To the editor: Re: 'City needs to keep fighting methadone clinic,' letter of Sept. 13, 2002 from Susan Shetler. The recent paranoia surrounding the relocation of Oshawa's methadone clinic is becoming absurd. The latest letter from Susan Shetler is a prime example. Ms. Shetler notes "it would be one of the largest of its kind in Oshawa!" Since there is only one clinic in Oshawa, it could also be designated as "the smallest of its kind in Oshawa." She goes on to ask, "How will we possibly keep our city secure and safe when clinics of this kind move to our downtown core?" [continues 253 words]
Your Sept. 18 editorial acknowledges that many medical-marijuana advocates see this as a states' rights issue. "Not so fast," you say, reminding readers that "states' rights" were also asserted to justify racial segregation during the civil rights era. I see a big difference, however. For me, the key issue of medical marijuana isn't whether state law "trumps" federal law whenever both could be valid. Rather, it is what to do when federal law is invalid, restricting freedom in areas where the Constitution gives the U.S. government no authority. The Controlled Substances Act 21 USC 13, Sec. 801, appears to be such a law. [continues 140 words]
When I read the Sept. 19 medical marijuana story, I got the same sickening feeling one gets when they are a witness to man's inhumanity to man. This man, Michael Farrell, is obviously someone that has a number of problems and is clearly in need of some help. The article reads as though the nine agents and deputies were suffering a great hardship by having to tolerate a yard with dog feces. What was the purpose of this article? Was it because 30 pounds of marijuana and 18 plants are such a huge "drug bust"? Or was it to publicly humiliate someone by exploiting their living conditions? I certainly do not feel that this world is a safer place as a result of these heroics. Irish McNeil, Chico [end]
In the middle of the night last year, Murray police Detective Michael Faircloth phoned 3rd District Judge J. Dennis Frederick and asked him to approve a warrant to search an apartment where suspected drug dealers were staying. Faircloth read part of the affidavit, swore that the information was true and -- at the behest of the judge -- signed Frederick's name. During a later search of the apartment, the officers confiscated more than six pounds of methamphetamine and five pounds of cocaine. [continues 440 words]
The Times Argus staff deserves great thanks for its extremely important, timely and well-written series on the drug epidemic and its presence in central Vermont. I would like, however, to emphasize several points that could have been made more clearly. First, it is critical that people, especially our young people, realize that today's heroin is so pure that you can become physically addicted to it after using it only once or twice. There is simply no such thing as experimenting with heroin. [continues 315 words]
Drugs: Annual Sweep in Los Padres National Forest Has Netted 7,000 Marijuana Plants So Far. Six Suspects, All Undocumented, Have Been Arrested. The war on drugs in Ventura County was on full display Wednesday, replete with guns, thumping helicopters and sweaty, bug-bitten troops in camouflage scouring the rugged hillsides for the enemy. As they have done each fall for the last three decades, county and federal agents this week descended on another small patch of the giant Los Padres National Forest north of Ojai, seizing piles of the annual marijuana harvest. [continues 229 words]
Marijuana: Residents Feel Relief, Guilt after Feds Raid Operation in Sonoma County. SEBASTOPOL, Calif. -- First came the snarling guard dogs, then the barbed-wire fence and 24-hour security patrols, all of it smack in the middle of a leafy neighborhood on the outskirts of this wine country town. Residents along Martin Lane reached a collective conclusion this summer: Robert Schmidt's medicinal pot farm was a problem. An armed camp, they called it. A magnet for thieves. A danger to neighborhood kids. [continues 1692 words]
Settlement: the Family of a Man Killed by El Monte Police during a Drug Probe Will Get $3 Million. Deal Includes Department Reforms. The city of El Monte agreed Wednesday to pay $3 million to the family of a 65-year-old man who was fatally shot in the back after officers stormed his bedroom during a narcotics investigation. The city also agreed to comply with 15 conditions--including apologizing to the man's wife and a series of reforms for its Police Department. [continues 885 words]
Craighead County Sheriff Jack McCann has been an advocate of drug courts for a long time. He views the program and rehabilitation rather than prison for first-time, non-violent offenders as the answer to a major social and law enforcement problem. Now he wonders if he has been "wasting our time" because he has made little progress toward establishing a drug court for the county. McCann admits that it has simply come down to a matter of money. That's the frustrating part. The veteran law enforcement officer views drug courts as a sound investment, not decriminalization of the state's drug laws. [continues 395 words]
Court: Defendant Says Baca Told Him 'It Was OK' to Distribute Medical Pot; Baca Denies It. A man charged with growing and selling marijuana rested his case in a preliminary hearing Wednesday after calling a single defense witness: Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca. Steve Corchado said the 26 plants police found in his home in October 2001 were for medical use by himself and members of his Santa Monica cannabis club. He said Baca told him "that it was OK" to distribute the drug if he followed California law that decriminalized marijuana use for medical purposes. [continues 542 words]