DOJ bullies Delaware into suspending medical marijuana dispensary program
The Obama administration’s stunning betrayal of medical marijuana patients claimed a new victim today. Delaware Gov. Jack Markell announced that he would halt the implementation of the state’s medical marijuana dispensary program following a vague and threatening letter from U.S. Attorney Charles Oberly III.
Oberly’s letter, dated February 9 but made public today, says that patients and individual caregivers would not be federal enforcement priorities, but that entities distributing marijuana “could” be targeted. It also says that state employees would not be immune from liability under the Controlled Substances Act for acts mandated by the Delaware medical marijuana law.
Mr. Oberly’s intimidating sentence about state employees is particularly outrageous given that the Delaware law does not require any violation of federal law. Mr. Oberly does not say what actions he believes would constitute violations of the CSA.
In Delaware, state employees would not possess, cultivate, or dispense marijuana. They would merely register those entities that would no longer be criminalized under Delaware law and set up rules dispensaries would abide by for such protections. No court has found that such conduct would constitute a federal crime, and the federal government has not taken any criminal or civil actions against states with medical marijuana programs.
U.S. Attorney Michael Ormsby in the Eastern District of Washington state sent a similarly vague letter, which was used as a reason for Gov. Christine Gregoire to veto a dispensary regulation bill. Yet, when an Arizona paper asked why state employees would be at risk in Washington but apparently not in Arizona, U.S. Attorney Ormsby said his concern was that state employees would be grading and handling – and thus possessing – marijuana under the Washington proposal. However, this was likely not even an accurate understanding of the Washington bill.
Following a two-year campaign led by legislators, patients, and MPP, Delaware became the 16th medical marijuana state last May. An affirmative defense went into effect on July 1, allowing qualifying patients who possess marijuana to prove the defense in court to avoid a conviction. The Markell administration was expected to release rules for dispensaries in the coming weeks, with three dispensaries being registered by the end of the year. The rules would also provide for ID cards to protect patients from arrest. Halting the dispensary program forces patients to the criminal market, or leaves them with no access to their medicine at all.
If you live in Delaware, please urge Gov. Markell to reverse course, to stand by patients, and to fully implement the compassionate law. Regardless of where you live, please let President Obama know it’s past time to live up to his word. If the Obama administration’s hostility to medical marijuana patients and providers will affect your vote in November, or your willingness to donate or volunteer for him, please let his campaign know.
Tagged with: betrayal and Delaware and DOJ and Markell and Medical Marijuana and Obama and Oberly by the author
21 comments
Obama is still laughing at people with illnesses. Vote him out in November.
Medical Marijuana Week
The medical cannabis community is under attack, and we must be heard!
More than 100 DEA raids, dozens of federal prosecutions, manipulation of the tax code, and threats to landlords and elected officials — the aggressive, anti-medical cannabis efforts of Obamaʼs Justice Department must stop!
Join Americans for Safe Access Chapters and Affiliates across the country in celebrating Medical Marijuana Week by standing up for our right to safe access. Take time each day to participate in the week of action outlined below.
During Medical Marijuana Week (Feb. 13-17), here are some other ways you can get involved and make a difference:
1. Monday, February 13: Call the White House at 202-456-1111 and tell Pres. Obama to keep his promise to not use Justice Department resources to undermine state laws, stop putting politics before science, and act immediately to reclassify cannabis as medicine.
2. Tuesday, February 14: Contact Congress, 202-224-3121, and urge your representative to sponsor legislation to reclassify cannabis, end federal interference in state programs, and provide licensed patients and provides a defense in court.
3. Wednesday, February 15: Ask your Governor to sign the DEA Rescheduling Petition. Find your Governor’s contact information by clicking here.
4. Thursday, February 16 @ Noon: Make your voice heard at a rally near you! Click here for a full list of rallies.
5. Friday, February 17: Join the movement and help fund the fight for safe access.
Your all jumping the boat before it even sprang a leak. Obama isnt the master mind behind all this state-dea crap.
A wise warrior once said
” You cannot force anyone to sue the federal government for enforcement of federal schedule I as long as your state agrees marijuana has no accepted medical use in the United States. Stop wasting time on this crap. You file a law suit against the state in a state court demanding the state challenge the federal classification like the U.S. Supreme Court told you to do. The classification is just an ordinary federal regulation. Suing to prevent the enforcement of the federal Controlled Substances Act is a losing argument. The U.S. Supreme Court rejected that argument in Gonzales v. Raich, 545 U.S. 1 (2005), specifically at page 33 telling everyone what to do, ” the statute authorizes procedures for the reclassification of Schedule I drugs.” Why can’t you just do that and stop wasting time? ”
Do your part and they wont have a choice.
