Pubdate: Wed,  6 Mar 2002
Source: Independent, The (CN ON)
Copyright: 2002 Conolly Publishing Ltd.
Contact:  http://www.eastnorthumberland.com/thisweek.html
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1596
Author: Tom Philp
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Cannabis - Medicinal)

LOCAL CASE SUBJECT OF QUEBEC FILM

Two independent filmmakers from Montreal visited Northumberland this week, 
gathering information for a television documentary on the medical use of 
marijuana.

Jean-Pierre Roy and Marianne Boire said their interest in the "human side" 
of medical marijuana busts increased after reading articles in The 
Independent. The case involving Dianne Bruce, her daughter Michelle Hughey, 
and the many medical marijuana exemptees depending on Bruce's company, Lady 
Dyz Helping Hands, "really touched us," they said.

Bruce made no secret of the fact she grew "strain specific" marijuana for 
"sick people" last year on her Dundonald acreage. Police officers, 
including members of the Kawartha Combined Forces Drug Squad, visited her 
"grow" regularly over a six-month period from May 2001.

OPP Sergeant Bill O'Shea had been asked to sit on Lady Dyz' Board of 
Directors, but declined the offer. Bruce has a photograph of OPP Sgt. John 
Murphy standing in the marijuana garden last September, about one month 
before police seized the marijuana.

Drug squad officers raided Lady Dyz on October 19, 2001, ten days after an 
article on her work with medical marijuana "exemptees" appeared in The 
Independent. Bruce spent ten days in a Whitby jail before being granted bail.

"When we read that, that a sick woman was in jail for ten days because she 
grew marijuana for other sick people, it really touched us," Roy said.

Roy is an experienced filmmaker and producer who worked for TVO in Ontario, 
and TVA in Quebec. Boire is a graduate student in journalism, who is 
interested in producing films about scientific subjects, with the object of 
portraying the "human side" of complex issues.

"The medical marijuana issue is very complicated," Boire said. "For me, it 
is important to show people that human beings are affected by ... decisions 
made by government and the police."

The filmmakers spent Sunday interviewing Bruce and Cobourg-area exemptee 
Gord Strickland. Tim Carriere, a Canadian Forces veteran, and medical 
marijuana exemptee, who suffers from several disabilities, told his story 
to Roy and Boire on Monday. The Independent was visited by the filmmakers 
on Monday, where this reporter was interviewed.

Roy and Boire hope their production will be aired in Quebec later this 
year. They do not know if the film will eventually be shown in Ontario and 
other parts of Canada.
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MAP posted-by: Alex