US Marijuana Party

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Hub cop may resign after guilty plea in shooting

By Michele McPhee
Boston Herald Police Bureau Chief
Tuesday, April 24, 2007

A veteran Boston police officer is expected to resign from the force after pleading guilty yesterday to charges he shot a fellow cop during an off-duty argument about whether he was too drunk to drive, officials said.
Officer Paul Durkin, 50, entered the guilty plea yesterday, just days before his trial on assault and battery charges was expected to start. He also indicated in court that he would turn in his badge after 27 years of service to the Boston Police Department, entitling him to a city pension.
Prosecutors said that after a night of drinking June 22, Durkin pulled his service revolver out and shot Officer Joseph Behnke outside that cop’s West Roxbury home. Behnke was shot in the left hip, and was brought to the hospital by his wife, a nurse.
Durkin was indicted by a grand jury in September. Behnke is still out on paid administrative leave awaiting the results of an internal investigation, BPD spokeswoman Elaine Driscoll said yesterday.
Judge Janet L. Sanders sentenced Durkin to three years’ probation and ordered him to undergo alcohol treatment, said Jake Wark,spokesman for the Suffolk County District Attorney’s office.
The sentence was applauded by BPD Commissioner Edward Davis last night. “Violence is unacceptable in our society and anyone who engages in violent behavior must be held accountable,” he said in a statement.
Durkin’s attorney, George Murphy, could not be reached last night.

Monday, April 23, 2007

How to Stop the Next Campus Shootings

Bring Back the Posse
ALEXANDER COCKBURN
CounterPunch
April 21
2007

Friday, April 20, 2007

HAPPY 420!!!



I have some major news to share with all of you that I can hopefully release by the end of today. In the meantime...Happy 420!!!

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Thursday, April 19, 2007

420

420

Monday, April 16, 2007

12 states give OK to medicinal cannabis

St. George Daily Spectrum, UT
Apr 14, 2007


Somebody finally got it right. Gov. Bill Richardson recently signed a bill that makes New Mexico the 12th state in the Union to allow medical use of marijuana.

How Richardson and the state legislature got it right was by deciding that instead of just allowing the compassionate medical practice, it would get into the business of producing and distributing the herb, something Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington have not quite come to grips with.

In New Mexico, you will soon be able to go to your doctor who, if it's appropriate, will write a prescription for medicinal cannabis. The patient will then make a purchase through a state-regulated facility.

No more argument about how many plants a medical marijuana patient may cultivate, no more arguments about the compassionate shops that sell cannabis even though they face the risk of federal drug agents raiding their legal stores, no more concern that those who use the drug are also cultivating it for sale.

It's all neat, clean and tidy.

Now, before you get on a high horse about this, let's make it perfectly clear that this is a plea for the legalization of marijuana for medicinal uses. Legalization for recreational use is a different issue. This is about medicine.

Imagine that your doctor says you have a medical condition for which there is no cure, one that will slowly rob you of your quality of life - from impotence to immobility. The condition is guaranteed to result in unrelenting pain that will, in fact, grow worse.

You'll get Lortab, Demerol or Oxycontin for pain. You'll get Soma or Skelaxin to relax the muscles. Probably some Prozac, Lexapro or Zoloft to help with depression and some Xanax or Valium to relieve those moments of high anxiety. Don't forget the Viagra or Cialis to maintain an intimate relationship with your partner, or other meds specific to your condition. And, you'll wind up addicted to one or more of these meds, guaranteed. Not so with cannabis.

According to a Mayo Clinic report (http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/medical-marijuana/GA00014), researchers believe cannabis can aid in the treatment of nausea that accompanies chemotherapy or HIV/AIDS, glaucoma, Multiple Sclerosis, spasticity from spinal cord injuries, depression, chronic pain and other disorders.

Cannabis is more gentle on the system and less addictive than those other harsh drugs. It's cheaper. And dosage can be easily regulated by the patient.

Our kids? Recent studies indicate sedatives and painkillers are more popular than marijuana, with alcohol and tobacco the most frequent "gateway" drugs.

I really hope you never hear the Doc say "There's no cure."

But, if you do, I hope by then the government overcomes its prejudices against a medicine that can be of tremendous value to many, that is gentler on the body and can be much more affordable.

MP taught victim to shoot heroin, court told

Dan Proudman and Andrew Clennell
Sydney Morning Herald, Australia
04/16/07


MILTON ORKOPOULOS befriended a 16-year-old boy and plied him with alcohol, cannabis and heroin - and taught him how to shoot up - while he sexually abused the teenager over three to six months, police allege.

