A new study may prove that the party drug is effective in therapy. But will ecstasy make the leap from club to couch? On the street, rave-goers have labeled it "the love drug." Newspaper reports have dubbed it a killer. But for Marcela Ot'alora, ecstasy was a lifesaver. Repeatedly raped when she was a teenager, Ot'alora spent years locked in the grip of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). "My whole body would go into a panic," says Ot'alora, now 42 and a therapist in Lafayette, Colorado. [continues 1070 words]
U.S. drug czar Asa Hutchinson said on Thursday that the George W. Bush administration is concerned that Mexican drug money could end up financing terrorist activities, Reforma daily reported. The head of the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) said there is a possibility that terrorist groups would ally themselves with organized crime groups in Mexico, as has been the case in Colombia. "Mexican drug traffickers have been the base of drug mobilization in Colombia and the U.S., and...three terrorist organizations in Colombia receive financing from narcotrafficking," Hutchinson was quoted by the daily. [continues 170 words]
Eighty officers go after 31 suspects in Grey-Bruce Local news - One of the largest crackdowns on the local drug trade began Wednesday morning. Eighty police officers from around Grey-Bruce and Southern Ontario went hunting for 31 people suspected of involvement in drug trafficking. "It's a big operation. With 80 officers involved, it's one of the biggest I've seen in this area for a long time and it should have a significant impact on the drug trade in the area," said Senior Const. Steve Starr of Grey County OPP. [continues 172 words]
At Dallas' Courthouse, A Small, Hopeful Experiment Is Under Way In Breaking The Jail Habit The judge takes his seat behind the bench, wearing shirtsleeves, a striped tie and a bucketful of country-boy charm. "How y'all doing today?" "Fine...OK...good...," respond the two dozen or so recovering addicts who remain seated in the gallery. "I could be doing better," he tells them. "I just got back from the funeral of a close friend." In any other court it would be odd--a judge sharing details from his personal life, breaking down the traditional wall between law and litigant. But few judicial trappings are in evidence in Re-entry Court, a one-of-a-kind social experiment that takes addicts who have served nine months of their probation in a prison drug treatment center (SAFPF: Substance Abuse Felony Punishment Facility) and attempts to smooth their entry into the community. This forward-thinking program, which convenes at the Frank Crowley Courthouse each Thursday at 3 p.m., is run by State District Judge Robert Francis, a lanky, plainspoken jurist who seems to care as much about feelings as he does about facts. [continues 1680 words]
Last month, we discussed adolescent substance abuse and dependence, identifying their complex causes and the need for multifaceted approaches to prevention and cure. Along with biological and psychological causes, substance problems are strongly influenced by culture. Because the pressures of peer culture can be very strong in schools, and students are often more likely to confide first in teachers rather than parents, educators should be well informed about the most current risks and effects of substance abuse, especially because information about specific drugs frequently changes. [continues 1388 words]
What happens when America's most irresponsible flimflammers on teenage sex (the Kaiser Family Foundation) and drug use (Joseph Califano Jr.'s Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University) team up? We get a junk-science survey wildly exaggerating modest teen-risk percentages to 50 percent ...73 percent ... yes, even 89 percent! Kaiser's survey for CASA found fewer than 5 percent of senior high school students ever had sex after using drugs or alcohol. That makes teens safer than grownups. Can't use that. So, Kaiser applied timeworn numbers-boosting scams. [continues 655 words]
"Protect our children!" cry the Lindesmith Center-Drug Policy Foundation and Common Sense for Drug Policy, groups opposed to the "War on Drugs." How? Legalize marijuana for Mom and Dad! "Right now kids have an easier time buying pot than beer," declares Lindesmith Program Officer Robert Sharpe. "What's really needed is a regulated market with enforceable age controls," as in the Netherlands, where marijuana decriminalization brought "lower levels of drug use." And give parents who put their own highs ahead of keeping their children the legal right to abuse hard drugs like methamphetamine, says a fund-raising letter from Lindesmith Director Ethan Nadelmann. [continues 624 words]
