MARIJUANA PROHIBITION IS A BIG GOVERNENT PROGRAM

MARIJUANA PROHIBITION IS

A BIG GOVERNMENT PROGRAM

TODAY’S CANNABIS BUSINESS PLAN IS

        YESTERDAY’S MARIJUANA CONSPIRACY

 

MERCY, COMPASSION AND JUSTICE

ARE AT THE INTERSECTION OF

BUSINESS, POLITICS AND PROFIT

POLITICS OF POT AND THE PRISONERS LEFT BEHIND

Exciting new businesses are being formed and their many new symbols slide across the trader’s screens, CGC – Canopy Growth, CRON – Cronos, TLRY – Tilray, ACB – Aurora, ACRGF – Acreage Holdings and on they go.  They are being closely scrutinized by those who are betting on the new cannabis business enterprises.  They are worth billions.  Simultaneously millions of new dollars are being funneled to Washington lobbying firms. 

There are new opportunities for those who operate in the juxtaposition between government and private enterprise.  They are establishing firms or hiring firms in the nation’s capital.  Financial participants are rapidly expanding and their names are rolling out as this opportunity explodes,  John Boehner, Newt Gingrich, Martha Stewart, Ron Klink, Joe Crowlay, Joe Montana, Barney Frank, Bill Weld to name a few.

It appears that marijuana legalization is the horse that has left the barn as this federally illegal substance has been legalized to some degree in 33 states plus the District of Columbia.  Over 70% of the population believes that marijuana should be legalized.  

In the meantime marijuana remains on the Controlled Substance Act’s Schedule as a Schedule 1 drug.  It is designated as a more dangerous substance than Fentanyl, OxyContin, and Meth.  In 2017 there were over 600,000 arrests for marijuana. 

There are nonviolent marijuana offenders in federal prison serving sentences of life without parole that will not receive sentencing relief from the First Step Act and did not receive clemency from President Obama.  Concurrently, there are estimates that we spend up to $42 billion per year for marijuana prohibition.  This money is spent for investigating, arresting, prosecuting and incarcerating. 

This Alice in Wonderland scenario simply illuminates the dysfunction of our legislative process, criminal justice system and administrative law.

  

It is the formula that triggers disrespect for the law and calls into question the integrity of those who are charged with enacting and enforcing it. 

Consistency and integrity would require that all engaged in the emerging cannabis business enterprises be prosecuted for engaging in the sale of this substance that is scheduled as more dangerous than Fentanyl and OxyContin.  If congress is not willing to kill this golden goose then those who are paying the ultimate price for this heresy should receive immediate sentencing relief by Presidential Clemency. 

Congress also needs to act quickly to remove this substance from the Controlled Substance Act’s Schedule and let states regulate it as they see fit.  Anything less is sheer hypocrisy.  

Jacob Sullum at Reason - Relief for Pot Prisoners

 Always check Jacob Sullum at Reason

Jacob Sullum - Reason

Cory Booker's Marijuana Justice Act, which he reintroduced last week, would rehabilitate the much-maligned plant by removing it from the federal government's list of proscribed substances. The New Jersey senator's bill also aims to rehabilitate the victims of that arbitrary ban, and in that respect it differs from most of the legalization measures that have been passed by states or proposed by members of Congress.
 
By and large, the lingering impact of laws that criminalized peaceful activities involving cannabis has been addressed as an afterthought, if at all. Booker's bill, which he has made a conspicuous part of his campaign for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, therefore does a real service by raising the issue of what the government owes to people who were convicted of doing things that are no longer crimes.

Conditions - Prisone de la Sante

This is from the Blog Invisible Paris 

It is a piece I wrote many years ago about what it is like to visit a loved one in the oldest prison in France.  It is personal as I was visiting my brother, John Knock who was being held there prior to his extradition to the United States. 

Last December I wrote about the Prison de la Sante, imagining myself in the place of a visitor to the last remaining prison in Paris. Last week, Beth Curtis, a reader of this blog, sent me her memories of visits to the jail to see her brother. I found her account to be so touching and brave that I have decided to publish it in full here.

I came across the photo on your blog of an empty packet of cigarettes left on a gray splintered bench outside the Prison de La Sante, and immediately wanted to write to you about the many memories I have of the place. My first memory is of the bench itself, bolted to the curved metal support structure, with the ancient stone wall of the prison as a backrest and not a hint of greenery in sight. This is the bench that I sat on many times when awaiting entrance to the prison to visit my brother.

