Pubdate: Sun, 25 Aug 2013
Source: Ottawa Sun (CN ON)
Copyright: 2013 Canoe Limited Partnership
Contact: http://www.ottawasun.com/letter-to-editor
Website: http://www.ottawasun.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/329
Author: Jessica Murphy
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?196 (Emery, Marc)

TALE OF WHO PUFFED IT

Pot Activist Denies Toking With Trudeau

Pro-pot activist Marc Emery is offering his mea culpas to Justin 
Trudeau from a U.S. jail for saying he'd smoked pot a few times with 
the Liberal leader.

But Emery said he did get high once with Trudeau in August 2003 on a 
restaurant patio in Vancouver, though it was Emery "doing most of the smoking."

Trudeau said Friday Emery was "flat out lying" about the '09 
allegations, only met Emery once, and abstained from any pot use with 
the activist.

Emery apologized in an e-mailed response to questions about his remarks.

In the e-mail, forwarded to QMI Agency on Saturday by his wife, 
Jodie, he says it was a "very loose and irresponsible 
misrepresentation of what most people would regard 'four or five times.'

"I am indeed recorded telling a falsehood that, until now, I was 
unaware was out there. I'm totally embarrassed about it. I take my 
reputation very seriously, as of course, does Mr. Trudeau, and I'm 
really saddened that I have caused him some grief by this clear 
misrepresentation."

Emery said a video of his remarks only began circulating online after 
his 2010 sentencing and incarceration in Yazoo City federal prison in 
Mississippi, where he's currently serving a five-year term for 
selling pot seeds by mail.

"I am wrong, wrong, wrong," he said. "That video was recorded in July 
2009. I was clearly upset that in the 2009 session of Parliament Mr. 
Trudeau supported the Conservative legislation on mandatory minimums for pot."

The video shows Emery calling the now Liberal leader a "hypocrite" 
for voting along with the rest of the Liberal caucus in favour of 
Bill C-15, which would have introduced tougher penalties for growing 
pot plants and saying he'd smoked pot with Trudeau on more than one occasion.

C-15 did not pass, but similar legislation became law in 2012 as part 
of omnibus crime bill Bill C-10.

Earlier this week, Trudeau revealed he had smoked pot "five or six" 
times in his life, including once about three years ago at a dinner party.

He was MP for the Montreal riding of Papineau at the time.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom