Medical pot sellers in the north suburbs are lauding a new Illinois law that will eventually allow patients who might be prescribed an opioid-based painkiller to qualify for medical marijuana as an alternative. The Opioid Alternative Pilot Program has the potential to expand marijuana access to patients who have been, or could be prescribed medications such as Oxycontin, Percocet or Vicodin, even if they don't have one of the medical conditions the state otherwise requires for eligibility. Gov. Bruce Rauner signed the law on Aug. 28. [continues 978 words]
Chicago police officers pointed their guns at two young children while executing a search warrant at the wrong address, according to a lawsuit filed Wednesday in federal court. Gilbert Mendez is suing the city, saying police used excessive force when officers rammed their way through the front door of his McKinley Park apartment last November, according to court documents. The officers had intended to raid the apartment of Mendez's upstairs neighbor, who was suspected of drug possession. But Mendez, his wife, Hester, and two children Jack, 5, and Peter, 9, were alarmed when police officers barged in with guns drawn, the suit says. [continues 741 words]
Why don't more jails use them? After Neila Rivera began using heroin as a teenager, she fell into a predictable and depressing pattern. She'd get locked up and go through detox, only to return to drugs as soon as she got out. It's a routine that has become more dangerous as heroin, now commonly mixed with powerful synthetic opioids like fentanyl, has become more unpredictably potent: Studies show that people released from incarceration, their drug tolerance lowered from abstinence, are far more likely than others to overdose. [continues 1565 words]
Legalizing marijuana makes sense for a lot of reasons, but there's one valuable thing we'll lose when police stop arresting people for smoking pot: A sense of just how misleading our crime data are. Data on arrests and reported crime play a big role in public policy and law enforcement. Politicians employ them to gauge their success in making neighborhoods and the entire country safe. Police departments use them to determine where to deploy more officers to look for more crime. They are fed into recidivism-risk algorithms, which help judges and parole boards make decisions on sentencing and release. [continues 638 words]
Severe bleeding linked to consumption of synthetic cannabinoids has resulted in at least two deaths and injury to nearly 90 others, according to state health officials. Illinois legislators approved an amendment to the state's controlled substances act last spring in an attempt to curb the sale and use of synthetic drugs. Gov. Bruce Rauner signed the bill into law a few months later. Less than a year after that, an outbreak of severe bleeding and at least two deaths are being linked to the ingestion of these materials, many of which are found for sale at tobacco shops, convenience stores and other retail sites throughout the state. [continues 482 words]
Two people have died and 56 sickened in the Chicago area and central Illinois after using synthetic pot, popularly known as K2 and Spice, state officials said on Monday. Over the weekend, the Illinois Department of Public Health announced that one person had died after using synthetic cannabinoid products, but on Monday the state agency announced that a second person had also perished. Generally, those sickened by the drug have been hospitalized for internal bleeding as well as blood coming from the ears, eyes and mouth. [continues 590 words]
SPRINGFIELD, Ill. -- The owner of a Chicago convenience store and two employees have been charged with selling synthetic marijuana that has been linked to two deaths. Federal prosecutors have charged 48-year-old Fouad Masoud and 44-year-old Jad Allah, both of suburban Justice, and 44-year-old Adil Khan Mohammed of Chicago with conspiring to distribute and sell a controlled substance. Federal prosecutors say U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents made undercover buys of the synthetic cannabinoids at Masoud's West Side Chicago store. [continues 74 words]
"My uncle is prescribed marijuana." "My parents use it, and they're doing fine." As a drug prevention specialist who does in-school presentations in the U.S., as well as internationally, Zach Levin has seen the problem firsthand: Teens know that recreational use is legal in states such as Colorado and that medical use is on the rise, and they're using that information to support the old argument that a little weed never hurt anyone. And starting today, Illinois teens have one more argument: In a symbolic win for legalization forces that did not change local laws, Cook County residents voted in favor of legalizing recreational marijuana use by a wide margin Tuesday, with 68 percent in favor and 32 percent against. [continues 790 words]
Historically opioid medications were used cautiously by physicians for selected patients to reduce pain associated with acute injury or illness, and for those suffering from life-threatening diseases such as cancer. This caution was based upon recognition that improper use of opioids could result in patient harm. However, in 1996, the American Pain Society, supported by opioid pharmaceutical manufacturers, promoted acknowledgment and expanded treatment of pain as the 'fifth vital sign" by physicians in hospitals. In 2001, the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations introduced new pain standards recognizing the under-assessment and treatment of pain, which then expanded the use of opioids. In the two decades that followed opioid use and abuse has exploded, with nearly 80 percent of the world's opioid medications now being consumed in the U.S. [continues 426 words]
There's a lot of truth-bending in political campaigns. Remember then-presidential candidate Donald Trump's false assertion in 2015 that thousands of Muslims in New Jersey celebrated the 9/11 attacks? Or how about Hillary Clinton's tall tale in her 2008 campaign that on a trip to Bosnia, "I remember landing under sniper fire. aE& We just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base." That, too, didn't happen. Benjamin Thomas Wolf's Pinocchio moment is also a doozy. [continues 317 words]
Legislation to legalize recreational marijuana use throughout the state is being revised to gain more bipartisan support in an effort to secure a veto-proof majority. State Rep. Kelly Cassidy and state Sen. Heather Steans introduced the bills last year, but the Chicago Democrats are rewriting some aspects to make the legislation more attractive to Republican counterparts. Cassidy and Skillicorn met Friday with the Daily Herald editorial board to discuss the legislation. Cassidy said having Republican support for the legislation would help get the law implemented this year since Gov. Bruce Rauner has signaled he would veto such a bill. Democrats have a veto-proof majority in the Senate, but would need at least five Republicans in the House to override a gubernatorial veto even if every Democrat supported the bill. [continues 245 words]
East Dundee Republican state Rep. Allen Skillicorn, left, has co-sponsored a bill introduced by Chicago Democratic state Rep. Kelly Cassidy to legalize recreational use of marijuana in the state. Legislation to legalize recreational marijuana use throughout the state is being revised to gain more bipartisan support in an effort to secure a veto-proof majority. State Rep. Kelly Cassidy and state Sen. Heather Steans introduced the bills last year, but the Chicago Democrats are rewriting some aspects to make the legislation more attractive to Republican counterparts. [continues 368 words]
The state Senate on Thursday voted to ask on the November ballot whether recreational use of marijuana should be legalized and taxed in Illinois. The ballot question would be only advisory, so even if voters approve, lawmakers still would have to act. Sponsoring Sen. Bill Cunningham, D-Chicago, said it is important to poll the public because some lawmakers are already working to legalize recreational marijuana use for people over 21. He noted that in most states that allow recreational use, it was done by voters expressing support in the ballot box. [continues 305 words]
Illinois voters could get a say whether the state should legalize recreational marijuana if lawmakers decide to put the question on November ballots. A state Senate committee advanced the idea on Wednesday, but a ballot question would be non-binding. That means it would work like a statewide public opinion poll and wouldn't legalize marijuana even if a majority of voters approve. Lawmakers who want to legalize the drug could get a political boost, though, if voters favor it. State Sen. Bill Cunningham, D-Chicago, said putting the matter to a vote would "bring the public into the debate" and "give them an opportunity to register their opinion" as lawmakers debate the idea in Springfield. [continues 303 words]
On Wednesday, the Illinois Senate Executive Committee overwhelmingly passed SB336, a bill that would allow people with opioid prescriptions to apply for a medical marijuana card, with only Minority Leader Bill Brady, a Republican from Bloomington, voting no in a 16-1 decisive passing. If signed into law, SB336 would amend the medical marijuana program to allow those who are prescribed opioids to apply for medical marijuana instead, giving patients the ability to choose medical cannabis, which has consistently shown to be a safer alternative, over the highly addictive and often deadly opioids. [continues 565 words]
As the legal marijuana industry navigates uncertainty on the federal level, state attorneys general are asking Congress to pass a law allowing banks to work with cannabis companies. Along with Illinois, 28 other states, Washington, D.C., and several U.S. territories have legalized medicinal cannabis, and eight states and the District of Columbia allow recreational use. But in the eyes of federal law, weed is still illegal, and the cash earned selling it is drug money. Illinois' highly regulated medical cannabis industry, operating under a state pilot program, has been fighting to expand. Earlier this week, a judge ordered the state to add intractable pain -- pain that's resistant to treatment -- to the list of 41 conditions that qualify patients to use medical marijuana. [continues 744 words]
CHICAGO -- The Latest on lawsuit to allow 11-year-old to receive marijuana treatment while at school. The Illinois attorney general's office has told a federal court it will allow a suburban Chicago school district to administer medical marijuana to an 11-year-old leukemia patient to treat her for seizure disorders. The commitment made to Judge John Blakey on Friday came two days after the student's parents sued Schaumburg-based District 54 and the state for the girl's right to take medical marijuana at school. Illinois' medical cannabis law prohibits possessing or using marijuana on school grounds or buses. [continues 251 words]
In a case that could have far-reaching implications, parents of an elementary school student who has leukemia are suing a Schaumburg-based school district and the state of Illinois for the right for her to take medical marijuana at school. Plaintiffs identified only as J.S. and M.S., parents of A.S., filed suit Wednesday claiming that the state's ban on taking the drug at school is unconstitutional because it denies the right to due process and violates the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). [continues 778 words]
An Oct. 28 letter to the Daily Herald advocated greater access to marijuana for people suffering chronic pain, citing a study in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). But if you visit the JAMA website and enter the search word "marijuana," you'll also see dozens of articles showing that marijuana can kill more than just pain: it can negatively impact things like cognitive function, moral clarity and the general health and well-being of users and their children and grandchildren. [continues 157 words]
Johnsie Gooslin spent Jan. 16, 2015, tending his babies -- that's what he called his marijuana plants. More than 70 of them were growing in a hydroponic system of his own design. Sometimes, he'd stay in his barn for 16 hours straight, perfecting his technique. That night, he left around 8 o'clock to head home. The moon was waning, down to a sliver, which left the sky as dark as the ridges that lined it. As he pulled away, the lights from his late-model Kia swept across his childhood hollow and his parents' trailer, which stood just up the road from the barn. He turned onto West Virginia Route 65. Crossing Mingo County, he passed the Delbarton Mine, where he had worked on and off for 14 years before his back gave out. Though Johnsie was built like a linebacker, falling once from a coal truck and twice from end loaders had taken a toll. At 36, his disks were a mess, and sciatica sometimes shot pain to his knees. [continues 4150 words]
Thirty people were shot, three fatally, during a violent 18-hour period from Saturday to Sunday in Chicago, which included a police-involved shooting and an attack outside Mount Sinai Hospital. In the Lawndale neighborhood, a woman's voice echoed as she voiced her frustration at the scene of a double shooting that left a 31-year-old man dead and another man wounded. "They know it's a drug house," she yelled out at the police and crowd that had gathered. "They don't give a (expletive). I do. I'm tired of this (expletive)." [continues 2261 words]
Chicago, I'm told, has a morality problem. That's what White House deputy press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the other day when asked if violence in our city is related to easy access to guns. "I think that the problem there is pretty clear that it's a crime problem," she said. "I think crime is probably driven more by morality than anything else." That's an interesting statement, given the reason the question was posed: The administration had just announced that 20 federal gun agents were being dispatched to Chicago to help with a task force focused on the flow of illegal guns into the city. [continues 1083 words]
