75A - PH - MEDICAL MARIJUANA - PROHIBIT

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Drug Violence: State 1VledicallVlarijuana Laws Creating More Confusion and Abuse Posted Friday, March. 02, 2007 1.2:13 PM Today's New York Times covers the laiest murder generated by the passage of State- based "medical" marijuana laws. For years, marijuana legalization groups have worked to bypass the Su . reme Court`s decision, the PDA's ofi5cial lntera~;ency Advisory, and Federal. law regarding medical marijuana. Symbolic medical marijuana laws which have been. passed in some U.S. states have given too many citizens the false impression that growing and distributing marijuana is safe and legal...... "Since 1997, after the first medical marijuana law was passed in California, as many as 201egal marijuana providers have been killed around the country, mostly in robberies..." ..Mr. Gorman's killing, legal experts say, has exposed the paradoxes and ambiguities about medical marijuana that most states have failed to gn'apple with. The Colorado Department of Public Health and )nviranment, which administers the marijuana program, is not authorized, for example, to provide i.nforrnation about where the 1,100 patients who are certified under the program can obtain thew drugs, according ~~ to the department s Web site... Not only do these State laws create confusion, but they also foster abuse. As we've noted previously, the co-founder of California's medical marijuana has lamented its passage stating that, "We created Prop. 215 so that patients would not have to deal with black market profiteers. Bu.t today it is all about the money. Most of the dispensaries operating in California are little more than dope dealers with store fronts." Source: http:/(pushingback.com/blogs/pushing_back/archive/2007/03/02/30b03.aspx Oregon 1Vledical marijuana abusers {February 7th, 2007] In preparation for a state law enforcement conference last year, Portland Police Sgt. Pat Walsh called drug units across Oregon to aslc what they were most worried about. The answer: medical. marijuana. "It's not Grandma with stomach cancer that we have a problem with," Walsh says-it's the scores of people using the law as a cover for slinging dope, giving those with a Legitimate need a bad name. So in the name of the legit growers in our Jan. 24 cover story, "Garden of Weedin'," we make medical marijuana abusers this week's Rogues . Law-enforcement officials say once a medical marijuana card is issued, there's little oversight to make sure the right amount of pot is being grown and that all the nugs are going to patients. Portland police don't keep separate statistics onmedical-marijuana cases, but estimate they investigated about 30 such cases last year. In one such case, residents of a home on Portland's North Terry Street had two medical. marijuana cards, letting them legally grow 12 marijuana plants. Source: htt~//www wweek com/editorial/3313/8516/ 22 75A-117