I loved Brian Peterson's "Wishy-washy McLellan sets back medical marijuana cause" column (Aug. 29-Sept. 4 issue). Seriously ill patients who say marijuana is good medicine for them have wanted the testing that would prove them right for many years. Such testing has not been allowed. Politicians who say that medical marijuana is a hoax have curiously never called for clinical testing that would prove that marijuana is not as effective as medicine. Why would they spend decades saying marijuana is not effective medicine when they could have called for clinical testing that would prove their point? Logic would say that they know they would end up proving the patients' claims instead. [continues 57 words]
What sensible soul approves of illegal drug use? Not a one. The practice ruins families, wrecks neighborhoods and destroys futures. Given the great harm drug abuse inflicts, you'd think the "war on drugs" would be a no-brainer. But it isn't. In fact, it appears to be among the most brainless and ineffective government ventures of recent times. The matter comes to mind because a growing group of Minnesotans -- many associated with local churches -- are challenging the wisdom of waging such a war. They wonder how it can be that that U.S. incarceration rates have risen to an all-time high while crime rates have hit a three-decade low. For the wonderers, those discordant trends raise a question: Since a smaller share of Americans are breaking the law than at any time since the '70s, who's being locked up? [continues 610 words]
The overwhelming reaction to the recent Senate committee report recommending the legalization of marijuana has been one of surprise and incredulity amongst commentators. While most in the news media have stated that there is no way the government will carry out the recommendations any time soon, local medical marijuana advocate Brian Taylor thinks differently. "The momentum is so unstoppable that the worst that will happen is a year of decrim and then legalization," Taylor says. While Taylor thinks the age limit of 16 will be controversial, he agrees with the Senate's conclusion that decriminalization is hypocritical and should be avoided. He thinks the House of Commons will go along with this approach. [continues 294 words]
DUNCAN -- An off-schedule transfer of a state senator's daughter from the Stephens County jail to prison sparked the ire of the sheriff's deputies and the senator. Deputies claim Sen. Carol Martin, R- Comanche, used her political clout to persuade state Corrections Department officials to take her daughter, Alisha, to prison apart from other inmates on Monday, when they normally only take death row prisoners. The senator, however, said political pull had nothing to do with the move. She said a court order required that her daughter be moved by Monday, and because of the crowded jail, Martin wanted it enforced. "On the days that my daughter was in there, from Thursday to Sunday, a six-man cell had 13 women, plus my daughter, in the cell, and eight of the women had to sleep on the floor," Martin said Wednesday. Because of the jail's reputation, Martin said, she made sure the court order would transfer her daughter no later than Monday. Stephens County Deputy Mary Lou Hosler said she's never seen an inmate transferred on a Monday in nine years, unless the inmate was going to death row. To her, the off day move was favoritism. "Why make a state agency that has been going by a certain policy for many years change that to accommodate one person?" Hosler asked. Alisha Martin, 20, pleaded no contest to charges of conspiracy to manufacture a controlled dangerous substance. She was sentenced to 128 days and will begin a drug rehabilitation program. [end]
In these troubled times, it's nice to know that there is one thing that can always bring a smile to our faces, and maybe even cause us to laugh so hard that we cry. I am referring, of course, to the War On Tobacco. Rarely in the annals of government -- and I do not mean to suggest anything juvenile by the phrase "annals of government" -- will you find a program so consistently hilarious as the campaign against the Evil Weed. [continues 681 words]
A Big New Effort To Repress The Cocaine Industry BOGOTA - Last year, some 35,000 peasant farmers in the Colombian department of Putumayo, the world's largest single source of cocaine, signed pacts agreeing to pull up their coca bushes within 12 months in re-turn for government aid. Thousands com-plied; many more did not-not least be- cause aid was slow to arrive. Now Colombia's new government, supported by the United States, is all but scrapping this policy of voluntary eradication in favour of a big new push to spray coca fields with herbicide. After a decade in which coca production steadily rose in Colombia, American officials say that this year they will finally start to get on top of it. [continues 786 words]
