March 2009 Activist Newsletter

AMERICANS FOR SAFE ACCESS
March 2009 Activist Newsletter

IN THIS ISSUE
* U.S. Attorney General Says Medical Marijuana Raids Over
* Obama Urged to End Intimidation of Property Owners
* Congress Asks DEA to End Monopoly on Medical Marijuana Research
* Maryland Lawmaker Backs State Medical Marijuana Study
* ACTION ALERT: Be One of Obama’s 10 Letters a Day
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***U.S. Attorney General Says Medical Marijuana Raids Over***
Pressure from Advocates Brings Change to Long-standing Policy

The tireless work of medical cannabis patients and activists has begun to pay
big dividends in Washington, D.C., with the new Administration’s attorney
general, Eric Holder, telling a news conference that ending the raids on
medical cannabis providers is now government policy.

ASA members were among the thousands of advocates calling the White House and
their elected representatives in the wake of the raids, deluging the
administration’s website with pleas for policy change, and participating in a
large protest at the federal building in Los Angeles.

Holder, appearing at a Washington news conference on Feb. 25 alongside the
DEA’s current Acting Adminstrator, Michele Leonhart, was responding to a
question about whether the DEA raids that have occurred in California since
Obama took office last month would continue.

"What the president said during the campaign, you'll be surprised to know, will
be consistent with what we'll be doing in law enforcement," Holder said, noting
that Obama is his boss. "What he said during the campaign is now American
policy."

During the campaign, President Obama was repeatedly faced with questions about
federal interference in the 13 states that have enacted medical cannabis laws.
Obama said then that his experience with his mother’s death from cancer made
him sympathetic with the plight of patients, and that he saw no difference
between a doctor prescribing morphine and marijuana. During a March 2007
interview, he also said that he thought it “entirely appropriate” for
states to look after the health and welfare of their citizens be legalizing the
medical use of marijuana "with the same controls as other drugs prescribed by
doctors."

The attorney general’s comments follow a White House statement from earlier
in the month, in which spokesman Nick Shapiro responded to pressure over recent
raids in California.

"The president believes that federal resources should not be used to circumvent
state laws" Schapiro said, and that the president’s appointees would be
expected to “review their policies with that in mind.”

The statements this month from the White House and the Attorney General were
greeted with relief and jubilation by patients and advocates across the
country.

"Americans for Safe Access welcomes President Obama's continued pledge to end
federal interference with state medical marijuana laws," said Caren Woodson,
ASA’s Director of Government Affairs. “These statements reflect a sea
change in federal policy.”

ASA, the nation’s largest medical cannabis advocacy organization, sent policy
recommendations aimed at harmonizing federal and state law and encouraging
research to President Obama and Congress earlier this year. More than 72
million Americans live in a state that has enacted laws that authorize the
limited use and distribution of cannabis for therapeutic use.

“We look forward to working with the President and his Administration to
enact long-term policies that support safe and legal access to cannabis for
therapeutic use and research," said Woodson.

While fierce federal opposition to state medical cannabis programs begun during
the Clinton Administration, which threatened to sanction any physicians who
even spoke with their patients about the therapeutic potential of cannabis
before being rebuffed by a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that affirmed the First
Amendment rights of doctors in such cases. Under Clinton, civil court action
was taken to shut down medical cannabis dispensing collectives.

The Bush Administration pursued a more aggressive policy, raiding medical
cannabis dispensaries throughout California, brining criminal charges against
more than 100 individuals who were in compliance with state law, and
threatening commercial property owners with criminal proceedings and forfeiture
of their property for renting to patient collectives. Patients in New Mexico
and Colorado were also targeted, though not on a similar scale.
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***Obama Urged to End Intimidation of Property Owners***

The Obama Administration has been asked to stop the Bush tactics of
intimidating California commercial property owners who rent to patient
collectives that provide medical marijuana.

Congresswoman Lois Capps (D-CA) sent a letter last month to incoming U.S.
Attorney General Eric Holder, decrying threats by the Drug Enforcement
Administration (DEA) and the U.S. Attorney's Office against property owners
that lease space to state-sanctioned medical marijuana providers. The letter
was prepared with assistance from ASA’s Washington office.

Since the summer of 2007, the DEA has sent letters to at least 300 landlords in
California threatening federal criminal prosecution and asset forfeiture if
they continue to lease to medical marijuana dispensaries. The Department of
Justice had not acted on the DEA threats until early January, when property
owners in Capps' district of Santa Barbara received an ultimatum -- evict their
tenants by February 21, or face legal jeopardy.

Capps letter urges the new administration “to act swiftly to suspend the
enforcement threats against the property owners in California who are in
compliance with local and state law."

Though licensed under a Santa Barbara city ordinance, since the threatening
letters were first sent in 2007, most of the dispensaries in Santa Barbara have
been evicted by their landlords or have closed voluntarily to avoid legal
problems.

"We applaud Representative Capps' leadership in opposing DEA intimidation,"
said Caren Woodson, ASA Director of Government Affairs. "Given public
statements by President Obama and others in his administration about changing
medical marijuana policy, these tactics are completely indefensible."

