Earlier this year, Cooley ignored the legal opinion of California’s attorney general when Cooley claimed (incorrectly) that virtually all medical marijuana dispensaries were operating illegally and should be shut down. 

Now, after two L.A. City Council committees rejected calls to ban the sale of medical marijuana, Cooley is once again making up his own rules, declaring that he will prosecute dispensaries even if the city council adopts an ordinance allowing the legal sale of medical marijuana under state law.

Perhaps someone should remind the district attorney that he is paid to uphold the law, not invent it.

Two-thirds majorities were needed in both the state House and Senate to override Lynch’s veto. The override passed in the House by a vote of 240-115, but came two votes shy in the Senate, which voted 14-10.

This result is particularly disappointing because an overwhelmingly majority of New Hampshire residents (71% according to a recent poll) support protecting seriously ill patients through medical marijuana laws. Unfortunately, several cowardly legislators remain under the impression that voting in favor of compassionate and commonsense laws might hurt them politically.

Fortunately, this fight is not over. MPP and our allies in New Hampshire will continue to work toward marijuana policy reform in the Granite State. Already we have seen tremendous progress: In 2007, the state House voted down a medical marijuana bill, but today, 67.6% of the House voted to make a medical marijuana bill law.

Learn more about the campaign in New Hampshire here.

The answer is 13. They are Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington.

But many media—as well as some government sources—incorrectly counted Maryland as the 14^th state to protect medical marijuana patients from arrest and prosecution. Unfortunately, Maryland’s law does no such thing; the Free State has not yet earned a place among states with effective medical marijuana laws.

That’s because the Darrell Putnam Compassionate Use Act, signed into law in 2003 by then-Gov. Robert Ehrlich (R), falls short of the laws passed by the 13 medical marijuana states in many respects.

Here’s why: Maryland’s law protects patients from jail, but it does not protect them from arrest and does not give them any means of safe access to their medicine. Even patients using marijuana with a doctor’s recommendation are still subject to arrest, which has forced many to appear in court to prove they use marijuana because of medical necessity. While the law does protect seriously ill patients from any prison sentences if they can prove a medical necessity, it still allows for fines up to $100, and it gives prosecuted patients no recourse to seek refunds for legal fees. In many instances, the fate of medical marijuana patients in Maryland depends solely on their legal representation.

A proposal to create a state task force that would have re-evaluated Maryland’s current medical marijuana law died in committee earlier this year. But until reforms are passed, Maryland should not be included in the list of medical marijuana states.

Read more about Maryland’s medical marijuana laws and the latest legislative developments here.

According to the survey, 74 percent of Los Angeles County voters support the state’s medical marijuana law. 77 percent said that they prefer regulating L.A.-area medical marijuana facilities over closing them all down. Support for regulation crossed all demographic groups, including Republicans who favor regulation over wholesale closure by a 62 to 30 percent margin.

The poll also found that 54 percent of voters think marijuana should be made legal for adults over 21 and and its sales taxed and regulated like alcohol.

Hopefully these results will further demonstrate to the Los Angeles City Council and other elected officials that attacking the medical marijuana community is a no-win game in L.A. politics.

The poll — conducted by Mason-Dixon Polling and Research — surveyed 625 regular voters in L.A. County. The questions and results by demographic breakdown can be downloaded here.

After 53% of voters in the Centennial State approved a medical marijuana amendment in November 2000, Colorado has quietly emerged as a potential model for how states can responsibly and competently oversee the establishment of a medical marijuana industry.

There are currently more than 100 dispensing collectives statewide, an estimated 13,000 residents with valid medical marijuana cards, and 800 different physicians who have recommended them, according to recent figures. New dispensaries are being opened and considered in municipalities all over the state with little reported opposition.

When protests have been raised, municipalities have, by and large, purposely avoided the type of reactionary backlash seen in California and instead tried to strike a balance among the collectives, patients and critics through discussions and regulations—not orders to shut down. For example, several skeptical municipalities have decided to place temporary moratoriums on new dispensaries until they decide how best to regulate the establishments.

This difference between California and Colorado might best be seen when comparing some of their top lawmen. In California, L.A. County District Attorney Steve Cooley said all collectives are illegal and “are going to be prosecuted.” In Colorado, by stark contrast, Boulder County District Attorney Stan Garnett has said he wants to be the country’s most progressive D.A. when it comes to medical marijuana. He has even said he’s willing to consider full marijuana legalization.

And if these signs aren’t encouraging enough, the Denver Post is reporting that the tiny valley town of Ophir (population 163) will decide on Tuesday whether to consider becoming the state’s first municipality to grow medical marijuana as a way to make up for lost tax revenues.

Says planning and zoning chairwoman Sue Beresford, “A town can dream, can’t it?”

Judge Alan M. Simpson sided with city officials, who since August have been trying to shut down the collectives through a nonsensical zoning ordinance that requires the businesses to obey both state law (under which they’re legal) and federal law (under which they’re not). Such an ordinance is essentially impossible for the collectives to obey as long as medical marijuana remains illegal under federal law.

Lawyers for the collectives say they will argue at an Oct. 22 hearing that because state laws permit medical marijuana, local governments can’t use zoning ordinances to ban the collectives. Until then, medical marijuana patients in Fresno will be unable to safely or legally obtain their recommended treatment within city limits.

“The real winners in that will be the drug dealers and the drug cartels,” said Sean Dwyer, owner of California Herbal Relief Center, one of the closed collectives, which itself caters to 800 patients. “Because rather than being able to get their medication from us legally, they will be forced to buying it illegally off the street.”

When will California officials understand that their job is to enforce California’s laws, not the federal government’s? Medical marijuana has been legal in California since 1996. Sadly, as attorney William Logan told a local ABC affiliate, “here we are 13 years later, [still] trying to figure out how to get medicine to patients.”

Canadian researcher Mark Ware presented results of a yearlong safety study known as the COMPASS study, which compared 215 patients who used marijuana to manage chronic pain with comparable control patients who did not use marijuana. Ware and colleagues report “no difference in serious adverse events” between the two groups, concluding, “Cannabis use for chronic pain over one year is not associated with major changes in lung, endocrine, cognitive function or serious adverse events.”

A much-awaited study came from the University of California, San Francisco, where Donald Abrams and colleagues tested the effects of adding marijuana to the therapeutic regimen of chronic pain patients on long-term morphine or oxycodone therapy. Unfortunately, because the researchers were crunching numbers right up until the conference, the abstract doesn’t include a lot of details. But the study shows that marijuana did indeed add significant pain relief on top of that already provided by the narcotic painkillers. The scientists conclude, “Cannabinoids may augment the analgesic effects of opioids, allowing longer treatment at lower doses with fewer side effects.”

Meanwhile, British researchers added to the body of evidence indicating that marijuana can aid the treatment of multiple sclerosis. Two-hundred and seventy-nine patients received either a standardized cannabis extract, given orally, or a placebo. Patients receiving the extract were twice as likely to experience relief of muscle stiffness, and also reported relief of body pain, spasms, and sleep problems.

The drugs that killed nearly 14,000 people in 2006 are, of course, legal medicines. They have been approved for sale by the same federal government that bars medical use of marijuana – for which the count of medically confirmed overdose fatalities remains zero.

This gets even crazier when you consider that – as we’ve pointed out before – there is evidence that use of medical marijuana can help some pain patients reduce their doses of these dangerous and addictive narcotics.

Williams, 56, said she had no idea her husband, Royce, was growing marijuana on their 40-acre property in Chilton County, Alabama until federal authorities raided their land and found 408 plants growing several hundred yards from their house.

Then in May, Royce Williams committed suicide, rather than serve a potentially lengthy prison sentence for the federal drug charges he was facing. His wife, who works as a nurse at a Montgomery hospital, said Royce smoked marijuana because it was the only medication that helped ease the chronic pain he suffered as a result of several surgeries.

Now the Montgomery Advertiser is reporting that the U.S. attorney’s office plans to seize the Williams’ property – including the house still occupied by Mara Lynn, who in 2003 was diagnosed with breast cancer that spread to her liver, lungs and bone, but is now in remission.

“It is not morally right,” the Advertiser quoted Mara Lynn Williams as saying. “My husband paid with his life. What else do they want?”

According to a spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office, “[Royce Williams’] death, which ended the criminal case, had no effect on the ongoing civil case … The bottom line is, we don’t want people to benefit from criminal activity.”

Benefit? I suppose seeing her husband suffer a bit less because of the relief he got from medical marijuana might count as a benefit, but doesn’t driving him to suicide make up for that? Must she be made homeless, too – on top of losing more than $18,000 cash, vehicles, computers and other belongings the Advertiser says were seized by the Feds?

To help us change these cruel laws, go to MPP’s Federal Action Center.

While the chief has every right to dislike California’s medical marijuana law, it is his job to enforce state law, not attack it. That’s something the courts have made unmistakably clear, most notably in a case known as Garden Grove v. Superior Court. In that case, city police had improperly seized medical marijuana from patient Felix Kha, and then insisted they couldn’t return his medicine to him because federal law takes precedence over state law. The state appellate court ordered the return of Kha’s marijuana, stating, “[I]t is not the job of the local police to enforce the federal drug laws as such.”

Memo to Chief Hansen: Is there something about the phrase, “it is not the job of the local police to enforce the federal drug laws” that’s hard for you to comprehend? Is Redding so completely free of robberies, rapes, murders, auto thefts, and other actual crimes that you have nothing else better to do?