The late Bob Vezina, arguably one of the best city editors this newspaper ever had, used to threaten the immediate dismissal of any reporter who screwed up a phone number in a story. To this day, some 15 years later, I am loath to put a phone number in an article. However, when I must, I check the number carefully, and phone it myself (often more than once) to make sure it is correct -- all the while remembering the sound of Vez's gruff, expletive-enhanced voice promising to drop-kick my sorry keister into the unemployment line. [continues 643 words]
BOISE -- The Idaho Court of Appeals has voided the drug convictions of a Twin Falls County woman because of conversations a court bailiff had with the jury. In the unanimous decision, the three-judge panel ruled that because prosecutors could not show that the communications between the bailiff and the jury were harmless, the verdicts against Michelle Eguilior had to be set aside under state Supreme Court precedents. Eguilior was convicted and given a 3- to 10-year sentence after being charged with selling marijuana to an undercover informant for the Twin Falls Sheriff's Department in 2000. A search of her home turned up more marijuana, methamphetamine and drug paraphernalia. [continues 276 words]
HIGHLANDS RANCH - Sheriff's deputies with drug-sniffing dogs swept through ThunderRidge High School on Monday, beginning a program initiated by the school district. The sweep found nothing to alert the dogs around student lockers at the 1,550-student school. But authorities were investigating nine vehicles in the parking lot, principal Mike Lynch said. The dog "alerts" did not surprise many ThunderRidge students. Rebecca Dunlap, a 16-year-old junior, was surprised that only nine vehicles had turned up alerts, but said "if kids are stupid enough to bring drugs to school, they deserve to be caught." [continues 151 words]
The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court is being asked to decide whether it is a crime for a participant in a needle exchange program in a certain city to carry needles outside that city's boundaries. The case involves Maria Landry, 22, a recovering drug addict who was arrested for shoplifting in Lynn last year. After voluntarily telling police officers she had four hypodermic needles in her purse, she was charged with illegal syringe possession, even though she is a member of an authorized needle exchange in Cambridge. [continues 198 words]
Despite strong objections from town leaders, the Vermont Department of Health has decided to allow the Vermont CARES needle exchange program to remain open in St. Johnsbury. In a letter dated last Thursday to Town Manager Mike Welch, DOH Commissioner Jan Carney stated she believes Vermont CARES made efforts to deal with the public and inform residents about the program, as mandated by Health Department guidelines. Welch said what Carney used to make those determinations is unclear. "I would like to know what she used to demonstrate that they exerted effort," he said. Carney conceded those efforts did not achieve the intended result of making town officials and the public more aware of what was planned. "In addition," stated the letter, "the Department of Health's review of the application did not go far enough to assure that the advisory group has engaged the Selectboard and the community as a whole in this process." [continues 162 words]
In a mass notification prompted by a Philadelphia Inquirer investigation, New Jersey prison officials informed 421 inmates they had hepatitis C. The notification took place in the last two weeks of July, a medical audit shows. More than 1,100 prisoners known to have the disease have now been informed, according to the audit. No New Jersey prisoners are being treated for hepatitis C, and no decision has been made on how to pay for their care. Correctional Medical Services, the prisons' private medical vendor, said some of the 421 inmates had been told before July, but this had not been noted in their electronic files. Twenty-one people were recently released from prison without being told they were infected. Uninformed patients can spread the blood-borne disease through shared drug paraphernalia, sex, and possibly even blood droplets on shared toothbrushes. State Prison Commissioner Devon Brown and CMS officials said they were trying to contact the 21 infected people who had been released. [continues 187 words]
Jake Elmore came back to Hawai'i this fall to go to school. But mostly he came here to save himself. Instead, the 23-year-old, 6-foot-tall business student left his UH dorm room six weeks ago in a body bag, the victim of accidental poisoning by a toxic mixture of alcohol and methadone, according to autopsy findings. Like so many other young people, Jake was trying to find his way through a complex and competitive world where expectations are high, the risks seem tame, and alcohol and drugs are as seemingly plentiful as cappuccino. [continues 1838 words]
ADAMS COUNTY - When members of a drug task force pounced on a suspected methamphetamine lab Friday morning, a 4-year-old girl met them at the door. The youngster ended up hospitalized in protective custody, her aunt and grandmother ended up in jail on drug charges, and her mother was on the lam, apparently with the girl's 5-year-old brother in tow. "Unfortunately, it's becoming more common," Thornton police Lt. Lori Moriarty said of the combination of methamphetamine and children. [continues 295 words]
Pair Plead Guilty To Manslaughter In Deadly Explosion Two men were sentenced to prison for manslaughter Monday in a methamphetamine lab fire that killed two women. James Campbell, 29, and Daryl Willis, 48, pleaded guilty to manslaughter and drug possession in the Jan. 16 fire that trapped Pamela English and Tammy Marie Campbell in the basement of 310 S. Lincoln St. They are the first Coloradans to die in a meth lab explosion. The lab was in Willis' home, although he wasn't helping make the drug that day. James Campbell, a meth addict, was helping English and Tammy Campbell when someone kicked over a can of Coleman fuel, igniting a fireball that engulfed the basement, police said. James Campbell and Tammy Campbell are not related. [continues 337 words]
Brian Brown, 49, was placed on administrative leave and cited for possessing one ounce or less of marijuana, a Class 2 petty offense, said Sgt. Tim Moore of the Douglas County sheriff's office. The charge carries a possible $100 fine upon conviction. A statement from the Douglas County School District said the discovery was made Monday during a random search inside the school and in the parking lot using drug-sniffing dogs from the sheriff's office. The search, the first in a new program at all the county's high schools, identified nine cars as possibly having trace amounts of illegal substances. Subsequent searches cleared all but the one car, according to police. [end]
Party: Libertarian Occupation: Software engineer Family: Single Question answers: 1. I would ensure that no one's parental rights can be terminated without a jury of their peers saying so. The Department of Human Services has run amok in this state. 2. I believe that schools should be privatized. Private and homeschooling do the job better for less money. Also, many of the expenditures in higher education are for things not actually having to do with education. I believe we can better educate children and cut the 50 percent of the budget that goes to education. [continues 78 words]
DENVER (AP) - A random drug search of lockers and cars at ThunderRidge High School turned up marijuana in a teacher's vehicle. Brian Brown, 49, was placed on administrative leave and cited for possessing one ounce or less of marijuana, a Class 2 petty offense, said Sgt. Tim Moore of the Douglas County sheriff's office. The charge carries a possible $100 fine upon conviction. A statement from the Douglas County School District said the discovery was made Monday during a random search inside the school and in the parking lot using drug-sniffing dogs from the sheriff's office. The search, the first in a new program at all the county's high schools, identified nine cars as possibly having trace amounts of illegal substances. Subsequent searches cleared all but the one car, according to police. [end]
Saturday, September 28, 2002 - GRAND JUNCTION - Authorities have arrested a woman suspected of marijuana trafficking eight years after she was indicted. Sally Sabori, 58, was being held Friday in the Mesa County Jail on $100,000 bail. Sabori was one of nine people indicted by a grand jury after an investigation uncovered a drug ring that imported nearly 1,000 pounds of marijuana into Grand Junction every year between 1986 and 1994, authorities said. She and her husband, Manual Sabori, were arrested in Tucson, Ariz., in 1994 but failed to appear in court after being released on bail, said Mesa County Assistant District Attorney Martha Kent. [continues 146 words]
Denver police have arrested five people on suspicion of trying to distribute 50 pounds of high-grade marijuana, according to a police report. Officers executing a search warrant Monday in the 700 block of South Washington Street uncovered the 50 pounds of potent "BC Bud," the report states. Carl Larsson, 24, Sarah Jane Mullenix, 28, and Trevor Hanson, 22, all of Denver, and Ryan Archibald, 25, and Brian Black, 24, of Washington state were arrested. [end]
