Pubdate: Sun, 06 Aug 2000
Source: Honolulu Advertiser (HI)
Copyright: 2000 The Honolulu Advertiser, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.
Contact:  P.O. Box 3110 Honolulu, HI 96802
Fax: (808) 525-8037
Website: http://www.honoluluadvertiser.com/
Author: Dan Nakaso

NEW LAW INSPIRES PRO BONO PAKALOLO

Nearly two months have passed since Gov. Ben Cayetano signed a bill that 
made Hawai`i the eighth state to legalize possession of marijuana when used 
for medical treatment. But nowhere in the 17 pages of regulations are there 
are any allowances to distribute or sell marijuana, or even allow patients 
obtain seeds or plants to grow their own.

A new Hawai'i law legalizing medical marijuana has prompted many Isle 
residents to look for ways to grow or obtain the drug legally.

A mechanized pulley silently drags high-pressure sodium lights back and 
forth above 23 marijuana plants, bathing them in 1,000 watts of blinding light.

A ventilation system sucks the heat out of the marijuana growing room to 
avoid detection by police helicopters equipped with infrared heat sensors. 
Fans gently exercise the plants and stimulate growth as a machine produces 
carbon dioxide to encourage photosynthesis.

The friends who set up the $9,000 operation in a home in a quiet Honolulu 
subdivision have been told repeatedly they could make big money selling 
pakalolo on the street. They're not interested.

They say their marijuana goes to select friends and family who suffer from 
a variety of injuries, illnesses and other problems that marijuana helps 
when prescription drugs don't. Among the ailments that it is used to treat 
are insomnia, back and neck injuries and menstrual cramps.

They say they give away their pakololo or sell it below market prices, 
which run about $400 to $600 per ounce. They also smoke it themselves for 
medicinal purposes.

The hui is part of the expanding network of underground pakololo growers 
filling a demand for so-called medical marijuana, pot grown and smoked not 
just for the high but to relieve pain associated with a variety of physical 
maladies.

Nearly two months have passed since Gov. Ben Cayetano signed a bill that 
made Hawai`i the eighth state to legalize possession of marijuana when used 
for medical treatment. The law allows people to use marijuana if they have 
a "debilitating medical condition" such as cancer, glaucoma or AIDS or for 
a medical condition that causes pain, nausea or other problems.

The outlaw growers gave a tour of their operation to The Advertiser with 
the understanding that the location and their names not be revealed.

"We realize the risk," said one of them, a 40-something state employee and 
divorced father of two. "But if we can help folks live as close a normal 
life as we can, that's the risk that we have to take. If we can help people 
live productive lives, we feel we're helping the community. We're coming 
from the heart."

Marijuana relieves nausea and stimulates appetites for people with cancer 
and AIDS, advocates say. For glaucoma patients, they say, marijuana reduces 
the intraocular pressure in the eye. And it eases pain, migraines and 
menstrual cramps.

Patients who are registered with the state can have no more than three 
mature marijuana plants, four immature plants and one ounce of usable 
marijuana per mature plant.

Although medical marijuana has been legalized in Hawai`i, no one has been 
certified to get it.

State narcotics enforcement officials have been writing procedures to allow 
doctors to register patients. The proposals will go to the attorney 
general's office, public hearings and the governor before they're adopted, 
perhaps by the end of the year.

But nowhere in the 17 pages of regulations are there are any allowances to 
distribute or sell marijuana, or even allow patients obtain seeds or plants 
to grow their own.

"This medical marijuana act doesn't address how you obtain it," said Keith 
Kamita, chief of the state's narcotics enforcement division. "That's one of 
the flaws in the law."

Kamita knows that the absence of distribution or cultivation rules will 
hardly discourage growers.

"There are going to be more," he said. "We know that."

His office received about 50 calls per day soon after the medical marijuana 
bill passed, mostly from people wanting to know how to register.

About 20 percent of the calls came from people who want to grow, sell or 
distribute marijuana to groups of patients. The law allows only registered 
caregivers to possess marijuana for their patients.

The National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws in Washington, 
D.C., gets about 30 e-mails per week from people in Hawai`i wanting to know 
how they can legally obtain marijuana.

Like the other states and the District of Columbia, which also allows 
medical marijuana, Hawai`i's law conflicts with federal law, which outlaws 
marijuana.

"People in Hawai`i are logically confused," said Allen St. Pierre, the 
organization's executive director. "There's no doubt that demand is high 
for it. So if there's a demand for it, in a logical system then there would 
be a system for distribution. This bizarre parallel universe cannot 
continue without amending federal legislation."

St. Pierre said that Hawai`i probably will have to follow the same pattern 
as other states in which somebody who forms a growers' club or buyers' club 
gets arrested, and the issues are aired in court. At that point, police and 
prosecutors generally will make some sort of informal concession that will 
allow the clubs to continue operating, St. Pierre said.

"I wouldn't be a soothsayer in saying that it's likely that somebody will 
play the role of legal martyr," he said. "It doesn't have to happen. But 
odds are it will. Then the precedent is that local accommodations will soon 
be arrived at."

The U.S. Justice Department shut down six buyers' clubs in California. One 
of them, the Oakland Cannabis Buyers' Cooperative, filed suit. U.S. 
District Judge Charles Breyer ruled last month that the Oakland Cannabis 
Buyers' Cooperative can legally distribute marijuana to patients.

Breyer further ruled that the government failed to prove why seriously ill 
patients should not have legal access to the substance.

The court proceedings in California sounded familiar to Joanna McKee, 
co-founder and director of the Green Cross Patient Co-op in Seattle.

McKee, who uses marijuana for migraines and to ease the pain from three 
spinal cord injuries suffered in a series of car accidents, co-founded 
Green Cross in 1992. In 1995, she was growing 162 plants in her bedroom 
when authorities raided the house and arrested her. The search warrant they 
used eventually was thrown out of court. McKee won on appeal.

Today, she continues to operate the Green Cross Patient Co-op, but merely 
acts as a conduit between growers and 1,000 patients, who keep their 
medical permission slips on file with her.

Washington's law also has no provision for growing, selling or distributing 
medical marijuana. But McKee said she no longer has problems with police, 
who now come by only to ensure she has records for patients.

"We are illegal," McKee said. "But when they busted us, the press was so 
bad for them and good for us."

Tom Mountain, a Hawai`i medical marijuana advocate, spends his days 
thinking of ways to give patients low-cost marijuana and keep himself out 
of legal trouble.

He even has a name picked out for his group, the Honolulu Medical Marijuana 
Patients' Co-op.

Instead of running into trouble by selling marijuana, Mountain said he 
might give it away and accept whatever donations patients can make.

Or he might help form a hui in which he helps patients tend to their 
marijuana plants. Instead of buying the marijuana, the patients would pay 
only rent, Mountain said, reducing the cost to about half the current 
street price.

"At this point, the intent of the law is clear, but it's not helping 
anybody," Mountain said. "The law is flawed, and everybody admits it. So if 
we don't get the approval from the state, we're going to do it anyway."
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MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart