SUP. MARK LENO introduced an ordinance last week that would create an identification card program for San Francisco residents who legally use or provide medical marijuana under the Compassionate Use Act, which California voters enacted in November 1996 via Proposition 215. "The legislation is intended to attend to the needs of patients, providers, physicians, and police," Leno told the Bay Guardian. "But my greatest concern was for the patients." The bill has been assigned to the Board of Supervisors' Public Health and Environment committee. Leno said he expects "resounding" support from the board. [continues 592 words]
A State Ballot Initiative Would Send Thousands Of California Kids To Adult Prisons. DESPITE ENDLESS RERUNS of the Littleton shootings and the constant barrage of sensationalistic headlines, teenagers today are not all on the verge of murdering or being murdered. In fact, kids today are committing far fewer crimes than they did five years ago. In San Francisco the downward trend began in 1989 dropping from 2,404 charged juvenile offenses that year to 1,620 in 1998. And we're not just talking about less shoplifting and tagging: Since 1990 the youth murder rate has dropped nearly 50 percent. [continues 1136 words]
How The Chronicle Doctored The Numbers To Screw Terence Hallinan According to the San Francisco Chronicle, San Francisco is saddled with the worst district attorney in the state at least until the November elections. On Sept. 2, the paper led with a lengthy "special report" excoriating prosecutor Terence Hallinan for what the Chronicle considers a paltry conviction rate. "Hallinan ranks dead last among California's 58 county prosecutors, winning convictions in less than a third of the criminal cases lodged with his office last year," Chron staffer Bill Wallace wrote. [continues 1229 words]
THE SAN FRANCISCO Chronicle has been critical of Terence Hallinan for years, critical of his record as a progressive supervisor, critical of his campaign for district attorney, and critical of almost every major move he's made in that office. Now the Chron has leveled its most serious offensive yet a front-page story that, in essence, accuses Hallinan of letting huge numbers of violent criminals go free. The Chron story charged that Hallinan has the worst rate of felony convictions of any district attorney in California. [continues 521 words]
WHEN MIKKI NORRIS and Chris Conrad met each other at two demonstrations in a row -- an anti-Reagan rally followed by an antinuke protest in 1981 -- they took it as a "good sign." It was. This month the El Cerrito residents celebrated their eight-year wedding anniversary. It marked the beginning of a partnership that is helping fuel a far-reaching public reevaluation of the war on drugs. Conrad had long been an activist for social justice, fighting to develop alternative energy, stop pollution, and alleviate world hunger. Norris traces her activism to "being raised in a Jewish family not long after the Holocaust. That led me to human rights issues, and then to the cannabis issue, which made me aware of the rest of the drug war. I started seeing cannabis prisoners as political prisoners." [continues 496 words]
The Butte County district attorney has dropped its case against Pete Brady. The Chico journalist was charged with possession of marijuana despite being a lawful medical marijuana user under California's 1996 Compassionate Use Act, enacted by voters as Proposition 215 (see "Reefer Madness," 4/7/99). "The District Attorney's Office is signaling its willingness to work humanely with medical marijuana defendants," Brady, who represented himself in court, told us. "We need a truce in this drug war, so people on all sides of the issue can be compassionate with each other and work toward win-win outcomes." [continues 210 words]
SHAWN CAME CLOSE to kicking heroin a while back; he'd tried to kill himself and was thrown in a city psychiatric ward. "I told them, 'I'm depressed 'cause I'm strung out,' " he said. "They put me in a three-day detox, put me on Prozac, and then put me out on the street." There were no rehab beds available in San Francisco for him. Shawn has been addicted to junk on and off for the past five years. In that time he's lost dozens of friends and shooting partners to overdoses. "In 1994 I watched 23 of my friends die. It made 1995 the year to stay alive. I've died twice myself and been revived," he says, eyes bugging, his tattooed hands caked with grime and a spot of blood. "Now I'm just a crabby old bastard." [continues 838 words]
California voters supported medical marijuana. The state's new attorney general says he does too. So why are patients who smoke pot still getting arrested? By Randall Lyman LAST YEAR Dr. Vincent DeQuattro learned that Steve Kubby, a former patient, was still alive. DeQuattro was amazed: 15 years ago he had diagnosed Kubby with malignant pheochromocytoma, a rare form of adrenal cancer that usually kills within five years. The doctor learned of Kubby's survival when he opened the state voter information pamphlet. Kubby was listed as the Libertarian Party's candidate for governor. [continues 1718 words]
I read with interest that Assemblyman Bill Leonard wants to place a $2 billion bond on the March 2000 ballot to construct six new prison facilities throughout California. It seems to me that the taxpayers of California could spend their money in much more meaningful ways, such as on education or preventive programs or drug rehabilitation before incarceration occurs. LINDA CHIANCONE Glen Allen, Va. [end]
It seems to me that the taxpayers of California could spend their money in much more meaningful ways, such as on education or preventive programs or drug rehabilitation before incarceration occurs. LINDA CHIANCONE Glen Allen, Va. [end]
Medical marijuana activist Dennis Peron and a handful of supporters staged a 45-minute sit-in at the San Francisco office of state assembly member Carole Migden Friday, Feb. 26 to protest Migden's refusal to sponsor a bill that would legally reclassify, or "reschedule," marijuana in California. The bill, which Peron had asked Migden to introduce in the state legislature, would reschedule marijuana automatically once it is rescheduled by the federal government. Marijuana is currently a Schedule 1 drug, meaning it is legally considered to have no medicinal value and to have a high potential for abuse. [continues 202 words]