Two Elgin men were arrested after police said they tried to sell pancake mix in a drug deal with undercover officers. [Name redacted], 18, of the 600 block of Hampton Circle, was charged with four counts of unlawful delivery of a controlled substance, and one count of unlawful possession of a look-alike substance with intent to deliver, police said in a Facebook post Friday. [Name redacted], 19, of the 300 block of Ann Street, was charged with one count each of unlawful delivery of a controlled substance and possession of a look-alike substance with intent to deliver, police said. [continues 115 words]
[Name redacted], is charged with selling about a kilogram of heroin mixed with carfentanil -- the elephant tranquilizer -- and another potent opioid, fentanyl. A grand jury has indicted a Cincinnati man on charges of selling an elephant tranquilizer in Chicago, the first time someone has been charged here with selling the drug -- which is used by narcotics dealers to boost the potency of heroin, federal prosecutors said Tuesday. [Name redacted] is accused of selling the mixture of drugs to the informant on Sept. 9 in a vehicle near 93rd and Stony Island on the South Side. An audio recording was made of the deal, authorities say. [Name redacted] allegedly offered to sell the informant a kilogram of the mixture for $65,000. [continues 302 words]
I am writing to you in regard to the article "New pitch made for alcohol, drug treatment center near Campton Hills." The opioid epidemic is a rather common in the U.S., but the opioid overdose statistics in Illinois have risen dramatically over a very short period of time, nearly 1,700 people in our state died from overdoses in 2014. This is a multifaceted problem, but our first step is destigmatization. The recent opioid overdoses are directly related to an overall decrease of prescribing large amounts of pain killers. This crack down, which is absolutely necessary, causes people with narcotic addiction to seek it through heroin, rather than narcotic pain killers. Many reports all over the U.S. are pointing to heroin laced with fentanyl, a super potent narcotic, most likely from China, as the culprit to the heroin overdoses. This problem is not going away any time soon. [continues 92 words]
[photo] Partygoers smoke marijuana during a Prohibition-era themed New Year's Eve party at a bar in Denver, celebrating the start of retail pot sales. Denver is starting work on becoming the first city in the nation to allow marijuana clubs and public pot use in places like restaurants, yoga studios and art galleries. Voters narrowly approved the "social use" measure last November. (Brennan Linsley / AP) Denver has started work on the nation's first law allowing marijuana clubs and use in public places such as coffee shops or art galleries. But the details about what those pot clubs would look like are very much in the air. Here's what we know, and don't know, about the looming pot clubs headed to Denver: [continues 274 words]
Depressed, withdrawn and coping with a death in the family, Joseph thought getting high would help him feel better. Instead, he said, his marijuana smoking grew into a daily habit that made him paranoid and constantly question how others saw him. He went days without going home, showering or eating much besides potato chips. "I always thought (marijuana) would bring down my anxiety, but it just made it that much worse," the Rockford-area man said. One day, after getting so high that he was pacing around, alarmed by his own gaunt appearance and generally "freaking out," Joseph was taken by his brother to a Rosecrance drug treatment center in Rockford, where he entered an inpatient program. [continues 1228 words]
[photo] A medical marijuana dispensary is proposed for 1154 N. Main St. in Algonquin. Algonquin officials are considering a medical marijuana company's proposal to open a dispensary in a medical office complex. ILDISP III LLC, represented by Ross Morreale, is seeking a special-use permit for a free-standing building at 1154 N. Main St., out of which the company would sell marijuana to patients with a prescription. An attached garage would also be added onto the building, which formerly housed an MRI center, as a secure area for deliveries and waste removal, according to the proposal. [continues 234 words]