John, my brother, had disappeared in 1994. Shortly afterwards an indictment, for conspiracy to import and distribute marijuana and to money-launder, was issued from a Court in Florida for him and his co-defendant, Claude Duboc, who was picked up in Hong Kong within a matter of weeks. I did not know where John was, and in my heart of hearts I hoped that I would never see him again so that he would be able to live his life in freedom.

John was later arrested though at a phone booth on the Champs Elysees in Paris when he was answering a call from someone who had been working for Claude Duboc. The arrest was arranged by the US Justice Department who requested that Interpol pick him up and hold him in France until he could be extradited to the US.

John’s first letter after his arrest was almost euphoric. He was ready to fight what were described as exaggerated charges. He had never been arrested before and felt that anything would be better than not being able see his family again or communicate with them. He would fight the extradition for the next three years while housed in La Sante.

I visited the prison many times in those three years. Sometimes I was alone, sometimes with my brother’s child, my sister and my brother’s wife, and during my last visit there, with my own adult son. He sat and chatted with me until the window in the wall opened and I could begin negotiating my entrance into the imposing prison that has been called a hell hole. My son could not enter, but he kept me company on the walk to the prison and on the bench.

 Veronique Vasseur, the prison physician, told me that the cells were full of rats and lice. Suicide is rampant, and depression lurks in every crowded cell. It has been said that prisoners with no other means had swallowed drain cleaner as a way to relieve the pain of life. With these thoughts in mind, the prisoners families and friends, who had often traveled to this place from many places around the world, met on the bench where we talked about families and loved ones and gave each other support.

Towards the end of my visits to La Sante, I found a very pleasant route from my lodgings on the Left Bank to the prison which made visits a little easier. It was a beautiful and textured atmosphere that I could sense on my way to sit on this bench. I made sure each time that this walk included a passage through Luxemburg Gardens.

Each time I walked to the prison, memories flooded into my mind of my brother, a small wiry boy, always in motion with a shock of unruly blond hair blowing in the wind. I can see his irrepressible smile and the vision is one of pure joy and freedom.

 I realise that most people have not had the opportunity to go inside La Sante. What is the process? What degradation awaits? How does it smell, feel and look? During the War it housed those who had opposed the German occupation as well as violent criminals, and when France was liberated there was a bloody riot and many were killed. It had a bad reputation but what was it really like?

My first visit was in 1996 when John was 49. This visit was with his wife and 5 year old son. Gaining access to La Sante was always a daunting task. We had made visits to the Ministry of Justice, presented countless documents, and identification, engaged advocates to oil the process. Three times we had everything in place and presented ourselves at the small window in the wall. Our advocate spoke earnestly with the grim face at the door. The language was incomprehensible and our advocate seemed to be a clueless Inspector Cousteau. No, not today - “What must we do?” A shrug of the shoulders, he doesn’t seem to know. We needed a new approach. Finally John’s attorney in Belgium was able to unlock the mystery and the code was broken. We would have a full 45 minutes on a designated day. The anticipation of that first visit was almost unbearable.

We stood at the window and presented our documents. After some scrutiny we were admitted through the small door. Inside was a conveyer belt where we were to place all our belongings and shoes. The inside was dark, in gray concrete with drab chipped industrial paint on metal surfaces. After entering each section of the maze, iron doors are locked behind you. We were destined to communicate with sign language made up of gestures and expressions. We are lead to a counter by a guard with keys and authority. Another door is closed and locked. At the counter, we can leave anything that we have brought for John - books clothes and papers. We stand rigid while we watch these few possessions be examined. They are accepted and we are lead into another concrete room lined with metal lockers that remind me of school lockers in the 1940s and 50s. There we divest ourselves of all possessions. We must not retain even so much as a single scrap of paper.

We are now lead into a large dark room with concrete floors and walls. It is furnished with benches much like the one against the stone wall outside. The wait begins again on these bare wooden benches, and with a five year old child it is very difficult. Time stands still until we are finally called to proceed to the next level.

We follow the guard up a set of stairs and are greeted by a long hallway lined on the left with doors every five feet or so. Another door is unlocked then locked again behind us and we find ourselves in a five by five room with a locked door on the opposing wall. There is a small wooden table and three small plank bottom chairs. I experience fear and joy beyond belief. Now we must wait. We hear a guards gait and ring of his keys, and now he is at the door. There is a small window and through it John’s face appears. There is a smile from ear to ear and bittersweet tears. We have made it.

Beth's conclusion in her mail was a surprising one. "There were many international prisoners there awaiting extradition to their countries. Remarkably they all felt that extradition to the US would be the least desirable outcome, and they were correct. La Sante is unsanitary, and frightful looking - terribly crowded and unhealthy, but somehow civil".

Her brother, John Knock, is today being held in a jail in Allenwood, Pennsylvania. If you wish to find out more about his predicament, see the support website that Beth runs: http://www.johnknock.com/

President Ford's Proclaimation for a White House Clemency Board.

 

  

This is President Ford's Proclamation for  a White House Clemency Board.  

This is the model for clemency that President Obama did not adopt

Clemency Initiative Enacted by Gerald Ford after the Viet Nam War

It was an act of compassion and mercy that resulted in granting over 13,000 Petitions for Clemency.  Neil Eggleston and President Obama did not want to adopt this highly successful model. 

By virtue of the authority vested in me as President of the United States by Section 2 of Article II of the Constitution of the United States, and in the interest of the internal management of the Government, it is ordered as follows:

SECTION 1. There is hereby established in the Executive Office of the President a board of 9 members, which shall be known as the Presidential Clemency Board. The members of the Board shall be appointed by the President, who shall also designate its Chairman.

GERALD R. FORD
The White House,
September 16, 1974.

NOTE: The White House announced the appointment of the following persons as members of the Presidential Clemency Board:

DR. RALPH ADAMS, 59, educator, has been president of Troy State University in Troy, Ala., for 10 years. He is a graduate of Birmingham-Southern College with LL.B. and J.D. degrees from the University of Alabama, and a brigadier general, Air National Guard of Alabama.

JAMES P. DOUGOVITA, 28, is a full-time teaching aide of minority students in the department of applied technology, Michigan Technological University. Mr. Dougovita is a veteran and has been awarded the Combat Infantryman Badge, Silver Star, Bronze Star, Purple Heart, and is now a captain in the Michigan National Guard.

ROBERT H. FINCH, 51, is a lawyer and partner in the firm of McKenna, Fitting & Finch in Los Angeles, Calif. He was formerly Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare and Counsellor to President Nixon.

CHARLES E. GOODELL, 48-Chairman-is a former Senator from New York who is currently in the private practice of law. He was a Ford Foundation Fellow at Yale and was a graduate of Williams College.

REV. THEODORE M. HESBURGH, 57, is president, University of Notre Dame, and holds honorary degrees from numerous colleges and universities. He is a permanent Vatican delegate. He has served as Chairman of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and as a member of the Committee on an All-Volunteer Armed Force.

VERNON E. JORDAN, 39, is executive director of the National Urban League, an organization concerned with the advancement of the minority groups. Mr. Jordan is a lawyer by profession and served previously as the executive director of the United Negro College Fund, director of the voter education project, Southern Regional Council, and as Attorney-Consultant in the U.S. Office of Economic Opportunity.

JAMES MAVE, 31, is executive director of Paralyzed Veterans of America in Washington, D.C. He is a graduate of Bridgewater College, Bridgewater, Va., and received his master's degree from Virginia Commonwealth University.

AIDA CASANAS O'CONNOR, 52, is a woman lawyer with a master of laws degree from George Washington University, Washington, D.C. She is a member of the Bar of the State of New York, the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico, U.S. District Court of Puerto Rico, and the Supreme Court of the United States. Presently she is assistant counsel to the New York State division of housing and community renewal in New York City.

GEN. LEWIS W. WALT, USMC (Ret.), 61, retired after 34 years in the Marine Corps and is a veteran of the Second World War, the Korean and Vietnamese wars. He was an Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps. He has received the Navy Cross, Silver Star, Legion of Merit, Bronze Star, the Purple Heart, and numerous other military decorations.

---

Citation: Gerald R. Ford: "Executive Order 11803—Establishing a Clemency Board to Review Certain Convictions of Persons Under Section 12 or 6 (j) of the Military Selective Service Act and Certain Discharges Issued Because of, and Certain Convictions for, Violations of Article 85, 86, or 87 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice and to Make Recommendations for Executive Clemency with Respect Thereto," September 16, 1974. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=23895.

A DISCUSSION OF MERCY AND COMPASSION

 THERE ARE THOUSANDS OF ALICE JOHNSON'S

It is more apparent now than ever before that today’s cannabis business enterprise is yesterday’s marijuana conspiracy.  Marijuana prohibition is a big government program.

I’m writing to ask you to support our effort to secure clemency and retroactive sentencing relief for nonviolent marijuana offenders serving sentences of life without parole and other egregiously long sentences for cannabis.  The current climate of legalization has made these sentences an Eighth Amendment issue.  It can be said that this sentencing fosters disrespect for the criminal justice system.

For the past ten years, Life for Pot has been advocating for sentencing relief/clemency for nonviolent marijuana offenders.  Tangentially, this would also include removing marijuana from the CSA Schedule.

