Panel Winnowing Field of Applicants The District of Columbia's health department is expected within the next few days to give its first indication of who qualifies to grow medical marijuana in the nation's capital, a significant step in a program aimed at comforting the sick and dying that is more than a dozen years in the making. A panel of health, regulatory and law enforcement officials tasked with choosing the top 20 out of 28 applications to open cultivation centers in the District is scheduled to complete its initial review by Friday and provide notice to qualifying applicants and Advisory Neighborhood Commissions in the relevant areas by Jan. 4, according to a schedule from the D.C. Health Regulation and Licensing Administration. [continues 478 words]
The Oct. 24 front-page article "Acreage of drugs soars in Mexico" showed once again that the United States' decades-long policy on drugs will never work. Eradication of drug crops and interdiction of drugs entering the United States raise the price of drugs. Raising the price of drugs prompts people to participate in either growing or distributing drugs. It is a never-ending cycle. How many more years must our society suffer before we finally realize that our drug culture is a health problem, not a criminal one? If drugs became available through a health provider, the profit motive would disappear, along with the concomitant crime it spawns. David Marchand Towson [end]
EL BARRIL, Mexico -- The Mexican government is allowing domestic marijuana and opium poppy production to climb to record levels, as soldiers who once cut and burned illegal crops here in the vast Sierra Madre mountains are being redeployed to cities to wage urban warfare against criminal gangs. Since President Felipe Calderon ordered his troops into the streets in late 2006, the acreage dedicated to marijuana farming has nearly doubled in Mexico, according to technical reports by the U.S. government and the United Nations, data provided by the Mexican military, and interviews with law enforcement agents and growers. [continues 1300 words]
Legalization of Marijuana Would End Drug Profiteering and Violence Imagine you are a drug lord in Mexico, making unfathomable profits sending your illegal product to the United States. What is the headline you fear the most? "U.S. to build bigger fence"? "U.S. to send troops to the border"? "U.S. to deploy tanks in El Paso"? No. None of those would give you much pause. They would simply raise the level of difficulty and perhaps cause you to escalate the violence that already has turned the border region into a war zone. But would they stop you or ultimately hurt your bottom line? Probably not. [continues 603 words]
Candidates to grow medical marijuana in the District risk wasting their time, energy and a non-refundable $2,500 if they're not prepared to meet the strict demands of the application process about to get under way. The D.C. Department of Health issued strict rules Friday that govern how qualified applicants should submit paperwork from Aug. 15 to Sept. 16 for a cultivation license The applications, which will be scored by a multi-agency panel, could highlight who is serious versus those who is ill-equipped to handle the demands. Candidates so far have only submitted a formal intent to apply. But now they must submit a detailed security plan and descriptions of how marijuana will be handled, stored, packaged and labeled. [continues 345 words]
In D.C. Superior Court on Tuesday, 36 people were scheduled to be arraigned for carrying marijuana. The alleged offenders were collared by police for marijuana possession in the latter half of July and the beginning of August, and faced up to six months in prison time and up to $1,000 in fines. Court records indicate prosecutors are going ahead with 18 of the cases. Eleven of the citations were given in predominantly black police districts east of the Anacostia River. Only one was issued in the Second Police District, which contains some of D.C.'s whitest neighborhoods. That snapshot of the District's criminal justice landscape would seem to reflect past statistics, which say black residents are eight times more likely to be arrested for sparking a blunt than their white counterparts. [continues 547 words]
The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, following a 20-month nationwide investigation, said Thursday it has arrested more than 1,900 members of a Mexican drug cartel as part of an operation known as "Project Delirium." DEA Administrator Michele M. Leonhart described the arrests, along with the seizure of $62 million in U.S. currency and nearly 25,000 pounds of cocaine, heroin, marijuana and methamphetamines, as the largest ever against the La Familia Michoacana cartel, one of Mexico's most violent drug gangs. [continues 506 words]
Lawmakers for the first time have introduced legislation in Congress to end the federal criminalization of the personal use of marijuana. The bipartisan measure -- H.R. 2306, the 'Ending Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act of 2011' and sponsored by Massachusetts Democrat Barney Frank and Texas Republican Ron Paul along with Reps. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.), John Conyers (D-Mich.), Jared Polis (D-Colo.), and Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) -- prohibits the federal government from prosecuting adults who use or possess personal use amounts of marijuana by removing the plant and its primary psychoactive constituent, THC, from the five schedules of the United States Controlled Substances Act of 1970. Under present law, all varieties of the marijuana plant are defined as illicit Schedule I controlled substances, defined as possessing "a high potential for abuse,"and "no currently accepted medical use in treatment." This classification is not supported by either existing science or public opinion. [continues 717 words]
15-Month Program Provides Counseling, Stable Environment When Martina Brown gave birth to her youngest son in November 2009, she knew she wouldn't be leaving the hospital with him. Ms. Brown, 39, had used drugs throughout her pregnancy. And when doctors discovered her newborn had drugs in his system, he was immediately placed in foster care, she said. On Friday, after Ms. Brown and nine other women graduated from the Superior Court of the District of Columbia's Family Treatment Court, she recalled how far she had come in battling her drug addiction since hitting "rock bottom." [continues 606 words]
