A coroner’s inquest jury ruled this weekend that the fatal shooting of Trevon Cole by a Las Vegas narcotics officer during a botched marijuana raid in June was justified, despite reports of conflicting testimony and contradictory evidence.

Cole, 21, was shot dead in front of his pregnant fiancée after officers raided their Las Vegas home on June 11. He was unarmed. It was later revealed that officers meant to target a different man with the same name, who they claimed was a major marijuana dealer. Officers were serving a search warrant on Cole after allegedly buying 1.8 ounces of marijuana from him over a five-week period.

Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department Detective Bryan Yant, who has been involved in other questionable shootings, testified that he fired the fatal shot after Cole stood up and moved his hands toward the officer “in a shooting motion.”

“Unfortunately he made an aggressive act toward me,” Yant said, according to the Las Vegas Review Journal. “He made me do my job.”

It took the jury only 90 minutes to clear Yant, even though the Review Journal and other sources report that his testimony and that of others were riddled with disturbing inconsistencies, including:

• Only one of the six officers present during the raid heard Yant give verbal orders to Cole. That officer testified that Yant said nothing to Cole about his hands.
• The bullet that killed 300-pound Cole traveled through his cheek and neck in a downward angle, leading the medical examiner to find it “highly unlikely” that Cole stood and stepped toward Yant, as Yant claims.
• Both the medical examiner and homicide detective who investigated the scene believe that Cole was crouched over the toilet when he turned toward Yant.
• Assistant District Attorney Chris Owens said the evidence suggests there was an “accidental discharge” when Yant kicked in the bathroom door. Other officers present heard both a door kick and a gunshot.

Read the full article in the Review Journal for more outrageous details about this weekend’s inquest, including egregious errors Yant made on the affidavit prior to the raid, and other apparent violations of department policy that officers made while executing the raid.

Cole family attorney Andre Lagomarsino called the inquest “a kangaroo court and dog and pony show” and is vowing to file a civil rights lawsuit, as well as a possible racketeering lawsuit, against the Vegas police department. "I think in this case I believe absolutely Detective Yant was held above the law," Lagomarsino told the local ABC affiliate. Phil Smith from the Drug War Chronicle has more details about the possible racketeering case.

Stay tuned for updates.

The National Black Police Association yesterday became the latest group to endorse California’s Proposition 19, the November ballot measure that would make marijuana legal for adults 21 and older. From the Los Angeles Times:

The National Black Police Assn., which has about 15,000 members, is the second African American organization to back the measure. The California NAACP has also endorsed it, citing the disproportionate arrest and incarceration of African Americans caught with marijuana.

Ron Hampton, the police association’s executive director, said he decided the group should get behind the measure because it would eliminate laws that have a negative impact on the black community.

“It means that we will be locking up less African American men and women and children who are using drugs,” said Hampton, a retired Washington, D.C., police officer with 25 years experience. “We’ve got more people in prison. We’ve got more young people in prison. Blacks go to jail more than whites for doing the same thing.”

Hampton said that the money being spent on the war on drugs could be better spent on education, housing and creating jobs. “It just seemed like to me that we have been distracted in this whole thing,” he said. “We can take that money, and focus and concentrate on things that really make a difference in our community.”

For more, watch LEAP executive director Neill Franklin discuss the endorsement on MSNBC:

The idiocy of our country’s approach to medical marijuana was on full display for all to see at the Minnesota Vikings training camp yesterday.

Since the age of 10, Percy Harvin, a Vikings wide receiver, has suffered from chronic, debilitating migraines. Luckily, later in life, Harvin found a therapeutic substance that not only relieved his migraines effectively, but also allowed him to play football. It was marijuana.

But during last year’s NFL combine, Harvin, a promising prospect, tested positive for marijuana, and was subsequently drafted much lower than expected. The Vikings finally picked him 22nd overall, reportedly after a long talk about his marijuana use, and specifically, how it needed to stop if he wanted to keep playing.

Harvin complied, and the migraines didn’t seem to be a problem for much of his breakout rookie season. “Questions about his ability as a receiver seem silly now,” Jim Trotter of Sports Illustrated wrote at the time. “The only thing that has slowed him is migraines.” Toward the end of last season, the migraines got worse, and Harvin was sidelined. Except now he wasn’t able to use marijuana to treat them, and nothing else seemed to work.

On Monday, after another stint in the hospital, Harvin was finally back in uniform at Vikings training camp. Cindy Boren of the Washington Post describes what happened next:

Harvin, who has battled migraines since he was 10 and sought treatment last year at the Mayo Clinic, had not practiced for two weeks because of migraines, returning to the field only Monday. Suffering another attack Thursday, he managed to return to the field and looked up to the sky to field a punt. He doubled over, vomited and seemed momentarily unresponsive and was taken to the hospital. The scene was so disturbing for players that the rest of practice was called off.