Uhhh, the memo says patients are ok, but distribution is not ok. Seems clear to me. It is not patients that are at risk, it is businesses serving patients. There is a major difference. Peer to peer or self provision is no hassle to the feds. Dispensaries are a hassle to the feds, so don’t go there…
In response to Sam Smith, patients will be at risk because they have no legal access to their medicine if dispensaries are not operational.
Even in states with home cultivation, many patients are unable to grow because they are too sick, because they are not allowed to do so by their landlords, or for many other reasons. In addition, it takes several months after planting a seed to get usable marijuana. In practice, many in patients in home cultivation states are without access. Some I worked with got mugged and/or had guns pulled on them when buying marijuana on the streets. Thus, this federal policy absolutely puts patients at risk, even if a law has home cultivation.
However, it is even more detrimental to Delaware patients because there isn’t home cultivation in Delaware. It is one of the six states in the country where legislators were compassionate enough to approve medical marijuana. But the method of access they were comfortable with was dispensing. So, for patients to have any access (other than the criminal market or illegal cultivation), a new law would have to pass to allow cultivation.
Even then, as I noted, many patients would be at risk since not all patients would be able to grow or would know a generous patient who would be able and willing to provide a surplus.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/final-rules-for-legalization-of-medical-marijuana-produced-in-washington-dc-2012-02-13?reflink=MW_news_stmp
If you live in Connecticut and want to end marijuana prohibition in our state, please take a minute to visit http://www.ctprimaryproject.com.
Please pass this on to anyone you know in Connecticut!
Maybe someone in Delaware should take the time to actually read the Controlled Substances Act:
TITLE 21 – FOOD AND DRUGS
CHAPTER 13 – DRUG ABUSE PREVENTION AND CONTROL
SUBCHAPTER I – CONTROL AND ENFORCEMENT
Part E – Administrative and Enforcement Provisions
-HEAD-
Sec. 885. Burden of proof; liabilities
-STATUTE-
(a) Exemptions and exceptions; presumption in simple possession
offenses
…
(d) Immunity of Federal, State, local and other officials
Except as provided in sections 2234 and 2235 of title 18, no
civil or criminal liability shall be imposed by virtue of this
subchapter upon any duly authorized Federal officer lawfully
engaged in the enforcement of this subchapter, or upon any duly
authorized officer of any State, territory, political subdivision
thereof, the District of Columbia, or any possession of the United
States, who shall be lawfully engaged in the enforcement of any law
or municipal ordinance relating to controlled substances.
The terrorist sleeper cell, U.S. Attorney Michael Ormsby, has got his orders. Which states are next on the list provided by the head DEA administrator?
Joe Bidan has always been strongly anti marijuana…do the math….
[...] Article from The Marijuana Policy Project. Visit their website to find out how to volunteer or donate. [...]
The feds had their chance to save face on medical marijuana, and then came the Cole memorandum that moved the goal posts in the middle of the game. DOJ didn’t want more states to adopt California-style MMJ laws by raiding California cannabis providers and ignoring those established by states rather than private individuals, aka citizens and voters. So states started keeping it within the establishment, overlooked and operated by that state’s establishment.
Then the feds changed their policy, changed the rules. Now they are going to crack down on state and local government employees and arrest them in MMJ states like Delaware, and any state with similar laws.
The only near-term solution is for these states to adjust or rewrite their MMJ laws so that all a person needs to do is get a recommendation from a doctor and either be their own cannabis provider or designate a cannabis provider or providers in order to qualify for state-level protection to keep their job and professional licensing, driver’s license, too.
The feds either deceived us into enacted MMJ laws they could easily thwart by threatening to arrest state and local government employees, or someone in charge of the DEA before Leonhart put the feds on a face-saving trajectory with the bitch did a switch on. Michele Leonhart, the bitch who did the bitch switch.
It’s back to square one, folks, rewriting the eastern MMJ laws California style. At present, the patients are not getting their medicine through the programs as intended in DE, NJ, RI, etc. If the patients and providers have no registry, the feds will not have an easy time finding everyone. They like the easy prey, the easy decrees to the state government employees.
Any new states enacting MMJ laws, such as NY and PA, should have California-style laws. Only a doctor’s recommendation required. No state ID card registry for patients or caregivers/providers. Only an MMJ tax stamp which can be bought and resold by any adult for protection. So a non-MMJ patient could buy it for a NY or PA MMJ patient who wants to remain anonymous. If you think that has too many loopholes then the MMJ patient or the caregiver would be the only ones allowed to purchase the MMJ tax stamps, but there must absolutely be protection a registry or a database will not be created and then shared with the feds. With the state MMJ tax stamp comes all kinds of protections. With state protection for professional licenses and occupations and privately owned vehicles. With job protections. With banking and insurance protections. With IRS protection/loopholes.
