Pubdate: Sat, 19 Mar 2016
Source: Trentonian, The (NJ)
Column: Passing the Joint
Copyright: 2016 The Trentonian
Contact:  http://www.trentonian.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1006
Author: Edward Forchion, NJWeedman.com For The Trentonian

UTILIZE POLICE DISCRETION REGARDING POT POSSESSION

I'm passing this special JOINT to the Trenton Police Officers.

Dear Trenton Police Officers.

I am not your enemy, none of you should be mad at me for ignoring the 
marijuana laws. In fact I think you should ignore them as well. They 
do in the suburbs. You know the potheads are a peaceful bunch. You 
know arresting someone for marijuana ruins his/ her life more than 
marijuana use ever could. Some of your spouses, siblings, offspring 
and parents are potheads. But you continue to arrest non-family 
potheads here in Trenton.

With a straight face I ask you too: Utilize Police Discretion in 
regards to marijuana possession, sales, and manufacturing. Simply 
stop arresting people for the municipal prosecutors office. Stop 
creating cases for the defense lawyers. Stop presenting potheads to 
the system as chattel. Save your fellow human from a cage; for a plant.

Join the Reefer Revolution - #FtheLawyers - join L.E.A.P. Law 
Enforcement Against Prohibition.

Without a doubt the marijuana laws are the worst Jim Crow laws ever 
and you enforce them. 25,000 New Jerseians were arrested for 
marijuana last year, most of them POC's (Persons of Color). Every one 
of them was arrested by a police officer - this is disgusting to me. 
I ask you to "just say no more".

Trump lapdog: Chris Christie along with the majority of the lawyers 
in the state assembly keep the NJ Jim Crow marijuana laws in place 
for a reason. They continue to make chattel of us  "POC's", they 
depend on our prosecution. Stop helping them.

In some states the citizens have created citizen initiatives and 
ballot questions to end the absurdness and cruelty of the marijuana 
laws. They've legalized or de-criminalized. This isn't possible in 
NJ, the lawyers hold us hostage there are no state wide citizen 
initiatives available to us via NJ law.

Officer the NJ marijuana laws are a complete lie and anyone who 
believes in the lies of the marijuana laws are complete buffoons 
(preacher,. Do-gooder types) or are capitalizing off the Cannabis 
Cash cow - lawyers. I really see no in-between for 70 years our 
Government demonized marijuana for economic and racist reasons, using 
clear propaganda, deception and exaggerations. The Dudley do-rights 
still believe this crap, and the lawyers just suck off the misery they created.

Economically Cannabis-hemp-marijuana is one of the best industrial 
products ever discovered by man, but industrialists like William 
Randolph Hearst, Mellon and the DuPonts wanted this competition 
banned from the USA. Racism was used to accomplish it. (Google: Harry 
Anslinger the first head of the Narcotics Board.)

You guys are just doing your jobs and I ask you to stop doing this 
aspect of it.

Officer: I know you're not immune from common sense and the reality of truth.

You've been confronted with the truth about marijuana like most 
Americans in the last 20 years. You know like I do that the 
Government and the legal profession has lied to you about marijuana, 
continues to lie and they get away with it because you enforce those 
lies. You now are that DARE officer lying to kids. That can't make 
you feel good about yourself, you know you're doing a bad thing 
enforcing pot prohibition even though you joined the police force to 
do good (most of you). So why do you continue to arrest and ruin 
people? How do you arrest someone for Violating the state 2C:35 
marijuana laws that you know were created via racism and are false?

I'm anticipating some officers reading this saying: "Because it's the 
law and I swore to uphold the law? Well thru my THCsmoky breath I say 
to you that's not good enough - not nearly, it doesn't justify the 
harms to society that you cause when you just enforce these unjust, 
flawed lie of a Law that 2c:35 is. You are the only reason the vile 
lawyers can commit atrocities against the citizens in this lawyer 
created - Drug War.

After World War II, the Nazis at the Nuremburg Trials tried to 
explain away their crimes against humanity as their defense to the 
atrocities they committed in what's become known as the Nuremberg 
defense. - Just following lawful orders or by the German phrase 
Befehl ist Befehl ("only following orders", literally "an order is an 
order"), is a plea in a court of law that a person, whether a member 
of the armed forces or a civilian, not be held guilty for actions 
which were ordered by a superior officer or a public official.

The Nuremberg Tribunal rejected this defense under Nuremberg 
Principle IV, "defense of superior orders" is not a defense for war 
crimes, although it might influence a sentencing authority to lessen 
the penalty. Nuremberg Principle IV states: "The fact that a person 
acted pursuant to order of his Government or of a superior does not 
relieve him from responsibility under international law, provided a 
moral choice was in fact possible to him." (Wikipedia)

This is exactly how I feel about you officers  Our Government has 
engaged in a decades long inhuman war against us (the citizens of 
America) and you can't continue to use Befehl ist Befehl as your 
excuse. Stop following orders.

Last year the president of the State Municipal Prosecutors Office Jon 
Barr stated, "As a municipal prosecutor, I have had to waste 
countless taxpayer dollars and hours of police officers' time to 
prosecute New Jerseyans...the savings that will be realized will 
dwarf any drawbacks."

At the time I said, "If the Prosecutors Association really wanted to 
legalize marijuana, they could - just by refusing to prosecute those 
charged with marijuana offenses." If I were in JonHenry Barr's 
position I'd call a statewide vote for all municipal prosecutors to 
agree to end criminal prosecutions of all 2C:35 marijuana and 
paraphernalia charges.

You see, prosecutors have the ability to use prosecutorial discretion 
regarding which cases they prosecute, and it's a fact during the 
alcohol prohibition of the last century there were jurisdictions 
where prosecutors refused to prosecute alcohol charges. The NJ 
Prosecutors Association could just as easily refuse to prosecute 
marijuana offenses today if they really wanted to, Mr. Barr. I called 
him out 5 times in this very same Column.

When I had a moment to face to face speak to Mr. Barr at the state 
house he said blah, blah, blah, and continues hypocritically 
continues to prosecute people in Clark and Kenilworth. Ms. Kim Wilson 
the prosecutor of Trenton continues to #ruinblacklives over a plant.

Just like the Prosecutor(s) you could exercise discretion and refuse 
to arrest for marijuana.

Officer using common sense don't you ever wonder. Why is it that 6 
politically connected whitemen are allowed to sell medical marijuana 
as owners of state sanctioned "ATC's" (Alternative Treatment Centers) 
while YOU arrest people "mostly poc's" under (2C:35) state laws that 
define marijuana as having no "medical value". It's the same substance!!!

You are the frontline in this war on us, you are the money 
collectors, the chattel overseers, the Krackers in the lawyer's war 
to fill their pockets. "Just say nomore".

In spite of truth, science and justice the legal profession of New 
Jersey is addicted to the Cannabis Cash Cow that the state criminal 
marijuana laws are. They milk the COW despite the misery inflicted 
upon the citizens by the laws they know are flat-out lies. The State 
of New Jersey prosecutes and ruins citizens; under its 2c:35(c) 
criminal laws. This is a openly absurd legal stance the lawyers know 
to be untrue; marijuana is not a schedule one drug, the law is clearly a lie.

The lawyers from Chris Christie to Jon Henry-Barr rely on the 
proceeds (contracts, billing hours, drug program investments, stock 
in private prisons etc., etc., ) of the Cannabis Cow, they send their 
kids to the University and you help them send ours to the penitentiary.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom