Quick Hits (page 4)
Georgia Court Tosses Law Requiring Motorist Drug Tests
By: Dick Pettys (AP)
ATLANTA - The Georgia Supreme Court overturned a law that required motorists involved in serious accidents to submit to drug testing or face the loss of driving privileges for a year.
The state's implied consent law "authorizes a search and seizure without probable cause" and violates the state and federal Constitutions, the court ruled Monday in throwing out a motorist's conviction.
Under the provision the court struck down, any motorist involved in an accident causing serious injury or death was presumed to have given prior consent to a blood, breath or urine test to determine the presence of alcohol or other drugs in his body.
Refusing the test made motorists subject to a suspension of their license for at least one year. Evidence that they refused to be tested could also be offered against them at trial.
The court said the law was problematic because it compels testing of anyone involved in a serious accident regardless of whether there is any independent reason to believe they are impaired.
The decision stems from the case of Carey Don Cooper, who was involved in a two-vehicle collision in August 2000.
He agreed to a blood test after being informed of the implied consent law by a state trooper but later challenged it in court. The trial judge rejected his motion to suppress the results of the test, which had found traces of cocaine, and he was convicted and sentenced to 15 days in jail.
While prosecutors warned the ruling could cripple law enforcement efforts, the lawyer who challenged the law noted that the court left intact a provision that requires testing of those arrested for driving under the influence.
"If somebody's knee-walking drunk and a cop sees a bunch of beer bottles in his car and the person's slurring his speech, certainly the police are going to be able to request that person's blood," said layer William Doyle Healan III.
"This is not throwing out all blood, breath and urine tests. It only prevents police from taking blood, breath or urine when there's been an accident and police don't have any reason to arrest someone for DUI," he said.
Attorney General Thurbert Baker said the ruling removes an important tool for law enforcement officers in drunken driving cases. "He is definitely disappointed with the court's decision," said a spokeswoman, Natalie DiSantis.
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Tan 'n' Trends
Growin' Our Own (page 4)
The Wholesale Buyers' Criteria
By: Unknown
Management at a successful Oakland cannabis club (91 employees, days when the gross exceeds six figures) has developed a handy one-page checklist for use by buyers as they evaluate the pounds of dried herb brought in by growers. The so-called medical marijuana movement is really a business, dear reader, and only the efficient maximize their profits.
The checklist contains nine categories in a vertical column. The buyer samples the grower's cannabis and awards points based on his assessment in five of the categories.
First and foremost is "aroma/smell." If the buyer has to "pinch 4 smell," he awards the product one point. If the smell reaches him when the bag is first opened, two points. If the scent wafts through the closed bag (typically the heavy-duty type used for roasting turkeys), the grower gets the maximum: four points.
"Crystal content" is the second criterion. The grower gets one point for "on the inside of bud," two for "on inside and outside," and four for "All over bud & bag."
Third is "cure/dryness/texture." One point is given for "spongy with crackle, no clear snap." Two for "bends slightly, no crackle, clear snap." Three for "'slight to no bend with a clean [sic] snap."
Fourth is "consistent size of bud." One point for "all small buds," two for "mix of small and big buds," three for "all tops."
Fifth comes "length of flavor." One "bonus point" is awarded for "full flavor every hit."
The minimum total score for an acceptable product is four points, which gets the grower $3,100 a pound -- or did as of a month ago when this checklist was provided to this writer. The price offered to the grower increases $100 for every point awarded; five points = $3,200/lb, six points - 3,300, and so on. If a sample is deemed top-grade -14 or 15 points- management approval is required prior to a pay-out of $4,100 or $4,200 per pound.
The checklist designates four other categories "for market use only." Presumably the info collected is to be shared with prospective customers, but will not influence the price paid to the grower. The additional categories are:
* "Characteristics." The options are "smooth," "spicy," "harsh," "green," "hash-like," "sage [or sugar]," and "fruity."
* "Buzz type." The options are "sleeper high," "creeper," "head," and "body."
* "Growing Conditions," broken down into "hydroponic," "hormone," "soil," "inside," "outside," and "organic."
* "Strain origin." In addition to filling in a name, the buyer is to distinguish between pure lines and crosses.
Philip Denney, MD was shown the buyer's checklist and remarked that the priority given to smell reflects the triumph of marketing since cannabis gets its aroma from terpenes, which, although not inert, are not as significant as the cannabinoids in determining medicinal effect. It also appears that there's no pay-off for organic production, which is a shame, and that plants grown outdoors, which contain the fullest expression of trace elements (thanks to full-spectrum sunlight) actually command a lower price (as a result of wind 'damage'). Cannabis grown outdoors accounts for only about 10% of the total bought by the Oakland clubs.
The checklist list makes no reference to medical conditions for which a given strain might be particularly effective. Presumably the buyer-grower dialog does not touch on this subject. Which is also a damn shame.
The thought and effort that went into developing the buyers' checklist could have gone into -maybe still could go into- developing procedures that promote bona fide medical research. Soon after Prop 215 passed, a number of club proprietors, lawyers, and patients' advocates began meeting regularly to plan a trade group -the Medical Cannabis Association- to pursue the mutual interests of its members. The stated goals included lowering the price of cannabis and conducting research to identify and develop plant strains best suited for treating specific ailments.
Such work was already being done in England by G.W. pharmaceuticals, under license from the Home Office. G.W. scientists had identified several chemically active cannabinoids, and were developing strains in which those "of interest" were present in different proportions. They hypothesized that Cannabidiol (CBD, which exists only in trace amounts in the marijuana available in California) would turn out to be the sedative, anti-convulsant component of the plant.
