FORT COLLINS (AP) - A Fort Collins couple is opening a store to sell medical marijuana.

Store owners James and Pat Fleming say they plan to serve the needs of people who suffer from chronic pain and other illnesses and that they're "not out to be legal drug dealers."

The EnerChi Healing Center store would be the first of its kind in Fort Collins.

Other services they will offer include yoga, hypnosis, nutrition and meditation.

Fort Collins Police spokeswoman Rita Davis says what the Flemings are doing is legal as long as they are certified to grow marijuana and they sell it to users with a doctor's prescription and a state-issued registration card.

Marijuana use for medical purposes became legal in Colorado when voters approved Amendment 20 in 2000.

The store opens Monday.

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Newly Installed Drug Court Seeks To Aid In Client Recovery

Craig -- The principal organizers of the long-awaited and newly installed Moffat County Drug Court agree on what would constitute a success: one client kicking a drug habit and turning around a life once on the brink of a prison sentence.

"One person," said Jessie Cramer, a Communities Overcoming Meth Abuse board member and Drug Court committee representative. "That would mean a lot to me, and it would to their family and their children."

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BRECKENRIDGE - Don't be surprised if you walk out of the latest Backstage Theatre's production with a bad case of the munchies.

"Reefer Madness," which opens tonight in Breckenridge, portrays a 1930s anti-marijuana propaganda film, but its satirical staging sends a different message. "It's over the top ... by the end you still have probably the most pro-marijuana message you could have in an anti-marijuana show," said Dustin Murphy, who plays the all-American boy Jimmy Harper. "There's lots of layers, and little pothead jokes."

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(Re: "Marked man," cover story, Feb. 28.) Mark Udall continues to feed the hypocrisy of his life when he jokes about being arrested for marijuana when he was "young and reckless." He was sentenced to one year of probation and says he channeled the "experience" into "something positive" by going on to graduate college and eventually becoming executive director of Colorado Outward Bound, a state representative and now a federal representative.

How well would Mark Udall have "overcome" his arrest if he were arrested under today's drug laws?

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Last week I read a headline that said, "Senate committee approves death penalty for sex assaults on kids." The senate committee said in effect that anyone who sexually assaults a child under the age of 12 should be executed. I think that the committee that passed that bill needs to rethink what they did.

I was a police officer for most of the time from 1964 to 1995. I will assure the committee and anyone else that the seriousness of the sentence has little or no impact on whether or not a criminal will commit a crime. They just never think about it. If it were true then there would be very few crimes committed.

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Drug War Takes Another Turn To The Ridiculous

Anyone who has seen the 1936 anti-drug movie "Tell Your Children," more commonly known as "Reefer Madness," knows the ridiculous levels the powers that be will go to in their attempts to keep Americans from using a product that harms no one but themselves. The movie follows the destructive paths of several young people who become "addicted" to marijuana through wild parties thrown by pushers.

One scene has a young man, reefer tucked into to corner of his mouth, wildly pounding out jazz tunes.

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Drug War Promotes Criminal Activity

With 2.3 million Americans in prison, we should realize how ridiculous America appears to the rest of the world, as we invade nations to help them create a "better" society ("2.5M jailed in the land of the free," The Gazette, Feb. 29). America has become a police state with a prison system Stalin would have envied. The reason is simple: Drug prohibition is a failed policy which, by way of the law of unintended consequences, promotes and supports a large violent criminal element in our society.

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But Use By Coloradans Ages 18 To 25 Rose In The Period Ending In 2004-05.

The overall rate of illicit drug use by people 12 and older dropped slightly from 2003-04 to 2004-05 in Colorado, although the state was in the top five for illicit drug use, federal statistics show.

Small declines in illicit drug use occurred among those ages 12 to 17 and adults 26 and older, according to a report released Wednesday by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.

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Some students say no, science says yes

In the weeks leading to CU's infamous 4/20 events, staff writer Rob Ryan explores the culture behind marijuana use among students. His three-part series begins today and ends with comprehensive coverage on April 20.

Pot smoking could be a synonym for Boulder.

CU ranks No. 15 on the Princeton Review's list of colleges with the highest use of pot among students. But when asked whether smoking pot is bad for them or not, there appears to be no easy answer.

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Colorado Spent $599 Million On Corrections In '07

The number of Coloradans in prison has nearly tripled in 15 years, costing the state hundreds of millions of dollars.

The prison population stands at 22,424. That number, plus 9,567 parolees and 13,200 people in county jails, represents more than 1 percent of the state's adult population, according to statistics kept by the Colorado Department of Corrections and County Sheriffs of Colorado.

The Pew Center on the States last week reported that 2,319,258 Americans were in jail or prison at the start of 2008 - one out of every 99.1 adults. Whether per capita or in raw numbers, it's more than any other nation.