If medical marijuana were legal in the United States, and treated like any other legitimate medicine by the NFL, then Harvin could consult with a doctor about the best way to use marijuana to help relieve these awful migraines. (And anyone who is a migraine sufferer knows just how awful they can be.) More importantly, the Vikings could have a productive wide receiver. Instead, they’re forced to stand by idly as their $1.04 million investment is carted off the field in an ambulance, overcome by pain that could easily be relieved by a safe, non-toxic medicine.

How’s that for sensible marijuana policies?

Many readers have been questioning the accuracy of an Associated Press article I blogged about recently claiming Kentucky GOP Senate candidate Rand Paul, who has defended the rights of states to pass medical marijuana laws, “is opposed to the legalization of marijuana, even for medicinal purposes.”

As a former reporter, I always strive for accuracy, so I just got off the phone with a representative of the Paul campaign in order to clarify the candidate’s position — which isn’t as simple as the AP made it out to be.

“Doctor Paul’s stance has not changed, and that is a case of sloppy reporting,” said Nena Bartlett, Paul’s assistant campaign manager. “His position is that it’s a states’ rights issue.”

However, when I asked Bartlett if Paul personally supports medical marijuana laws, and would, for example, vote for a bill protecting patients from arrest if he were a member of a state legislature, she demurred.

“I’m actually not positive that he’s taken that stance,” Bartlett said. “He just believes it should be left up to the states … I’m not sure if that’s a position he would take at this time. It’s a decision for doctors and patients at the local level.”

So there we have it. Rand Paul believes the federal government should not interfere in state medical marijuana laws. But he does not support such laws himself, at least not at this time. It was therefore inaccurate for the AP to say he “is opposed” to medical marijuana laws. (Though the Paul campaign will not say he’s “in favor” of them either.) I regret having helped to spread that misinformation, and want to apologize to our readers.

MPP’s blog — like nearly every other one online — relies almost entirely on outside news organizations to provide us with information that we then analyze and make entertaining for our readers. As this episode demonstrates, sometimes news outlets get it wrong—even ones as old and esteemed as the AP. With that in mind, I hope our readers will appreciate where we’re coming from, and understand that we will always do what’s in our power to promote accurate information — and correct something when it’s wrong.

As always, thanks for reading.

Check out former New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson (R) -- an expected 2012 presidential contender -- discussing the need to end marijuana prohibition last night on MSNBC.

“I think it is at a tipping point, and people are ahead of the politicians on this one, and it’s still gonna happen. It’s gonna happen. I think statistically we’re about two and half years from 50 percent of Americans actually understanding this. From my own experience it’s really thin ice. With just a little bit of knowledge on this issue, people seem to move on this issue. People seem to be embracing this notion of, ‘Gee, it’s not working, we really have to do something different.’”

One month after MPP and an ideologically diverse coalition of drug policy reformers and advocacy groups called on President Obama to withdraw Michele Leonhart as his nominee for DEA administrator, a spokesperson for the White House has declared that the president is confident that the Bush holdover is the “right” choice for the job. Mike Riggs has the story in The Daily Caller:

Obama is confident that Leonhart is the right choice, the White House staffer said, and that as of Friday the president wasn’t considering anyone else for the position. In other words, the response from 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. to a chorus of concerns boils down to: Leonhart or bust.

MPP and others – including FireDogLake’s Jane Hamsher and the states-rights group the Tenth Amendment Center – pointed to Leonhart’s interim leadership of the DEA, which has included federal raids on state-legal medical marijuana providers and the denial of medical marijuana research applications, as evidence that she is continuing Bush-era policies that Obama promised to end. During the campaign, and in an October memo from the Department of Justice, the president and his administration pledged to end federal raids on state-legal medical marijuana providers.

But when Riggs asked the feds whether recent raids in California violate the spirit of the October memo, spokespeople for both the White House and DOJ seemed to backtrack on the president’s pledge.

But the White House and the Justice Department both told TheDC that Holder’s memo does not give dispensaries carte blanche to grow or sell marijuana, and that recent raids don’t conflict with what Obama expressed while campaigning.

“I wouldn’t say the memo ‘discourages’ certain raids,” a DOJ offical told TheDC. Rather, “it talks about prioritizing resources most efficiently.” And both the White House and the DOJ argued that the gist of the Holder memo was that the DEA would “not focus its limited resources on individual patients with cancer or other serious diseases.”

