Pubdate: Tue, 09 Sep 2014
Source: Metro (Halifax, CN NS)
Copyright: 2014 Metro Canada
Contact:  http://www.metronews.ca/Halifax
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/4727
Author: Ruth Davenport
Page: A1

COPS DEFEND THEIR RAID ON MEDICINAL MARIJUANA LOUNGE

Two arrests at Farm Assists. Deputy chief says police forces must
respond to complaints

The deputy chief of Halifax Regional Police says Canadian sentiment
around medicinal marijuana may be in flux, but police forces are still
required to enforce existing laws.

Social-media users erupted after police raided the Farm Assists
medical-marijuana lounge on Gottingen Street and two related
properties in Head of Chezzetcook on Friday, arresting owner Chris
Enns and his fiancee, Sherri Reeve.

"This is completely wrong and a GIANT waste of taxpayers money and
hrp's time," wrote Anthony Fares on the Metro Halifax Facebook page
Saturday.

But Deputy Chief Bill Moore said Monday the searches were a response
to public complaints - not arbitrary acts of harassment.

"If I'm legally allowed to provide medical marijuana with a
prescription, you brought in your prescription, I provide you with
material," he said. "You come walking through without any prescription
and then I sell, that ... is still a trafficking offence."

No details on the public complaints that prompted the investigation
were available as of Monday evening.

Outside court Monday, Reeve called the charges "ridiculous" - though
she said giving cannabis away for free could be considered
trafficking, even if it's being given to cancer patients.

"There is that, whether it's a just law or an unjust law," she said.
"I'm sure that Chris' intention is to change the laws in Canada
because cannabis is a medicine, whether Health Canada admits it or
not."

Moore said police use their discretion when enforcing laws, but added
that determining public policy and considerations of the "greater
good" is best left to the courts. About a dozen supporters came to
Halifax provincial court on Monday for the arraignment of a medical
marijuana lounge owner, calling the charges against him "sickening"
and "despicable."

"It's bulls---t," said Farm Assists client Will Jackson. "Once again,
another shakedown ... How can you put someone in jail who gives
(medication) away?"

Chris Enns and fiancee Sherri Reeve were arrested Friday when police
searched the Farm Assists location on Gottingen Street, the couple's
home and a grow facility in Head of Chezzetcook.

Police said they were responding to public complaints, but Reeve and
her supporters claimed it was part of a pattern of harassment.

"We believe they're attacking Chris because he's giving away free
medicine to cancer patients," she said. "We never get to know who
those complainants are, (or) what the complaints were."

Reeve said she's skeptical of the charges - which include drug
production and trafficking - and police investigation, saying only
cash was seized from the couple's home, but no cannabis or cannabis
extract.

"I assume they didn't take it because they knew I had a legal right to
possess it," she said. "We weren't over our plant numbers, we didn't
have too much on us at the time. I haven't broken any laws."

She also said officers seized plants at the couple's legal grow
facility, claiming they were too large, though the licence doesn't
include any restrictions on size.

With Farm Assists out of commission, Reeve said patients who relied on
their product have nowhere to turn - a situation client Will Jackson
called an "injustice."

"We're tough men," he said.

"There's people out there that need their medicine that can't come
down here and fight for it. So we're here for them, too."

Enns, a licensed medical marijuana user, was released from custody
Monday, under conditions to not possess, use or produce a controlled
substance. He is still able to smoke and grow medical marijuana.

He's due back in court on Sept. 29.
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MAP posted-by: Matt