ASA and other advocates estimate that approximately 400 dispensaries help
provide medical marijuana to a majority of the more than 200,000 qualified
patients in California. In August of 2008, State Attorney General Jerry Brown
issued guidelines recognizing the legality of medical marijuana dispensaries
and offered a set of recommendation for how such facilities could comply with
state law. In 2005, the California Board of Equalization began collecting tax
on the sale of medical marijuana, a revenue source for the state budget
estimated by ASA at more than $100 million.
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***Congress Asks DEA to End Monopoly on Medical Marijuana Research***
Sixteen Members of Congress Urge Attorney General Holder to change DEA policy

More medical cannabis will be available for research soon, if members of
Congress have their way.

After lobbying by ASA, Sixteen members of Congress sent a letter last month to
Attorney General Eric Holder, urging the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA)
to act "swiftly to amend or withdraw" an order that significantly curtails
medical marijuana research in the United States.

At issue is a 2001 request by a University of Massachusetts, Amherst
researcher, Dr. Lyle Craker, to grow pharmaceutical-grade cannabis for
federally approved research studies. Currently, many approved studies are
unable to proceed for lack of research materials. In February of 2007, DEA
Administrative Law Judge Mary Ellen Bittner ruled that monopoly should end
because expanded medical marijuana research is "in the public interest." The
DEA sat on the ruling for nearly two years before rejecting it less than one
week before the new administration took office.

For more than forty years, the government has given the University of
Mississippi a monopoly on cultivating marijuana for medical research. Not only
is this arrangement unlike that for any other controlled substance regulated by
the federal government, no other country restricts research in this way.

The Congressional letter authored by John Olver (D-MA) notes the broad
scientific and political support for Craker’s proposal:

“Forty-five members of the House of Representatives and Senators Edward
Kennedy and John Kerry, as well as a broad range of scientific, medical and
public health organizations including the Lymphoma Foundation of America, the
National Association for Public Health Policy, and the Multiple Sclerosis
Foundation have all written to DEA in support of Professor Craker's efforts.”

In her 87-page Opinion and Recommended Ruling, Administrative Law Judge Bittner
concluded that the quality and quantity of marijuana supplied by NIDA was
inadequate for the level of research that cannabis deserves.

The ACLU, which represents Professor Craker in this matter, is requesting
reconsideration and an opportunity to respond to new evidence used by the DEA
in its decision.
___________________________________

***Maryland Lawmaker Backs State Medical Marijuana Study***
Patients, advocates call Maryland law inadequate, seek changes

Maryland has edged one step closer to expanding a state medical marijuana law
that advocates say is too limited.

With assistance from ASA, Maryland State Delegate Henry Heller (D-Montgomery
County) introduced legislation in February that creates a task force to study
the issue.

The bill, HB 1339, would require the State Department of Health and Mental
Hygiene to staff a Governor-appointed task force to evaluate whether the
current state law is effective, fair, and equally enforced across all state
jurisdictions, among other issues.

"Maryland’s medical marijuana law is broken," said Tony Bowles, a
spokesperson with the Montgomery County Chapter of Americans for Safe Access.
"People suffering from serious or chronic conditions are still vulnerable to
arrest and prosecution, and are left without a safe, secure way to access
physician-recommended medical marijuana."

The Maryland state legislature passed the Darrell Putman Compassionate Use Act
in 2002, requiring state and municipal courts to consider a a physician's
recommendation for medical use of cannabis to be a "mitigating factor" in
marijuana-related state prosecutions. The law permits an affirmative defense in
state court, yet qualified patients may still be convicted and fined up to
$100.

Advocates say Maryland’s citizens with a physician’s recommendation to use
marijuana are routinely arrested, prosecuted, and, in some cases, fined more
than the statutory $100 limit.

“Maryland’s qualified patients in Maryland should not be forced to break
the law and use the illicit market to access to the medicine their doctors
recommend,” said Bowles.

Thirteen other states, containing more than 72 million people, have passed laws
authorizing patients living with a serious or chronic condition to use
physician-recommended marijuana free from criminal prosecution.

The Maryland chapters of Americans For Safe Access have been working with
patients and their supporters bring similar protections to their state.

"Every year, Maryland wastes precious law enforcement resources to investigate,
arrest and prosecute scores of people who legitimately use medical cannabis,"
said Bowles. "We applaud Delegate Heller's proposal and hope this task force
will put science above politics, paving the way for much needed changes to a
flawed medical marijuana law."

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ACTION ALERT: Be One of Obama’s 10 Letters a Day

Every day, President Obama reads 10 letters from average Americans, and yours
can be one of them. The president not only reads the letters his staff pick,
he acts on them.

This month we’re asking you to sit down and write a letter to the President.
Make it relevant, timely and compelling; explain how your struggle for safe
access to medical cannabis is about healthcare, the economy, and everyday
Americans caring for each other. For more information and help with talking
points, visit:
http://www.AmericansForSafeAccess.org/PresidentialRecommendations.

Send Letters to:

President Barack Obama
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Ave, NW
Washington, DC 20500

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http://www.safeaccessnow.org/downloads/ASA_mar09_newsletter.pdf.

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