The former NSW Aboriginal affairs minister was on suicide watch in Long Bay Jail last night after he was arrested at his mother's home yesterday and faced Newcastle Local Court on 21 fresh child sex and drug supply charges relating to a third teenage boy. Orkopoulos allegedly met the boy "two or three times a week" in the back of his car at a Lake Macquarie park in 1995.

In a statement to the court, Detective Sergeant Kristi Faber said the boy had not tried heroin before meeting Orkopoulos, but became addicted to the drug, as well as cannabis, and left his family when he was 17.

At first the boy had only smoked heroin, but he began injecting it after Orkopoulos allegedly "instructed the victim on how much to have and how to inject it". The court heard it was part of Orkopoulos's "grooming-type behaviour in which … he plies [victims] with alcohol and drugs" before assaulting them.

Cannabis counter brain cell damage after a stroke

SpiritIndia, India
04/15/07

Researchers from the Medical School's Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology have been the first in the world to show the cannabinoid CB2 receptor appears in the rat brain following a stroke.

Their findings were published recently in the journal Neuroscience Letters.

Dr John Ashton says the CB2 receptor is a protein produced as part of the body's immune response system.

"This response is triggered by stroke and causes the inflammation that leads to damage in the area of the brain around where the stroke has occurred.

"If the inflammation can be stopped or reduced then it offers the hope of reducing the extent of the da mage caused by stroke - and CB2 offers a potential target for such a drug."

Dr Ashton says cannabis targets both the CB2 and the related CB1 receptors.

"THC, the major active ingredient of cannabis, acts mainly on CB1 but it also affects CB2. While THC is known to have some positive effects in terms of pain management its use is severely limited because of the way it triggers the psychoactive CB1 receptors in the brain," he says.

Libertarian convert urges medical-marijuana reform

Ruth Mantell
MarketWatch
Apr 13, 2007


WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- After years of opposing medical marijuana reform, Bob Barr decided that the government had gone too far in keeping patients from relief. The epiphany wasn't drug induced.

Instead, Barr, a former GOP U.S. representative for Georgia, became alarmed by the "growth in government power and the decrease in individual freedom" since Sept. 11.

"The fear that I have with government being so large, so big, so powerful is that there's virtually no freedom left," he said in an interview. "That has caused me to re-evaluate my position to medical marijuana, and also to re-evaluate and strengthen in my mind the whole issue of federalism and states rights."

Last month, Barr, 58, joined the Marijuana Policy Project, a Washington-based nonprofit that advocates making medical marijuana available to patients, and taxing and regulating marijuana for general adult use.

As a congressman, Barr introduced the "Barr Amendment," which prohibited an initiative on medical marijuana in the District of Columbia.

Now as a Libertarian (he switched teams in December) and paid lobbyist for MPP, he will work to strike down the eponymous legislation, among other efforts.

Students arrested on felony drug charges

By Amanda Peterson
Assistant Campus Affairs Editor
The University of Alabama Crimson White, AL
April 16, 2007


Tuscaloosa police arrested nine UA students and two Shelton State Community College students on felony drug charges Wednesday.

Lt. Steven Anderson, spokesman for the Tuscaloosa Police Department, said in a news release the students were arrested Wednesday after a month-long investigation. More arrests are pending because the investigation is ongoing.

"Quantities of cocaine, marijuana, OxyContin, steroids and other prescription medications were bought and seized from the students," Anderson said.

The time has come to legalize marijuana use

Penn State Digital Collegian, PA
04/16/07


...[If marijuana can serve legitimate medical purposes and bring happiness and relaxation to a great many people, in spite of its illegality, I'd say it's high time we legalize.]...

Blue Sky



Original animation by Terry

Tuesday, April 03, 2007

Alabama Woman on Horseback Charged with DUI

Cops Claim Woman "rammed cruiser" with her horse in Henager, AL

Now I really think I have heard it all. Can you really make a horse 'ram' an automobile of any kind? And why do these thinigs always happen here?

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Thai prisoner boxes for freedom

BBC News, UK
04/03/07


A female Thai prisoner has boosted her chances of freedom by winning the world light flyweight boxing title.

Samson Sor Siriporn, a convicted drug dealer, beat Japan's Ayaka Miyano in a bout staged at the mixed Klong Prem jail, known as the "Bangkok Hilton".

Watched by dozens of prison staff, Siriporn won on points after 10 rounds in the ring, kick-starting parole proceedings for her early release.

The 24-year-old took up boxing to protect herself from violent inmates.

Siriporn, serving a 10-year sentence for selling small amounts of drugs, dominated the fight.