It’s that or states simply call the feds’ bluff and implement their programs anyway. They could outsource to save the government employees from arrest. Either way, once Pandora’s box East Coast has been opened, the feds can be scrutinized for wasting even more money.
A vote for Obama is a vote for more oil/drug money/drug/marijuana war. In other words, every vote for Obama is a vote for betrayal of the causes and policies the very people who voted for him, support.
Reformers should support Ron Paul or forever hold their peace, so to speak. Why the reform community and organizations ignore the only presidential, anti-war candidate is beyond me.
I just sent this to the President. Feel free to just copy it and send it to whitehouse.cov.
President Obama
I would not have sent you a $10 contribution if I had read my monthly MPP (Marijuana Policy Project), first. I will not be sending you any more money. You have broken your campaign promise to not attack our medical marijuana dispensaries and patients. If you continue to harass our community, you will definitely be a one term president. I hope a third viable party becomes a true option at the poles in November. The only way you will get me to vote for you is for you to begin to lobby the Congress to pass legislation to remove the marijuana prohibition, just like the Congress did with alcohol
Ya know, I don’t care. Weed is easily accessible everywhere where I’m from – so my guess is it’s easy to get everywhere, seeing is I live in one of the Northern Frozen States – Legal or not, it’s something that most cops turn their head from and only give slaps on the wrist for……so, whatever. Don’t legalize it: it’s not like it’s going away anytime soon.
On the Ron Paul for 2012 thing: I DO support him on his Marijuana policies, but I DO NOT support him on his far-right-radical other crap that he seems to love to give into the Right Wing Nutballs on, time and time again.
He wants to leave EVERYTHING up to the states; well, guess what? WE TRIED THAT when our Nation was founded with our 2st two Continental Congress’s , which BOTH FAILED because they lack strong central government to keep us together as a whole.
I say, OBAMA 2012, and in his 2nd term, I truly think he’ll figure this marijuana thing out correctly. I believe we’ll see a full liberal onslaught in his 2nd term with NO MORE PANDERING to the RIGHT WINGERS, like Ron Paul does.
Trading one GOOD policy (Ending Marijuana Prohibition) for a whole BUNCH OF RADICAL RIGHT WING POLICIES (what Ron Paul gives into: Abortion, Gay Marriage, etc etc etc) is NOT what our country needs either right now. PERIOD.
I like my Marijuana, but not so much that I’m willing to allow other people’s civil liberties & Constitutional rights to be shoved to the curb.
Peace.
I don’t see that it really makes a lot of difference seeing as how Delaware never got behind the law to start with. The law was passed in Delaware in July and this in now February and I have yet to find a doctor who is ready to “recommend” medical marijuana. So what difference does it make that there won’t be a place to get it. Heck, there is no doctor to “prescribe” it anyway. Life goes on and I’ll keep living the same way I have–with out government approval. Thanks Delaware for your bullsh*t new law.
Right on Dave Cain!! Obama has been shown over & over to be a liar. Vote him out!! Ron Paul is the only presidential candidate who will end the racist War on Drugs — proven to stigmatize and punish minority groups disproportionate to their numbers.
In response to Mike, it’s the federal government and not the states, that is the source of this Country’s ruin — from bank bailouts, to DEA/CIA/FBI drug networks, “preemptive” wars, “indefinite detention” laws turning America into a police state, on & on.
Ron Paul’s limited-government policy respects the Constitution and permits states to legislate in accordance with preferences of their real communities. Washington D.C. should have no say in personal preferences of citizens in Alaska who can decide for themselves whether or not they want to legalize or criminalize abortion, drugs, etc.
Ron Paul’s message is one of FREEDOM and LIBERTY to choose how you want to live! And to move freely to a community whose values reflect yours! Communities that want to thrive will structure their laws and societies to attract the best and the brightest of Americans.
Wake up Mike! It’s your Obamanation that’s continued the failed policies of all failed administrations before his. He is bought and paid for by the same people that bought & paid for W and Mitt Romney — check their donor lists and compare with Ron Paul’s (supported overwhelmingly by “small” donors and active military personnel who favor Ron Paul’s anti-war platform).
Now THAT, my friend, is Peace
YELLOW FlAME. There’s an easy way to find out, if Obama was behind all this “dea-crap.” Let him tell us, himself! Obama has made a clear choice in defending this nonsense. He thinks that more votes will be lost, if he takes a principled stand against Marijuana reform, than he will lose, if he opposes that reform.
Or, states can just legalize it for all adults over 21 and as a prescription for younger people.
Obama, Bush, Hitler, Satan are all dedicated to evil deeds. Obama is the only one who doesn’t even have the balls to open his mouth and take a stand. What a loser…
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