Child discovered at Weld Sheriff's Office Tuesday, October 15, 2002 - A 6-year-old Adams County boy who lived at a home police said contained a methamphetamine lab was dropped off at the Weld County Sheriff's Office in Fort Lupton early Monday, one day after police arrested his mother. The child, who had been missing, was taken to the office by unidentified Fort Lupton residents, said North Metro Drug Task Force Sgt. Jim Gerhardt. The boy's mother, 23-year-old Jamie Sanders, was arrested Sunday at a hotel near Interstate 70 and West Colfax Avenue, police said. She was being held on a $50,000 dangerous-drugs warrant in connection with a separate meth lab, according to police. [continues 469 words]
Wake County educators are giving their students a firsthand civics lesson in the abuse of power and the absence of common sense. County educators recently announced that they would start testing students in October for contact with marijuana by rubbing their hands or possessions with litmus paper. The litmus paper will chemically react with any marijuana residue. Similar tests for other illegal substances will follow in the near future. Wake County school administrators believe this test will easily pinpoint which students have broken the law and make high schools a better place. They could hardly be more wrong. [continues 446 words]
The three candidates vying for the Ohio House 22nd District seat agree on one thing: The average Ohioan is paying too darn much in taxes. It's an odd bond among three men who clearly represent different points along the political spectrum. "That's what they're telling me about," said Jim Hughes, the Republican incumbent, referring to recent conversations with constituents. "People are telling me 'We can't have our property taxes raised. I can't afford to pay for this stuff.'" [continues 461 words]
MANSFIELD - There's an age bias in north central Ohio when it comes to loosening laws on marijuana. "I don't think it should be legal," said Dave Keller, 67, of Mansfield. "It's been illegal for years. There must be a reason for that. Just because people keep smoking it doesn't mean it's OK." Congress banned marijuana in the United States in 1937. Ron Abraham, 71, doesn't think it's time to change a thing. "We should just stick with the laws we already have,"Abraham said. [continues 557 words]
Drugs. Those vile substances that can alter your consciousness, turn you into a junky and a failure, and, in short, ruin your life. Maybe you think I've seen one too many after-school specials, but God bless the American television networks' war on drugs and alcohol. It really seems that more and more families are being pulled apart by drug abuse nowadays. All you have to do is turn on an episode of COPS to see drug-addled mothers and fathers destroying their children's lives; and if that isn't enough to convince you that drugs are a moral plague on our society, then just go for a walk through any park in Toronto, after dark. You'll find packs of homeless crack-fiends and injection-drug users ambling through the dewy grass, in search of their next fix. How are these people to become productive members of society? [continues 480 words]
Long Beach Teen Says Abuse Was Easy To Hide Sydney snorted cocaine every day for a three-month stretch during her senior year at Long Beach High School. She was a cheerleader, an honor student and a drug addict. "I'm lucky I'm not in jail," she said. "I'm lucky I'm not dead." Sydney, 19, is now a sophomore at the University of Mississippi where she is studying business and Spanish. She withheld her real name to protect her identity. [continues 1538 words]
Staff at an Inverness psychiatric hospital have joined forces with Northern Constabulary to crack down on the use of illegal drugs. New Craigs Hospital staff contacted the police after patients who had been taking cannabis and amphetamine began threatening staff with violence and intimidating patients to prevent them reporting the situation. The problem came to light about two weeks ago, when it was discovered that patients authorised to leave the hospital during the day were returning at night with drugs and making them available to other patients. [continues 373 words]
"The drug war is a proxy for racism," says Andy Ko, project director of ACLU-Washington's Drug Policy Reform Project. "Most modern politicians wouldn't dream of explicitly advocating that society persecute or enslave poor people or members of minority communities. But that is exactly what is happening as a result of the 'get-tough-on-crime' drug war policies of the past few decades." Ten years ago, perspectives such as these might still have been viewed as exaggerated, rhetorical stabs at trying to reverse the trend of skyrocketing us incarceration rates. [continues 2152 words]
