs traffickers, but move prompts concern from US ambassador.

Peru's new government has temporarily suspended the eradication of coca plants, the base ingredient of cocaine, as it works to re-design its anti-drug programmes, the country's interior ministry said.

News of the suspension in eradication work prompted surprise and concern from US officials, whose country has tried for years to limit coca production in Peru as part of a broader "war on drugs" in the region.

The United Nations says Peru is now the world's leading coca grower and could surpass Colombia as the top cocaine producer.

Coca has been commonly used in Peru and other Andean nations for centuries and plays an important role in traditional indigenous culture. Many chew coca leaves or consume the plant in other ways, such as coca tea.

It is considered effective as a treatment for altitude sickness and is often used in medicine and in traditional religious ceremonies.

But supporters of eradication say most of the coca crop is cultivated for the cocaine industry.
"We are working on how to re-direct efforts," said Oscar Valdes, the Peruvian interior minister.

Valdes said eradication would resume "very soon" but added that the government wanted to focus more on catching major traffickers and cutting off access to supplies, such as kerosene used to refine coca into cocaine.

'Frontal fight' on trafficking

"The public must understand that the reduction of illicit crops will continue, as the president has said, and there will be a frontal fight against drug trafficking," Valdes said.

Richard Soberon, head of the anti-drugs programme for Peruvian President Ollanta Humala's government, said there was an indefinite "pause" in the eradication programme in the Alto Huallaga region northeast of Lima to evaluate the effort.

"In every country, in Afghanistan, in Colombia, in Bolivia, in Mexico, it is normal to have these pauses to do the necessary evaluation of what has happened, to correct mistakes," he said.

Bolivia Set To Withdraw From U.N. Treaty Banning Drugs

Toke of the Town
Steve Elliot

First Indigenous Bolivian President Evo Morales

The South American nation of Bolivia is set to withdraw from the United Nations Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, adopted in 1961 to outlaw "illicit substances" across the planet. It plans the move in protest of the U.N.'s classification of coca leaves as an illegal drug.

President Evo Morales -- who, not coincidentally, is also leader of one of the country's biggest coca producers' unions -- has asked the Bolivian Congress to pass a law that would take the nation out of the Single Convention, reports the Sydney Morning Herald.

Morales, an Aymara Indian who came to power as the leader of coca growers in the Chapare region, has moved away from the forced eradication of coca plantations while at the same time stepping up efforts against cocaine traffickers, with record seizures.

Photo: Cannabis Culture

Bolivian kids in the coca field

Like neighboring Peru, Bolivia permits the limited cultivation of coca for legal use in cooking, folk medicine and Andean religious rites. Unadulterated coca is a mild stimulant that counteracts the effects of altitude sickness and helps to suppress hunger pangs, reports Fox News Latino.

According to the Bolivian government, the Single Convention contradicts the Bolivian constitution, which says the country is "obliged to preserve and protect" the chewing of coca leaves as a cultural heritage and ancestral practice.

For years now, Bolivian officials have argued that coca in its natural plant form is not an illicit drug. The plant is legally grown in Bolivia for medicinal and traditional purposes. A considerable portion of the supply is also diverted and processed into cocaine for the U.S., Brazilian and European markets.

An international attempt to remove coca chewing from the U.N.'s illegal drugs list failed in January, so the government, based in La Paz, is now ready to withdraw from the convention.

Photo: Cannabis Culture

Bolivians harvesting coca leaf in the fields

No signatory nation to the Single Convention has ever formally withdrawn from it in the 50 years that the treaty has existed.

Under the draft law, which has already passed the lower chamber of the Bolivian Congress and is expected to pass in the Senate -- where leftist President Morales's party has a two-thirds majority -- Bolivia would keep its international obligations in the fight against drug trafficking.

Foreign minister David Choquehuanca said the country would rejoin the Single Convention next year, but with an important exception: That Bolivians be allowed to consume coca legally. The legislation states that Bolivia may rejoin the Convention only if the articles that outlaw the chewing of coca leaf -- in contravention of Bolivia's 2009 constitution -- are removed.