Seeking a Piece of the Medical Marijuana Action Montgomery Blair Sibley might be best known as the lawyer who defended the "D.C. madam," the infamous escort service owner who claimed to attend to the needs of Washington's elite. Sibley has a new focus these days, one that's luring a rabbi, a waitress, a State Department technician and a gaggle of other fledgling entrepreneurs: growing marijuana and selling it to sick people in the nation's capital. He and his partners have divined a logo ("Rx" over a pot plant) and a company name (the Medicinal Marijuana Company of America) and have found a New York Avenue warehouse at which they hope to grow enough pot to make a profit in the first year. [continues 1349 words]
For the first time in several years, the District is falling behind in its efforts to combat AIDS, according to a report to be released Tuesday. The advocacy group DC Appleseed Center for Law and Justice pointed to a lack of leadership by former mayor Adrian M. Fenty (D) at the end of his term and said the city's grades declined in three other areas: gathering and tracking data on the illness, managing grants to groups that help people with the disease, and its needle exchange program. [continues 506 words]
Mexican President Felipe Calderon spoke mostly in excellent English during a visit to The Post on Thursday, but for one particular word he looked to his interpreter for help. Since what he was looking for was "coherence" or "consistency" in U.S. policy, it's no wonder he was momentarily stumped. An hour-long conversation with the president, as polite as he was, brought home how badly that quality is missing from U.S. policy on drugs, guns, trade and democracy promotion, when viewed from south of the border. [continues 726 words]
They are a tough sell for sympathy, the addicts. One couple rolls up in a primer-gray hooptie. She's got toothpick legs, one improbably skinnier than the other. Her skeletal frame is swimming in a child's Bugs Bunny denim jacket. He's scary skinny, too, with withered teeth sticking out of white gums and a mean streak. "How can they do this? I thought this was supposed to stop the AIDS. What, they want more people to get the AIDS?" he snarls at the folks who tell him the brown paper bag they're giving him is the last batch of free needles he'll get. [continues 772 words]
Marijuana Usage Can Hasten Onset of Mental Illnesses Marijuana use can accelerate the development of psychotic illnesses and leave life-long damage, a study conducted by the GW School of Medicine and Health Sciences found. Researchers discovered that marijuana use can hasten the onset of schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders by up to 2.7 years, a fact researchers discovered while determining the extent of the link between marijuana usage and psychosis. Patient data from 83 previous studies was re-examined to find the link, Dr. Matthew Large, one of the researchers, said. [continues 132 words]
D.C. residents seeking medical marijuana are unable to obtain a prescription in the city, despite the legalization of the drug last summer. Difficulties in regulating the drug have caused delays in dispensaries being set up, D.C. Department of Health spokeswoman Mahlori Isaacs said. "Due to legal litigation, it is unclear when medicinal marijuana will make it to Washington, D.C. depositories," Isaacs said. Medical marijuana became legal in the District July 27, 2010, after Congress' allotted 30-day review period expired. If Congress does not touch a bill passed by the D.C. Council in that 30-day period, it automatically becomes law. [continues 340 words]
The Dec. 31 article "California No. 1 in pot admissions" (Nation) doesn't mention the fact that more than half of the people seeking treatment for marijuana abuse in the United States are sent there by the criminal justice system. While your story makes it seem that there's a huge epidemic of people checking themselves into treatment for marijuana abuse, the fact is that many of them are only signing up for treatment because, after being arrested, it is their only option for staying out of jail. [continues 99 words]
Americans Are Dying Because of White House Inaction Brian Terry died for President Obama's sins. Mr. Terry, a U.S. Border Patrol agent, was killed during operations against bandits near the southern Arizona town of Rio Rico, approximately 15 miles inside the U.S. border. Here and along other infiltration routes, gangsters prey on illegal aliens and drug smugglers or serve as private security forces for gangs engaged in illegal activities. Agent Terry was part of a four-man Border Patrol Tactical Unit sent to engage the bandits, and he was shot down in the resulting firefight. [continues 506 words]
THE OBAMA administration has shied away from issues involving the regulation of guns. Now comes word from The Post's James V. Grimaldi and Sari Horwitz that the Justice Department is advancing a plan to stem the flow of semiautomatic rifles to violence-plagued Mexico. It's about time. Over the past three years, some 30,000 people have been gunned down in Mexico in attacks fueled by drug cartels. Military and law enforcement officers there have seized some 60,000 weapons that were used in these crimes and traced to the United States. Mexican President Felipe Calderon has pleaded with U.S. officials to step up enforcement of gun laws and reinstate the assault-weapons ban. Doing so would be good policy but would trigger a fierce fight. For the moment, the administration has something much more modest in mind. [continues 261 words]
BOSTON - In the upcoming California referendum on legalizing marijuana for recreational use, Mexican President Felipe Calderon and U.S. drug czar Gil Kerlikowske have something in common. Both are missing the forest for the weed. According to recent polls, Californians are on the verge of approving the legalization of marijuana and overthrowing nearly a century of failed American drug prohibition. Hail to the Golden State. In the four decades since President Richard Nixon declared a "War on Drugs," the toll of prohibition includes at least $1 trillion in taxes spent, according to the Wall Street Journal. Worse are the millions of lives damaged by prison time and street violence. In 2007, for example, about 500,000 people were in jail on drug charges. [continues 574 words]
SECRETARY OF STATE Hillary Rodham Clinton caused a stir last week by suggesting that Mexico's drug-trafficking gangs were beginning to resemble an insurgency, like that which has plagued Colombia. She's right in the sense that the cartels have come to effectively control parts of the country, where they "attempt to replace the state," as Mexican President Felipe Calderon put it last month. Like most insurgencies, the Mexican drug armies also have an external source of funding and weapons. Shamefully, that is the United States. [continues 477 words]
Inside District of Columbia
