Pubdate: Sun, 09 Dec 2012
Source: Oregonian, The (Portland, OR)
Copyright: 2012 The Oregonian
Contact:  http://www.oregonlive.com/oregonian/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/324
Author: Noelle Crombie

MEDICAL MARIJUANA USERS QUESTION POLICE USE OF CARDHOLDER REGISTRY

Oregon medical marijuana advocates in 2006 successfully pushed to give
police round-the-clock access to the state's cardholder registry.
Patients with pot figured they wouldn't be arrested if cops could
quickly confirm their status with the program.

Six years later, police check the database thousands of times each
month. Law enforcement ran more than 20,000 queries on potential
patients and grow sites from March through October of this year,
Oregon Health Authority data show. For some context: About 55,000
people are Oregon medical marijuana patients.

Oregon police officials say the system protects the patients from
additional criminal investigation by proving they are entitled to
possess marijuana. And the number of queries is inflated by several
factors, police say, such as the need to look up variations on the
spelling of a person's name.

But some advocates worry that the volume of requests suggests police
use the registry to snoop on patients without obtaining a search warrant.

Jennifer Alexander, a medical marijuana patient who lives in
Beaverton, said police shouldn't access the registry unless they
suspect someone is breaking the law.

"Their perspective is all marijuana grows are illegal, so they treat
them as though they are criminal," she said.

How it works

Cardholder registries are common in medical marijuana states. In
Oregon, the health authority maintains the database.

Police don't need to give a reason for an inquiry, but they also don't
get access to patient records. Electronic queries about whether a
person is a patient or whether an address is registered produce yes or
no answers. Officers making a phone query may get additional
information such as how many patients a grower serves.

Brian Michaels, a Eugene lawyer and member of a state committee that
advises the medical marijuana program, said he wants officers to
provide health officials a police report number or else cite the
nature of a criminal investigation when they check the registry.

The Advisory Committee on Medical Marijuana hopes to persuade Oregon
Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum to act on their concerns.

Her spokesman, Jeff Manning, said Rosenblum hasn't heard reports of
police abusing their access to the registry. But two years ago,
Rosenblum, then an Oregon Court of Appeals judge, wrote an opinion
setting parameters on police access to the information.

ellen.jpg Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum, when she was a state
appellate judge, wrote an opinion setting parameters on police access
to the medical marijuana registry. Benjamin Brink/The Oregonian At the
time, the Douglas County sheriff's office routinely looked up the
medical marijuana status of people applying for concealed handgun
licenses, and Rosenblum ruled the tactic inappropriate.

"The statute does not authorize the use of database information for
purposes of helping to determine whether an individual uses, or may
use, marijuana," Rosenblum wrote.

The ruling, Michaels said, made clear that the database is presumed to
be private and that law enforcement may use it "only to prevent
unnecessary criminal investigation of patients, not to begin
investigation of participants."

Making inquiries

The Oregonian requested from the Oregon Health Authority a summary of
all law enforcement queries of the medical marijuana database from
March through October. The data showed 18,615 queries made
electronically and 2,363 by phone.

Police officials offered several explanations for the volume of
queries.

They said officers run name and address variations if they're
uncertain about spelling or exact location.

Drug investigators with the Clackamas County sheriff's office check
the database repeatedly when preparing a search warrant to see if a
suspect's medical marijuana status has changed.

"A person can be an applicant for weeks or months before their
information is entered into the database, so the wise investigator
will check up until the very last minute before they are going to
serve a warrant," Clackamas County sheriff's Sgt. Adam Phillips said.
"They are going to check this over and over and over."

In rural Malheur County, the sheriff's office ran 399 checks -- more
than the number of patients who live there.

Brian Wolfe, the Malheur County sheriff, said his office runs queries
after aerial patrols during which deputies scout outlaw grow sites.
They'll run addresses where police spotted marijuana to see if they
are legal.

Also contributing to Malheur County's numbers was a major
investigation into a medical marijuana dispensary in Ontario. The case
had more than a dozen suspects.

"We don't just randomly check addresses without a reason to check
them," Wolfe said.

Portland police made 1,319 electronic queries. The bureau's drugs and
vice unit makes most of the queries, Sgt. Pete Simpson said.

"A community member says, 'Hey, I saw my neighbor's garage open
yesterday and there was a bunch of tall plants in it,'" Simpson said.
"Police run the check, find out the person is a valid grower and it
ends the investigation generally."

But it doesn't end there for every police agency.

Compliance checks

In Salem, police said many of the department's 1,124 queries were
related to citizen complaints about suspected drug activity at
specific addresses.

"If they say, 'We think they are smoking drugs,' there is a good
chance we are going to run that residence," Lt. Dave Okada said.

Some of the complaints lead to visits by police.

"If we get out there, and there are six people and a bunch of
marijuana on the table, we are going to make six more inquiries,"
Okada said. "You can see how those numbers build up."

Medford Police Chief Tim George said his department's tally of 1,171
queries shows the agency is doing its job to keep the medical
marijuana program "an honest system."

"We are the people that monitor this program," he said. "I mean, who
monitors it? It's us."

Medford police Sgt. Kevin Walruff said police get up to a dozen
marijuana complaints a day during the summer and fall. Some callers
object to the way the plant smells. Others notice unusual traffic in
and out of a house, he said.

Cops' first step: check the address with the medical marijuana program
to see if it's legal. Police may follow up with a visit.

Oregon law lets a patient possess 1.5 pounds of marijuana, six mature
plants and 18 immature plants. Patients may also have someone grow for
them.

"We will go up there, talk to the grower if they allow us on," Walruff
said. "We will ask to do a compliance check and look at their cards
and count the plants make sure they have enough cards for the plants."

Oregon law says nothing about inspections of grow sites by state
health officials or by police.

Advocates object to visits by police.

"We don't have compliance checks," said Sandee Burbank, a longtime
activist. "There is no way it was ever set up for law enforcement to
monitor the program."

Lori Duckworth, a medical marijuana advocate in Jackson County, said
she gets calls each week from growers approached by police. Callers
ask, "Is a compliance check something real? Do I have to let them in?"

Duckworth advises growers to tell the cops: "Go get a search warrant,
and I will comply with you."
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MAP posted-by: Matt