A man accused of possessing 55 grams of cannabis escaped punishment yesterday after he told magistrates he needed the drug for health reasons. Brad Stephens, 45, who lives with his two children, claimed smoking cannabis was a "medical necessity" which eased the pain of his crippling spinal condition. The case is believed to be one of the first in which magistrates have accepted medical reasons as a defence to possession of a large quantity of cannabis. Carmarthen magistrates were told that police found the class B drug in a raid on Mr Stephens' home. He owned up to being a regular cannabis user but denied the charge of possessing the drug. His solicitor, Mike Reed, told the court: "Mr Stephens suffers from ... a degenerative bone disease of the upper spine and neck." He said that although his client has been prescribed morphine to combat the pain his body had built up a resistance so that he required in creasing doses. "Large doses of morphine can seriously damage health so by taking cannabis he reduces his dependency on morphine and the potentially fatal risk. In effect, the cannabis is saving his life," said Mr Stephens. [continues 83 words]
Prison officers blamed overcrowding for an eight-hour riot at Lincoln jail which left 27 prisoners and three staff injured. It took 300 police officers from three forces to help restore order at the jail yesterday morning after inmates went on the rampage. An investigation into the trouble has already begun. Duncan Keys, assistant secretary of the Prison Officers' Association, said: "Historically we would look at previous incidents such as Strangeways, where chronic overcrowding contributed to a major riot there. "We need more staff in there. Prison officers do a dangerous job in society and they should be increased." [continues 108 words]
The Government's chief adviser on youth crime outlined what he admitted were "controversial" plans yesterday to identify potential criminals among eight-year-olds. Lord Warner, chairman of the Youth Justice Board, said he accepted there would be fears that the children would become "stigmatised" but he claimed parents of unruly youngsters would welcome the idea. Children aged between eight and 13 would be identified by panels of professionals for displaying signs of problematic behaviour, including drugs use, poor mental health and family difficulties, he said. [continues 468 words]
The head of the Prison Service, Martin Narey, has accused the novelist Jeffrey Archer of being "self-centred" and of using his diaries to exaggerate the state of prison conditions. In an unprecedented attack on an individual prisoner, the prisons chief questioned the motives of the disgraced peer who is expected to receive more than AUKP300,000 from his chronicle of life as an inmate in Belmarsh prison, south London. This is Mr Narey's first personal response to Archer's lurid account of prison life, which includes details of drug taking among prisoners and beatings by officers. [continues 652 words]
Three appeal court judges today upheld the Daily Mirror's challenge to a High Court ruling in favour of supermodel Naomi Campbell's breach of confidentiality claim. The newspaper had contested the AUKP3,500 damages award and the decision that it must pay Miss Campbell's legal costs. The Master of the Rolls, Lord Phillips, giving the judgment at the Court of Appeal, said the February 2001 report about the model's drug addiction was justified in the public interest. The Streatham "born beauty had claimed that she felt "shocked, angry, betrayed and violated" by the article which included a photograph of her leaving a Narcotics Anonymous meeting in the King's Road, Chelsea. [continues 270 words]
OTTAWA (CUP)-Canadian adults may soon be legally entitled to "blaze," "smoke up" or "hit up the phat chronic" if a report tabled by the Senate of Canada is accepted and passed into law. The report, released by the Senate Special Committee on Illegal Drugs, bluntly calls for the legalization of marijuana. "Judges, lawyers, college students, brain surgeons, everyone smokes marijuana," said Senator and committee member Tommy Banks. "Putting someone in jail for simply having a joint in their pocket is wrong." [continues 452 words]
