LP RELEASE: CA medical marijuana ruling

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NEWS FROM THE LIBERTARIAN PARTY
2600 Virginia Avenue, NW, Suite 100
Washington DC 20037
World Wide Web: http://www.LP.org
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For release: June 6, 2003
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For additional information:
George Getz, Communications Director
Phone: (202) 333-0008 
E-Mail: Pressreleases@hq.LP.org
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Libertarians commend jurors, judge
for one-day sentence in medical marijuana case

WASHINGTON, DC -- A federal judge who handed down a one-day sentence to 
medical marijuana advocate Ed Rosenthal in California should be 
commended along with the jurors who pressured him to do so, 
Libertarians say. 

"Judge Charles R. Breyer just gave every drug warrior in America a 
cold, hard slap in the face," said Ron Crickenberger, political 
director of the Libertarian Party. "If every judge displayed this much 
common sense, the government's war on sick and dying Americans could be 
over within weeks."

Breyer, a U.S. District judge in San Francisco, ignored federal 
prosecutors' recommendation for a five-year term and sentenced 
Rosenthal to one day in jail on Wednesday for growing 100 marijuana 
plants. Breyer also set Rosenthal free immediately, saying he had 
already served the time.

Because federal law prohibits medical marijuana, Breyer had refused 
during the trial to allow jurors to hear evidence that Rosenthal was 
raising the plants with the explicit approval of local health 
officials.  Upon learning that after the trial, jurors publicly 
repudiated their guilty verdict and demanded that the judge spare 
Rosenthal from prison.

"Fortunately, Breyer eventually did the right thing," Crickenberger 
said. "But unfortunately, not every medical marijuana patient is as 
lucky as Ed Rosenthal.  

"In California and the seven other states that have adopted medical 
marijuana laws, federal drug agents have raided and ransacked clinics 
and dragged suffering, terminally ill people off to jail," 
Crickenberger said. 

"Federal judges routinely refuse to allow jurors to hear evidence about 
marijuana's medical benefits, or that medical marijuana is legal under 
their state laws. And many terminally ill AIDS and cancer patients are 
wasting away in prison, where they have been prevented from using their 
medication.    

"The fact is that by continuing to enforce federal medical marijuana 
laws, the government is sentencing its own citizens to a slow-motion 
execution."

One of the most poignant examples is the case of Peter McWilliams, a 
bestselling author and Libertarian Party member who died in California 
on June 14, 2000 after being denied his medicine, Crickenberger pointed 
out. 

"Peter had suffered from AIDS and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and had used 
medical marijuana to suppress the nausea caused by his other 
medications," he said. "While out on bail awaiting sentencing for his 
'crime,' he was prohibited from using medical marijuana -- a decision 
that almost certainly led to his death.  How is what the government did 
to Peter any different from premeditated, cold-blooded murder?"

Another example: Steve Kubby, former Libertarian candidate for 
California governor and a prime mover behind Prop 215, who uses medical 
marijuana to treat a rare form of adrenal cancer.

"Steve was arrested when police raided his Olympic Valley, California 
home in 1999, and was convicted in December 2000 of two minor drug 
possession charges. To avoid a jail term, he moved to Canada with his 
wife and two young daughters," Crickenberger said. 

"Like so many others, Steve has been forced to choose between 
abandoning his country and dying a slow, painful death in prison."

Future tragedies like these could be avoided with help from more jurors 
who demand the truth and more judges who are willing to buck the system 
as Breyer did, Crickenberger said.

"The long-term solution is to elect enough Libertarians to Congress to 
repeal ludicrous laws that turn Americans into criminals for trying to 
save their own lives," he said. "But until that happens, let's 
encourage judges to give every medical marijuana patient in America the 
'Ed Rosenthal' treatment."




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