- -- and says he's done it before In his latest controversial statement, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, known for his bloody anti-drug war that has killed thousands, threatened to throw corrupt officials out of a helicopter, saying he has done it before, to a kidnapper, and won't hesitate to do it again. "I will pick you up in a helicopter to Manila, and I will throw you out on the way," Duterte said in Tagalog in front of a crowd in the Camarines Sur province Tuesday, according to GMA News. "I've done it before. Why would I not do it again?" [continues 563 words]
Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte's war on drugs Rodrigo Duterte's war on drugs faces criticism for its brutal efforts that have left more than 3,000 drug users and dealers dead. Rodrigo Duterte's war on drugs faces criticism for its brutal efforts that have left more than 3,000 drug users and dealers dead. Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte affirmed on Friday that he shot dead three people as mayor, dismissing any uncertainty and displaying no remorse. "I don't really know how many bullets from my gun went inside their bodies," he said. "It happened. I cannot lie about it." [continues 409 words]
With fewer than 4,000 approved patients, the nascent medical marijuana business in Illinois is off to a slow start. Yet it hasn't kept away a cadre of cannabis entrepreneurs who once relied on guns, badges, tough drug laws and lengthy prison sentences to fight the drug. While neither state regulators nor the medical marijuana industry track the number of employees who were former law enforcement officials, The Associated Press has identified no fewer than 17 in Illinois, many of whom have outsized influence -- from a trustee of the state's chapter of the Fraternal Order of Police to one-time undercover narcotics officers. [continues 749 words]
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) -- A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit filed by a western Kansas woman against the state and several agencies after her son was removed from her home in 2015 when he told school officials she used marijuana. Shona Banda, of Garden City, alleged in the lawsuit filed in March that the defendants denied her civil rights by refusing to allow her to use medical marijuana to treat her Crohn's disease, interfered with her parenting and questioned her son without her permission. Medical marijuana is not legal in Kansas. U.S. District Judge J. Thomas Marten dismissed the lawsuit Tuesday, agreeing with the defendants' contention that Banda had no right to use marijuana and the agencies had some immunity. Banda says she intends to pursue the case after she recovers from a recent surgery. [end]
[photo] Hydrocodone at a pharmacy in Montpelier, Vt. (Toby Talbot / AP) Drug wholesalers shipped 780 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills to West Virginia in just six years, a period when 1,728 people fatally overdosed on these two painkillers, according to an investigation by the Charleston Gazette-Mail. That amounts to 433 of the frequently abused opioid pills for every man, woman and child in the state of 1.84 million people. The Gazette-Mail obtained previously confidential records sent by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration to the office of West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey. They disclose the number of pills sold to every pharmacy and drug shipments to all 55 counties in West Virginia between 2007 and 2012. [continues 881 words]
Imagine this: Upon taking his oath of office, President Donald Trump instructs his new attorney general, Jeff Sessions, to ignore civil rights laws. How would that go over? Before you yell, "But we are a nation of laws!" you can thank President Barack Obama and his prior Attorney General Eric Holder for magnifying this issue. Basically, the Obama administration made it standard operating procedure to ignore laws they thought unfashionable or unworthy. The best example of this is marijuana. To be clear at the outset, I am neither pro-pot nor anti-pot. And, in fact, marijuana is not even the issue - rather, the Constitution is. Marijuana is just the symptom that exposes the problem. [continues 754 words]
I've been thinking a lot lately about marijuana. No, it's not what you suspect, I don't smoke the stuff. Nor do I need it to alleviate pain. Rather, it's our country's schizophrenic way of dealing with "weed." Here in Stephenson County is In Grown Farms, which is perfectly legal and is growing marijuana plants to be harvested, packaged and sold at marijuana dispensaries as medicine. You need a doctor's prescription to get it. There hasn't been much controversy about it. Indeed, folks are happy that a new business decided to locate in the Freeport area. There's even talk -- perhaps far-out talk, but still -- of mixing marijuana, legally, with snack foods like pretzels or potato chips. Meanwhile, next door in Winnebago County, the county sheriff's police raided two fields, one near Durand, the other between Rockford and Winnebago, and found what they said was $1 million worth of marijuana plants. These plants were growing illegally. [continues 354 words]
The Illinois Supreme Court on Thursday announced it has created new rules for the state's cannabis decriminalization law - including setting a $ 120 fine for those caught with up to 10 grams of cannabis or drug paraphernalia. The law, which Gov. Bruce Rauner signed on July 29, gave the state Supreme Court the authority to further clarify the newly defined "civil law violation" of possessing up to 10 grams of cannabis or drug paraphernalia. Under the law, the violation is punishable by a fine between $ 100 and $ 200. In one of six newly created rules, the fine was set at $ 120 per violation. [continues 384 words]
African-Americans Ticketed, Arrested for Pot Offenses in Chicago Far More Than Any Racial Group Four years after the Chicago City Council decriminalized the possession of small amounts of marijuana, African-American neighborhoods continue to bear the brunt of enforcement, a Chicago Sun-Times investigation has found. As anticipated, the Chicago Police Department is making a fraction of the arrests for misdemeanor marijuana possession it made in 2011 - the last full year before cops were given the option of ticketing, rather than locking up, people caught with about half an ounce or less. [continues 1364 words]
She recently turned 18, and if Malia Obama did not know that she had become a legitimate target for sections of the American media, she does now. The "First Daughter" was videoed smoking what a witness claimed was a joint in a video clip released yesterday. The footage was taken at the Lollapalooza music festival in Chicago last month. It is unclear from the images whether what Obama can be seen puffing on is a regular cigarette or one rolled with cannabis. [continues 146 words]
Illinois Medical Marijuana Use Has Increased Under Strict Regulation As Business Expands In a warehouse in Joliet, hundreds of marijuana plants sway under high-intensity lights, taking in carbon dioxide-rich air, sucking up a constant feed of nutrients and bristling with buds. Like Olympic athletes, the plants are rigorously trained and intensively pampered. Tiny predator bugs patrol the surface of the vegetation, hunting down any pests. Workers prune stems and leaves to put all the plants' energy into buds that produce the drug's euphoric and medicinal effects. The process churns out 200 pounds of high-grade pot every month. [continues 991 words]
Last week, Gov. Bruce Rauner signed into law reductions in the criminal penalties for minor marijuana possession in Illinois. Previously, those convicted of marijuana possession faced possible jail time; now, just a citation and a fine. This reminds us of an age-old admonition: "Just because you can do something, it doesn't mean you necessarily should." Critics of this more liberal (or libertarian, depending upon your political persuasion) policy toward marijuana have reason to worry. As reported by the New England Journal of Medicine, there is an inverse correlation between the perceived risk of marijuana and the incidence of people's use of it. Simply put, the less risky people view marijuana, the more likely they are to use - and abuse - it. [continues 443 words]
Governor Signs Legislation to Issue Citations Instead of Time in Jail SPRINGFIELD - Getting caught with small amounts of marijuana will result in citations akin to a traffic ticket instead of the possibility of jail time under legislation Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner signed into law Friday. Rauner's approval of the decriminalization measure comes after he used his amendatory veto powers last year to rewrite similar legislation he argued would have allowed people to carry too much pot and fine violators too little. [continues 878 words]
(AP) - Illinois' experiment with medical marijuana has earned a boost thanks to Gov. Bruce Rauner's approval of legislation extending the state pilot program for 2 1/2 years and including two more medical conditions. On Friday, medical marijuana advocates and experts called it a turning point that gives patients guaranteed access to the drug and provides confidence to those selling and cultivating it in the state. Rauner signed the measure Thursday night. "It's a very good thing for us," said Charles Bachtell, founder and CEO of Cresco Labs, which holds cultivation permits in Illinois. "It's somewhat of an endorsement of the state saying, 'You're doing the right thing. We like what we're seeing from the pilot program and let's make some reasonable modifications.'" [continues 425 words]