Anti-CRACK Campaign Offers Real Choices To Would-Be Mothers "We don't allow dogs to breed. We spay them. We neuter them. We try to keep them from having unwanted puppies. And yet these women are literally having litters of children." These words, quoted out of Marie Claire magazine, belong to Barbara Harris, a middle-aged white woman in Orange County, California, who founded Children Requiring a Caring Kommunity (CRACK). CRACK is a national population-control organization that offers $200 cash to folks who struggle with chemical addiction to undergo sterilization or long-term birth control. CRACK's mission is to "save our welfare system and the world from the exorbitant cost to the taxpayer for each drug-addicted birth" by offering "preventive measures to reduce the tragedy of numerous drug-affected births." Since its inception, CRACK has enrolled almost 800 women around the country. Its Seattle chapter, called Positive Prevention, has posted flyers around town saying "Get Birth Control Get Ca$h." [continues 1382 words]
Wahkiakum School District's drug testing policy is going to get it's day in court, and the ultimate decision may decide how aggressively schools statewide can test for drugs. The state Supreme Court last week declined to hear an American Civil Liberties Union request to bar the district from conducting random, suspicionless searches of student athletes. The high court's action means that a trial about the drug testing policy will take place in Wahkiakum County Superior Court, perhaps before the end of the school year, attorneys say. [continues 447 words]
Congressmen think the county should be designated a High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area. So far this year, law enforcement officials have seized 20,567 marijuana plants in Umatilla County, more than the combined total of plants seized in the rest of the state, officials say. They also seized 40 methamphetamine labs in the county in 2001 and another 26 so far this year. Those statistics are why U.S. Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., and Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore., recently sent a letter to the federal government asking for a piece of a federal drug control agency's funding pie. [continues 453 words]
Wake County Middle and High Schools Will Use a New Litmus Paper Test for Illegal Drug Use. A Washington, D.C., company has provided litmus-paper, drug-screen tests, free of charge, to Wake County middle and high schools as part of a federally funded pilot program. The test will be administered to students who are suspected of using marijuana due to suspicious circumstances such as a strong odor, according to Corey Duber, Wake senior director for security. This plan draws criticism from groups, such as the American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina, because of the questionable accuracy of the testing devices and the fact that the original purpose of the program was to test the environment, not students. School officials should be concerned about illegal drug use on campus, but when teachers begin taking students out of the classroom setting to rub paper on their belongings, the learning process is interrupted. [continues 443 words]
I agree with drug czar John Walters' spokeswoman Jennifer de Vallance, that "Voters should consider the facts when they're at the polls this November." They should consider the fact that in the 5,000 year history of its use, marijuana has never been documented to kill a single person. They should consider the fact that last year there were almost 750,000 arrests for marijuana violations and 88 percent of those arrests were for simple possession. They should consider the fact that the United States, with fewer than 5 percent of the world's population, has greater than 25 percent of the world's prisoners - thanks primarily to our counterproductive war on users of certain drugs. [continues 94 words]
The chances of eventually developing cirrhosis or another serious liver disease from hepatitis C virus (HCV) may be lower than many experts believe, according to a computer simulation based on US liver disease statistics. "The news would be better if we could reliably predict which patients will and which will not progress quickly, which is not possible at this time," said study coauthor Dr. Joshua A. Salomon of the World Health Organization. As such, doctors must still face the difficult decision of when to put which patients on potentially toxic medications to slow the infection's damage to the liver, Salomon said. [continues 315 words]
Police Say Teen Shot In 'Drug Deal Gone Bad' Fourteen-year-old Charlie Castaway was supposed to be home baby-sitting his kid sister Friday night. But Charlie pleaded with his mom - he'd already watched his sister each night last week. Friday was his friend's birthday, and they wanted to go out and celebrate on University Hill. Valerie Lee Peterson let her son go - only to learn hours later that he'd been fatally shot while riding in the back of a stolen Honda Civic, the culmination of what police dubbed a "drug deal gone bad." [continues 773 words]
