DrugSense
posted on March 6, 2013 by
US HI: Pot Classified Incorrectly, Lawyer Argues
Honolulu Star-Advertiser, 05 Mar 2013 – Hawaii island marijuana advocate Roger Christie urged a federal judge Monday to be the first in the country to dismiss marijuana charges because he contends the drug incorrectly falls under the most restrictive federal classification of drugs. Christie’s lawyer, Thomas Otake, told U.S. District Judge Leslie Kobayashi that dismissing the charges would be historic. He said Washington and Colorado recently legalized marijuana and that Hawaii and 17 other states permit medical marijuana.
posted on February 28, 2013 by
US HI: Editorial: Troubling Delays in Bringing Christie to
Honolulu Star-Advertiser, 26 Feb 2013 – Whatever anyone thinks of Roger Christie’s argument that drug laws inhibit the free practice of religion by the church he runs, the way his case is playing out is disturbing. The Hawaii island marijuana advocate has been held in federal detention for more than 2-1/2 years. Due to various complexities of the case, including changes in his own legal representation, it’s hard to know who’s at fault for all the delays. But even an overextended law-and-order system is supposed to do its work as quickly as possible. Justice delayed is justice denied, as they say. – — MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
posted on February 18, 2013 by
US HI: Editorial: Repeal Drug Mandatory Minimums
Honolulu Star-Advertiser, 18 Feb 2013 – Hawaii is one of the nation’s safest states from violent crime but prison walls have been spilling over to Arizona because of another policy: mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenses. A federal sentencing commission determined two years ago that such sentencing rules are "excessively severe" and studies in Hawaii agree. Putting offenders behind bars for a requisite period in drug cases is harsh, futile and expensive, and state legislators should put the mandate aside. Congress approved mandatory minimum sentences as part of the "war on drugs" in the 1970s. Hawaii passed its mandatory minimum for drug offenders in 1986 and so did most other states. By the 1990s, then-U.S. Chief Justice William Rehnquist acknowledged that those measures were "perhaps a good example of the law of unintended consequences."