One can’t help but wonder, with the nomination of Leonhart, the ongoing raids, and this type of public about-face on the issue, if President Obama is now reneging on his campaign pledge to approach medical marijuana issues differently than his predecessor.

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs thinks it’s absurd to even suggest such a thing. “I hear these people saying he’s like George Bush,” Gibbs said recently. “Those people ought to be drug tested. I mean, it’s crazy.”

Crazy is exactly right, Mr. Gibbs. I mean, it’s not like President Obama picked the same person George W. Bush did to lead the DEA, and has insisted on standing by her while she employs the same policies that were in place under Bush. Oh wait …

Medical marijuana will soon be more widely available to qualifying patients in Germany, according to a government health spokesperson. From the English-language news site The Local:

Doctors could write prescriptions for cannabis, and pharmacies would be authorised to sell the plant once the law had been adjusted, a member of [Germany’s] junior coalition party, the pro-business Free Democrats (FDP), said Monday.

Marijuana would also be permitted for use as a pain reliever for the terminally ill in hospices and other care facilities, making it a legal part of their emergency pain-relief stocks.

[...] According to the International Association for Cannabinoid Medicines (ACM), only 40 patients in the country are currently allowed a medical marijuana prescription – even though law enforcement generally tolerates small amounts for personal use.

Meanwhile, patients in 36 of the 50 United States are still treated as criminals if they relieve their symptoms through marijuana, and our federal government persists in incorrectly classifying marijuana as a Schedule I drug—meaning it has “no accepted medical value”—while at the same time blocking the much-needed research necessary to move marijuana through the FDA approval process.

Elsewhere, Great Britain has approved liquid marijuana for medical use, and Israel is seeking to further expand its own medical marijuana law—even allowing hospitals to administer medical marijuana to patients.

Make sure to tell your elected officials that you’re tired of seeing the United States lag behind while other developed nations implement compassionate and science-based medical marijuana policies by visiting MPP’s Federal Action Center.

Four years after 92-year-old Kathryn Johnston was shot and killed by Atlanta narcotics officers who falsified evidence before and after a completely unwarranted raid on her home, the city of Atlanta has announced it will pay a $4.9 million settlement to her family. 

In November 2006, officers conducted a “no knock” raid on Johnston’s home based on bogus information from an informant who said he had purchased drugs there. (After the raid, the informant told a local news station that he had never even been to Johnston's home, and that police asked him to fabricate the story after the shooting.)

Johnston, who lived alone, apparently mistook the plainclothes officers for intruders and, according to the prosecutor trying the officers, fired one shot through the door and hit nothing. The police responded, firing 39 shots, killing Johnston and apparently wounding three of their own.

Investigators did not find any evidence that drugs were being sold in the apartment. In an apparent attempt to fabricate a cover story, one of the officers, J.R. Smith, planted three bags of marijuana in the home, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Yonette Sam-Buchanan.

The raid made national headlines, and the three officers involved eventually plead guilty to federal charges including conspiracy, voluntary manslaughter and making false statements. They are currently serving sentences in federal prison.

"The resolution of this case is an important step in the healing process for the city and its residents," Atlanta’s mayor, Kasim Reed said in a statement yesterday. "As a result of the incident, several police officers were indicted in federal and state court on charges and were later convicted and sentenced for their actions. In addition, the narcotics unit of the Atlanta Police Department was completely reorganized, which included changes in policy and personnel."

Unfortunately, raids like the one on Kathryn Johnston’s home continue to occur every day in places all over the country. Some compensation for Johnston’s family is a good start to repairing the damage, but a much more appropriate legacy for this highly-publicized tragedy would be for officials nationwide to realize that in a free society, armed officers shouldn’t be sent on missions to break down doors and potentially use violence in order to enforce nonviolent drug offenses.

UPDATED: Read a more recent post clarifying Paul's comments here.

Back in May, when Kentucky Republican Rand Paul defeated an establishment candidate to win his party’s nomination for the U.S. Senate, I pointed out that one of the issues Paul used to win over voters was his support of medical marijuana laws.

Now, in a telling political move, the son of Ron Paul has reversed his stance on the issue, telling the Associated Press last week that “he is opposed to the legalization of marijuana, even for medicinal purposes.” (He also stated that he doesn’t think the government’s war on drugs is “a real pressing issue” and that he wants to cut federal funding for drug treatment programs.)

Gee, I wonder if this has anything to do with that episode from his past that’s been discussed so much in the news lately. Is Paul selling out medical marijuana patients as part of a strategy to deflect criticism? Or am I being too cynical?

For the record, Paul’s Democratic opponent, Jack Conway, isn’t much better when it comes to marijuana issues, and has received police endorsements because of his support for tougher law enforcement strategies.