Over the years, we have encouraged criminal justice reform groups to carve out marijuana sentencing as a category that needs individual emphasis.  There has been very little interest in this category, although many do break out juveniles, women, minorities and crack cocaine.

 

The reason for this hesitance is not clear to me but the discussion always seems to gravitate to a discussion about inclusiveness and a perception that a carve out for marijuana offenders would imply that they were more “worthy” of consideration than other people serving egregious sentences for all drugs and nonviolent people charged with a violent offense on the worst day of their lives. 

We see this carve out as comparable to categories for women, minorities, juveniles, crack offenders.  We also believe that if we cannot find mercy and compassion for nonviolent marijuana offenders we have very little hope that there will be a shift toward redemption for all.   

In the current climate of legalization, Please consider marijuana sentencing reform as a category for advocacy.   The impact of marijuana prohibition and its huge influence on egregious prosecution and incarceration needs attention. It may in fact be the single most influential policy in introducing youth and disadvantaged communities to the criminal justice system. 

In 2017, there were 659,700 arrests for marijuana offenses.  They were not all prosecuted, but the intersection with the criminal justice system and the arrest record, begins the long journey.  No doubt, many of these arrests are disadvantaged

youth and young adults.  In many cases these individuals are low hanging fruit for law enforcement statistics.

Additionally we would address the fact that there are nonviolent people serving sentences of life without parole for a product that is now a billion dollar industry.  These individuals serving life sentences will not receive sentencing relief through the First Step Act as they were charged with conspiracy and were sentenced without plea agreements or substantial assistance.  These nonviolent people will not receive sentencing relief from the First Step Act.  They need Presidential Commutations. 

WHEN WARS END - CLEMENCY IS GRANTED 

TODAY'S CANNABIS BUSINESS PLAN IS YESTERDAY'S MARIJUANA CONSPIRACY

END THE FAILED WAR ON MARIJUANA

WE NEED CLEMENCY FOR A CATEGORY OF PRISONERS - THOSE SERVING SENTENCES OF LIFE WITHOUT PAROLE FOR MARIJUANA

 Life for Pot web site

Over 600,000 arrests per year are because of marijuana prohibition Cannabis Enterprises are a $20,000,000.000.00  dollar business and growing People serving sentences of life without parole for marijuana offenses need Presidential Clemency/sentencing relief 

This is why we need Clemency and Sentencing Reform 

 

War Metaphors have made the US the World’s Jailer

We Give Life Sentences to Nonviolent Drug Offenders

The Result of the War on Drugs

   1. Coarsened our Culture

   2. Increased the use of conspiracy charges

   3. Diluted our Sixth Amendment Right to Trial

   4. Increased the prison population by 734% since 1980   

   5. Increased the cost of incarceration by 2,000% since 1980

   6. Made us the World’s Jailer

Nonviolent drug offenders do not receive sentences of life without parole in any other developed country. 

This sentence is fiscally irresponsible, does not speak to mercy, compassion, does not fit the crime and is not just.

Conspiracy charges coupled with exercising your 6^th amendment right to trial results in a sentence many times higher than

Co-defendants. 

Conspiracy makes you responsible for the offenses of multitudes of people over all the years of the conspiracy.

There is no definitive evidence, only the testimony of:

1. Co-operating witnesses testifying for a plea,

2. Confidential informants testifying for money or a % of the forfeiture and

3. Agents

Examples of Clemency Granted for Categories of Offenders

Washington Granted Clemency to members of the Whiskey Rebellion

Jefferson Granted Clemency to violators of the Sedition Act

Madison Granted Clemency to the Lafitte Pirates after War of 1812

Lincoln Granted Clemency to Dakota Indians and Civil War Deserters

Johnson Granted Clemency to Confederate Soldiers

Grant Granted Clemency to Confederate Leaders

Harrison Granted Clemency to LDS members for 
plural marriages
         

Roosevelt Granted Clemency to participants of Philippine Insurrection

Harding Granted Clemency to violators of WWI Sedition Act

Kennedy Granted Clemency to violators of the Narcotic Control Act

Ford Granted Clemency to violators of Selective
Service Act - Over 13,000

Carter Granted Clemency to violators of Selective
Service Act

Hemp is Finally Legal

Life for Pot

Hemp Is Finally Legal. Let’s See if It Can Save the World

David Bienenstock

December 12, 2018

In 1985, legendary cannabis activist Jack Herer published a magnum opus called The Emperor Wears No Clothes, which through painstaking research told the hidden history of hemp—a once-revered crop cultivated for more than 10,000 years that played a vital role in America’s economy from colonial times until the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 made growing it a federal crime.