If the Medical Cannabis Association had lived up to its name, the dispensaries -- being the link between growers and patients, and having the physicial and financial resources at their disposal- would have attempted to do in California, however crudely, what G.W. was doing with government backing in a civilized country.
The clubs could have distributed high-CBD seeds (obtainable in Europe) to participating growers, and hired an analytical chemist to identify the cannabinoids of interest. California growers could have developed strains with different cannabinoid ratios, and the dispensaries could have encouraged their patient/customers to take part in n = 1 trials to test their efficacy. ("Try this strain for the next three weeks and report back.")
Instead, club personnel share with patients vague generalizations like "sativa is more cerebral" and "indica more physical;" or "Train wreck" is supposedly more effective for a given condition than "Purple skunk." But the truth is, seven years after the passage of Prop 215, there is no organized collection of medical data going on at the club level. Instead of emulating G.W. Pharmaceuticals, the club proprietors tend to badmouth and resent their corporate counterpart.
Recently an activist who should know better said that Dr. Ethan Russo, in deciding to work full-time for G.W., had "gone over to the dark side." Thus the small shopkeepers and their "activist" allies deride the ambitious Brits while secretly wishing that they themselves stood to make billions instead of mere millions. A Marxist might call it a split between the petit bourgeoisie and the big bourgeoisie... Or a case study in how a potentially radical movement gets co-opted, contained, and turned into a fancy façade for a profitable industry.
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Pipeline (page 4)
Ashcroft Limiting Prosecutors' Use of Plea Bargains
By: Eric Lichtblau (NYT)
WASHINGTON -- Attorney General John Ashcroft has made it tougher for federal prosecutors to strike plea bargains with criminal defendants, requiring attorneys to seek the most serious charges possible in almost all cases.
The policy directive issued by Mr. Ashcroft is the latest in a series of steps the Justice Department has taken in recent months to combat what it sees as dangerously lenient practices by some federal prosecutors and judges.
The move also effectively expands to the entire gamut of federal crimes the attorney general's tough stance on the death penalty, which he has sought in numerous cases over the objections of federal prosecutors.
"The direction I am giving our U.S. attorneys today is direct and emphatic," Mr. Ashcroft said at a speech in Cincinnati. Except in "limited, narrow circumstances," he said, federal prosecutors must seek to bring charges for "the most serious, readily provable offense" that can be supported by the facts of the case.
But critics in the defense bar and some federal prosecutors said the new policy would serve only to further centralize authority in the hands of Washington policymakers, discourage prosecutors from seeking plea bargains and ratchet up sentences in criminal cases that may not warrant them.
"What is driving this," said Gerald D. Lefcourt, past president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, "is that a tough-on-crime attorney general is pandering to the public, and he knows that this will play well."
Several federal prosecutors said they were deeply concerned about the new policy, which was first reported in The Wall Street Journal.
A West Coast prosecutor who spoke on condition of anonymity said that while it might be difficult for officials in Washington to enforce the new policy, it nonetheless puts significant pressure on prosecutors to explain their actions and will most likely result in fewer plea bargains in many jurisdictions.
"There's no doubt this could have a real impact on all of us," the prosecutor said.
The policy change is likely to escalate a debate that has become increasingly contentious over how prosecutors and judges mete out justice in the federal courts.
With the backing of many Republicans in Congress, the Justice Department has sought to impose greater uniformity and "accountability" in federal cases.
In addition to the expanded use of the death penalty, Mr. Ashcroft also announced a plan last month to track data on judges who give lighter sentences than federal guidelines prescribe.
But dissenters attacked the monitoring plan as a judicial black list, arguing that denying judges and prosecutors the discretion to analyze the facts of a case is a mistake.
And two Supreme Court justices, Stephen G. Breyer and Anthony M. Kennedy, have given speeches in the last few weeks arguing that Congressionally mandated "minimum" sentences, which also curtail judicial discretion, have created a system in which sentences sometimes are unfair or too long.
A decade ago, Attorney General Janet Reno enacted a policy to give federal prosecutors more discretion over how their cases should be handled by allowing for an "individualized assessment" of the facts and circumstances of the case.
But Mr. Ashcroft's directive effectively scales back that initiative in an effort to restrict the use of plea bargains and create what the Justice Department said would be more "transparency" in federal prosecutions.
Plea bargains are a popular and powerful tool for prosecutors to secure the cooperation of defendants and to speed cases through the system without devoting additional time and resources to a trial. Some 96 percent of the 60,000 cases handled by federal prosecutors in 2001, the last year for which complete figures were available, resulted in plea bargains, officials said.
But the new policy states that prosecutors must seek the most severe sentence allowed by law unless there are overriding considerations.
Cases that allow for exceptions include the "substantial assistance" of a cooperating defendant, the drain on resources that a trial might cause and the Justice Department's approval of a "fast-track" program used to expedite prosecutions, like the type used in Southwest border states to prosecute illegal immigrants.
Dan Collins, an associate deputy attorney general, said the new policy sought to ensure that decisions were driven by the facts of a crime and "not the luck of the draw in terms of which prosecutor happens to work on your case or which judge is assigned to it."
Despite the large percentage of cases that result in plea bargains, Justice Department officials said they did not expect the new policy to mean a "significant" reduction in their use, but they added that it was too early to predict the ultimate impact in terms of pleas or length of sentences.
Mr. Lefcourt of the defense lawyers association said Mr. Ashcroft's directive "is just bad policy" because it requires prosecutors to get the approval of a senior Justice Department official, including an assistant attorney general in Washington or a politically appointed United States attorney or another supervisor, before executing a plea bargain.
"This is taking discretion away from the U.S. attorneys' offices," he said. "The prosecutors on the ground who are most involved in the facts of the cases should be making these decisions. It shouldn't be dictated to them."
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