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Task Force Aims To Intervene Before Meth Use Leads To Crime

GLENWOOD SPRINGS - A preliminary study into Garfield County felony drug cases over four years shows that the number of methamphetamine cases has topped the number of cocaine cases -- previously the most prosecuted drug in the county.

The ongoing study, conducted by the Western Colorado Methamphetamine Research Center at Mesa State College, has looked at cases from 2003 to 2007 and found that methamphetamine has become the most prosecuted drug in the county.

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ACET Also Reaching Out To Users Seeking Help

Craig -- The All Crimes Enforcement Team, formerly known as GRAMNET, seized more than $250,000 worth of illegal narcotics in 2007, a number more than double the previous year's drug seizures.

"Our mission is the same -- to combat every aspect of illegal narcotics," said Garrett Wiggins, ACET task force commander.

The year-end seizure numbers were part of information ACET recently released during its annual meeting with financial contributors and assisting agencies.

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When I was a Michigan police officer, I spent my 12-hour shifts focusing on the drunk and reckless driver because they actually kill people. During my 18 years of service, the use of marijuana generated zero calls for service. Denver police might fear a change based on what Upton Sinclair said long ago: "It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on him not understanding it."

As a realist, I am confident that the use of alcohol will always generate enough trouble, so that no officers will need to lose their paychecks when Colorado allows marijuana to be legal, regulated and taxed.

Howard J. Wooldridge

Westminster, CO

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Remember those Office of National Drug Control Policy commercials a few years ago that equated drug use with aiding terrorists? The rationale behind them was that terrorists often finance their operations with proceeds from sales of illegal drugs, so good Americans shouldn't buy drugs because doing so aids the enemy. It's difficult to argue with that. For many years, rebels in drug-producing areas of the world have used to the illicit drug trade to generate revenue. the U.S. government considers these rebels terrorists.

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Windsor School District students may not be using drugs and alcohol as often as in the past, according to results from the Healthy Kids Colorado Survey that were being circulated Thursday.

The survey, which was given to Windsor students in the 6th, 8th and 10th grades, is used to evaluate general behavioral practices that may help and/or hinder the learning progress. The results of the survey have been shared with administrators and principals. The results will soon be released to the public in newsletters at the high school and middle school, district officials say.

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Lamar Police Chief Brian Phillips told The Lamar Ledger Monday he intends to move forward with plans to add a canine unit to the force in the near future.

Phillips said his own experience as a canine officer in Florida during the 1990s has convinced him the dogs are an invaluable tool in both drug interdiction and search capacities. In a recent press release Phillips commented that currently, when police suspect the presence of drugs, the department's ability to search is limited by the constitutional rights of individuals. On the other hand, if a drug sniffing dog is present and alerts officers to the presence of illegal drugs, probable cause for a further search is established.

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When Donald Vendel became Boulder's new police chief in 1967, he wrote a column in the Camera titled "Chief's Corner." At the time, illegal drugs had become Boulder's biggest police problem, but the city's residents knew very little about them. In one of Vendel's articles, he invited the locals to bring their own popcorn and to view a free movie at the Boulder Public Library on "the dangerous mind-warping drug LSD."

Drug use was rapidly increasing. Before long, Boulder became known as "a home for displaced hippies and a crossroads of the nation's drug traffic," according to a Camera reporter.

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White House drug czar John Walters recently criticized Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez for failing to stop the flow of drugs from his country into the United States and Europe. "Where are the big seizures, where are the big arrests of individuals who are at least logical coordinators? When it's being launched from controlled airports and seaports, where are the arrests of corrupt officials? At some point here, this is tantamount to collusion," Walters said in a story by the Los Angeles Times.

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Panel May Call for Few Prosecutions

The mayor's panel on marijuana policy might consider recommending that the Denver city attorney halt most prosecutions of people who possess less than an ounce of pot.

The idea was floated Monday by one of Mayor John Hickenlooper's panelists, attorney Frank Moya. He said the panel would fulfill its job to ensure last year's marijuana ordinance is implemented to the "greatest extent possible" as required by the initiative.

More than 57 percent of Denver voters approved Initiative 100, an ordinance making private adult marijuana possession of less than an ounce the city's lowest law enforcement priority. As part of the initiative the mayor was required to appoint an 11-member Marijuana Policy Review Panel, which met for the first time Monday.

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Real Estate Agents Want To Educate Youth On Drug Use

John Giroux feels plenty of passion about methamphetamine.

He has one simple goal: make it CLEAR that meth has no business in the Loveland community.

CLEAR, the Coalition of Loveland for Education, Awareness and Resources, is the brainchild of Giroux and Scott Eastman, both local real estate agents.

The group is only a year and a half old, but on Friday Giroux, along with members of local governments and law enforcement agencies, discussed how CLEAR could help eliminate meth use in Loveland.

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