DEA Invades California

[Pinch]

DEA invades California – please help
E-mail received 7:30 Pacific


Dear Pinch:

Thank you for financially supporting the Marijuana Policy Project in 2005. Would you please consider making one last donation before the end of the year? California's medical marijuana law is under attack, so there couldn't be a better time to speak your mind ...


- On December 9, six federal DEA agents invaded a Ukiah, California resident's home without knocking, pointed automatic weapons at him, and searched his house without producing a search warrant or any identification. "It intimidated the bejesus out of me," Clay Young said. "I said, 'Don't point that thing at me.' I was scared." After Young called the local sheriff's office, he was told the agents were "in the general area looking for information."


- On December 12, federal agents raided 13 medical marijuana clinics in San Diego. "They came in with guns (drawn) ... lined us up outside and handcuffed us," one employee told reporters.


- On December 20, a dozen DEA agents raided the home of a San Francisco couple operating a medical marijuana clinic, seizing 122 plants and $20,000 in assets. "They beat on the door. They took me outside in my underwear and cuffed me and then searched the house," Steve Smith told local media. No arrests were made.


If you're as outraged by these reports as I am, please read on to learn how MPP is fighting back and – if you like what we're doing – please donate to our work today. Your support is crucial. Would you please donate just $10 to help us keep up the fight?


One of our major projects right now is in San Diego, where the county Board of Supervisors voted 4-0 last month to try to overturn the state's citizen-enacted medical marijuana law. MPP is responding by (1) generating dozens of calls daily from San Diego voters to the county supervisors,(2) working with activists on the ground to generate substantial media coverage, (3) helping to pack the audience for the next board of supervisors meeting to urge them to stop defying the will of the people, and (4) commissioning a public opinion poll that will almost surely demonstrate that the voters oppose the supervisors' obstructionism.


All of this will culminate in a contentious, lively debate at the supervisors' January 10 meeting, where we hope they will back down from their attack on California's medical marijuana law. The room will be packed with activists affiliated with Americans for Safe Access, MPP, local medical marijuana clinics, and other organizations.


We have every reason to believe that we can succeed in San Diego, given what happened in Kern County, California last week ...


After the Kern County Board of Supervisors announced that it might delay issuing ID cards to medical marijuana patients – in violation of state law – MPP struck hard. After MPP generated hundreds of calls from residents to the supervisors – and dozens of citizens unconnected to MPP showed up to the board's meeting to testify against its actions – the previously hostile board voted unanimously to implement state law after all! As a result, the Kern County government will soon be issuing ID cards to protect patients from arrest when they grow, possess, or use medical marijuana.


MPP has a proven track record of success, but we need your help to fight aggressively against California politicians' attacks on their state's medical marijuana law. Would you please donate $10 or more today?


Please don't close this e-mail without clicking here to make a donation before the close of the year.


Thank you,

Rob Kampia
Executive Director
Marijuana Policy Project
Washington, D.C.


P.S. Your donation can be fully tax-deductible. Click here to donate by December 31 to receive a tax-deduction for 2005.
"They came in with guns (drawn) ... lined us up outside and handcuffed us."

"They took me outside in my underwear and cuffed me and then searched the house."

– victims of California medical marijuana raids

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Donate! The ass you save may be your own!

 

[Pinch]

I was gabbing with a grower at BPG, on San Pablo in Berkeley and he said something really interesting.

He asked, "Did you ever notice that the DEA always strikes in SF and seldom in Berkeley or Oakland."

I said, "Yeah, weird".. thank god I live in East Bay (CC County, Berkeley/Oakland)!

 

[SmokeyMacPot]

Yeah Pinch. Sucks that they did that. Power abusing bastids.

 

[paperbag]

got a donation link?

 

[420]

what does mpp say about the recent co-op raids pinch?

 

[Damagoman]

House Vote
Marijuana Policy Project - Press Releases Frontpage Content Listing

Raids increase
Marijuana Policy Project - Press Releases Frontpage Content Listing

Willie in Austin, Free the Weed concert
Marijuana Policy Project - Press Releases Frontpage Content Listing

 

[420]

thanks bro!

 

[Pinch]

Mr DaMago posted what little MPP has published on it...

This is a post I put up before heading off to Chicago last week:

California

And as you'll read, Oregon was getting "DEAed"* too! Seems it was a West Coast operation by the FEDS.

*DEAed=Fucked over!

Footnote: ASA (headquartered in Berkeley) was on top of this story.

 

[Damagoman]

Totaly planned to go down even before
the vote in the House was counted.
Rattlin' cages and tryin' to drive us back underground.
While they call us terrorists and try to turn folks against Us.

Screwin' from Both Ends, east coast and west coast.

 

[Pinch]

Here's something I read today...

Dispensary Progress in LA Despite DEA Raids
City Council Starts Regulatory Process; Calls on DEA to Cease and Desist

For two years, ASA organizers have been working with city officials in Los Angeles to ensure safe access to medical marijuana, educating them on the needs of patients and the benefits of a sound regulatory approach. The efforts of ASA and other patient advocates has resulted in significant progress in LA, so much so that the DEA has made it a target.

On the same day that the Los Angeles City Council was preparing to take an important step toward regulating the operation of medical cannabis dispensing cooperatives, federal agents staged another set of coordinated paramilitary raids designed to intimidate local officials and patients. The raids on ten dispensaries came within weeks of the DEA sending over a hundred threatening letters to landlords of LA dispensaries, telling them the dispensaries are operating illegally under federal law and that the landlords could lose their buildings to federal asset forfeiture.

These attacks on patient access were similar to the dozen simultaneous raids conducted in January. Like then, ASA activists sprang into immediate action, organizing protestors at dispensaries while raids were still going on and alerting the local media, which turned out in force.

Within two hours of the raids starting, over 200 patients and advocates had gathered at one Hollywood dispensary, blockading the entrances and preventing DEA agents from leaving until they released the employees being detained.

That same day, the Los Angeles City Council - under the leadership of Councilmember Dennis Zine, a former LA police officer with whom ASA has worked closely - voted overwhelmingly to establish the groundwork for a regulatory process for medical cannabis dispensaries that ASA has been advocating for two years.

The council then all signed a letter to the DEA and then unanimously approved a motion endorsing the Hinchey-Rohrabacher amendment, which would prevent future DEA attacks on state medical marijuana programs.

Councilmember Zine also joined ASA before the hearing in a press conference calling on the DEA to abandon its attacks on medical cannabis dispensaries and allow LA to move forward without further federal interference.

ASA's communication efforts helped ensure that LA media covered the raids and City Council actions from the patients' perspective - not the DEA's. And the story was picked up by the major networks and carried by hundreds of television and radio stations as well as newspapers across the country.

ASA : August 2007 Activist Newsletter