Illinois must add post-traumatic stress disorder to the list of diseases eligible for medical marijuana treatment, a Cook County judge ordered Tuesday in a sternly worded ruling that also said the state's public health director engaged in a "private investigation" that was "constitutionally inappropriate." In a lawsuit filed by an Iraq war veteran, Judge Neil Cohen ordered Illinois Department of Public Health Director Nirav Shah to add PTSD within 30 days. It's the first decision among eight lawsuits filed by patients disappointed with across-the-board rejections by Gov. Bruce Rauner's administration of recommendations from an advisory board on medical marijuana. [continues 386 words]
Terminal Illness Also Covered Under Bill for Rauner Advocates for medical marijuana hope Illinois' plan to expand its program will give the industry the boost it needs to sustain itself - but some doctors warn that, despite changes made to protect them, they still have legal and medical concerns about the product. After previously rejecting efforts to make medical marijuana available to more people, Gov. Bruce Rauner's office has indicated he will sign into law a bill to lengthen the pilot program by more than two years, to July 1, 2020. The legislation also adds two new qualifying conditions: post-traumatic stress disorder and terminal illness. [continues 1162 words]
As someone who writes about marijuana for a living, it recently started to seem a little strange I hadn't actually been to the promised land of legal cannabis that Colorado has become over the past couple of years. So on Memorial Day weekend, I flew to Denver on a mission to buy weed legally. I already knew the rules. Dispensaries close promptly at 7 p.m. You must be 21 or older to buy recreational cannabis; public consumption is a no-no. And so forth. [continues 309 words]
Editor's note: This is day three of a four-day series that examines the impact heroin is having on the community through the eyes of the addicts, their families, law enforcement and the groups that provide treatment. MOUNT ZION - Hearing a 35-year-old addict say things her son might have said made Kathy Burkham apprehensive. That's because Tyler Yount's decision to use heroin "one more time" after staying clean 11 months and two weeks was the last one he ever made. He overdosed on June 14, 2009, dying at age 23. [continues 729 words]
Editor's note: This is day two of a four-day series that examines the impact heroin is having on the community through the eyes of the addicts, their families, law enforcement and the groups that provide treatment. DECATUR The scars on Lori Caldwell's arms are still there, though they've begun to lighten. Caldwell wishes she could say the same for her mental and emotional scars. Caldwell's voice becomes a whisper as she tries to talk through her tears while recounting her plunge into addictions to heroin and crack cocaine. [continues 2706 words]
Editor's note: This is day one of a four-day series that examines the impact heroin is having on the community through the eyes of the addicts, their families, law enforcement and the groups that provide treatment. DECATUR Eric Buntain described the feeling of injecting heroin into his vein as "warm, euphoric, comfortable and relaxing: It feels great." About 30 seconds after injecting heroin, there's a surge of warmth coming from the low spinal area, a rush of sensation and an overriding sense of well-being. [continues 1448 words]
For months, Illinois' fledgling medical cannabis industry had been limping along - dogged by uncertainties over its future and hurt by disappointingly low numbers of patients whose medical conditions qualified them for state certification cards. But in the last few days, the clouds of gloom have lifted thanks to a compromise bill now awaiting Gov. Bruce Rauner's signature. The measure would extend the state medical cannabis pilot program by 2 1/2 years, to July 1, 2020. It would also expand the list of qualifying conditions, to include post-traumatic stress disorder and terminal illnesses, potentially adding hundreds of thousands of new patients to the state registry. [continues 830 words]
The days of "reefer madness" are long ago and far away. Illinois legislators have sent to Gov. Bruce Rauner a bill decriminalizing the possession of small amounts of marijuana, a measure taken in recognition of its widespread use and the futility of imposing more serious penalties on violators. The bill incorporates changes suggested by Gov. Bruce Rauner in an amendatory veto of similar legislation passed last year. Because the 2016 bill meets the objections he outlined in the 2015 bill, Rauner said he expects to sign it into law. [continues 229 words]
Inside Illinois
