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It's probably not what Army Reserve veteran Augustine Stanley imagined might happen.
But in the month since going public in this column about losing his job as a longtime jail officer when he tested positive for medical marijuana, the stoic, subdued Stanley has become the national embodiment of the controversy over treating of post-traumatic stress disorder with pot.
His story has appeared in national publications from Military Times to Hemp News, and he's heard from public officials and the public alike.
On Tuesday, Stanley and his wife, Anetra, joined Congresswoman Michelle Lujan Grisham, state Rep. Antonio "Moe" Maestas and members of pro-pot and pro-vet groups to launch a campaign aimed at protecting New Mexico's military veterans' legal access to cannabis.
The Freedom To Choose campaign, sponsored by the Drug Policy Alliance, hopes to educate the public about medical marijuana as a legitimate health care choice that has, at least anecdotally, proved successful in treating veterans who come home from the battlefields with PTSD, chronic pain and other wounds of war.
New Mexico has led the way in this treatment, becoming the first state to implement a licensed medical marijuana production and distribution system in 2007 and the first to recognize PTSD as a qualifying condition two years later.
So, see, New Mexico? We're No. 1 in something.
Connecticut and Delaware also allow for the treatment of PTSD with medical marijuana; last month lawmakers in Oregon and Maine passed bills that would expand their medical marijuana programs to include PTSD as a qualifying diagnosis.
About 42 percent of all medical marijuana users in New Mexico qualify for the program under the diagnosis of PTSD, many of them military vets.
"Now we have a medicine that works for New Mexico veterans," said Maestas, an Albuquerque Democrat who was instrumental in passing legislation to implement the medical marijuana program — with the support of then-state Health Secretary Lujan Grisham. "The naysayers still say there's no medical use for marijuana. All you have to do is speak to one veteran to see this isn't so."
One veteran, like Stanley.
You may recall that Stanley, 32, had worked as a corrections officer at the Metropolitan Detention Center since 1999, fresh out of high school.
He was deployed to Iraq in 2004 as an Army Reserve convoy security specialist and returned a year later a changed man, riddled with anxiety, insomnia, depression and anger. He was diagnosed with PTSD in 2011, but the medications he was prescribed left him feeling like a zombie, he said.
At the suggestion of another corrections officer with PTSD, Stanley qualified for the state medical marijuana program in the summer of 2012. That, he and his wife said, restored his ability to function and feel, and with no debilitating side effects.
"It has done wonders," Stanley said during Tuesday's teleconference. "It has given me all the joys of life back."
But it also cost him his job of 13 years after a random drug test last September came back positive for cannabis. MDC spokeswoman Nataura Powdrell said in this column June 17 that Stanley was fired not over medical marijuana but because he hadn't notified his supervisor about his use of a controlled substance.
But when asked whether MDC has an employee policy on medical marijuana, Powdrell said at the time that the jail's legal folks were still working on that.
So, are they still working? That's unclear.
And the answer on medical marijuana use for its employees? That's still a no.
"There is a conflict between state law and federal law which we believe still needs to be addressed," Powdrell said. "Our policy, as it now stands, does not allow for medical marijuana use. Also, all the relevant case law that we have found is consistent in holding public safety employees to a higher standard in not allowing medical marijuana use."
Which leads one to wonder whether MDC and other like-minded employers would prefer its employees "zombified," as Stanley described it, and facing unknown long-term side effects with less effective prescription drugs or unstable and unpredictable because they forgo treatment altogether — or unemployed.
This, then, is a new kind of reefer madness, a conflict between what works and the right to work based partly on hysteria and antiquated misconceptions and partly on federal law that still considers marijuana, medical or otherwise, illegal.
So far, the courts nationally have sided with employers, holding that while medical marijuana laws may protect the user from criminal action, they don't trump workplace drug policies.
While it is true that employees, especially those in security jobs, must be held to a standard that keeps them clearheaded and capable, it is also true that Stanley and many medical marijuana users are not the stereotypical stoner dudes toking doobies in bathrooms. As Stanley has said, he smokes before bed or off the clock when a panic attack strikes — much like anyone might with prescription medication — and his work production has never been compromised.
Stanley said that although there has been no progress in his efforts to get his MDC job back, he has been heartened by the outpouring of support.
"Knowing that we haven't been cast out by the public has been reassuring," he said. "We just hope that the county follows suit as well."
Lujan Grisham, at Tuesday's teleconference, said she wants to do everything she can to promote medical marijuana as a tool to treat military vets in all 50 states.
She might start first with MDC right in her own state.
News Hawk- Truth Seeker 420 MAGAZINE ®
Source: abqjournal.com
Author: Joline Gutierrez Krueger
Contact: » Contact Us | ABQ Journal
Website: » Veteran battles for pot policy help | ABQ Journal
But in the month since going public in this column about losing his job as a longtime jail officer when he tested positive for medical marijuana, the stoic, subdued Stanley has become the national embodiment of the controversy over treating of post-traumatic stress disorder with pot.
His story has appeared in national publications from Military Times to Hemp News, and he's heard from public officials and the public alike.
On Tuesday, Stanley and his wife, Anetra, joined Congresswoman Michelle Lujan Grisham, state Rep. Antonio "Moe" Maestas and members of pro-pot and pro-vet groups to launch a campaign aimed at protecting New Mexico's military veterans' legal access to cannabis.
The Freedom To Choose campaign, sponsored by the Drug Policy Alliance, hopes to educate the public about medical marijuana as a legitimate health care choice that has, at least anecdotally, proved successful in treating veterans who come home from the battlefields with PTSD, chronic pain and other wounds of war.
New Mexico has led the way in this treatment, becoming the first state to implement a licensed medical marijuana production and distribution system in 2007 and the first to recognize PTSD as a qualifying condition two years later.
So, see, New Mexico? We're No. 1 in something.
Connecticut and Delaware also allow for the treatment of PTSD with medical marijuana; last month lawmakers in Oregon and Maine passed bills that would expand their medical marijuana programs to include PTSD as a qualifying diagnosis.
About 42 percent of all medical marijuana users in New Mexico qualify for the program under the diagnosis of PTSD, many of them military vets.
"Now we have a medicine that works for New Mexico veterans," said Maestas, an Albuquerque Democrat who was instrumental in passing legislation to implement the medical marijuana program — with the support of then-state Health Secretary Lujan Grisham. "The naysayers still say there's no medical use for marijuana. All you have to do is speak to one veteran to see this isn't so."
One veteran, like Stanley.
You may recall that Stanley, 32, had worked as a corrections officer at the Metropolitan Detention Center since 1999, fresh out of high school.
He was deployed to Iraq in 2004 as an Army Reserve convoy security specialist and returned a year later a changed man, riddled with anxiety, insomnia, depression and anger. He was diagnosed with PTSD in 2011, but the medications he was prescribed left him feeling like a zombie, he said.
At the suggestion of another corrections officer with PTSD, Stanley qualified for the state medical marijuana program in the summer of 2012. That, he and his wife said, restored his ability to function and feel, and with no debilitating side effects.
"It has done wonders," Stanley said during Tuesday's teleconference. "It has given me all the joys of life back."
But it also cost him his job of 13 years after a random drug test last September came back positive for cannabis. MDC spokeswoman Nataura Powdrell said in this column June 17 that Stanley was fired not over medical marijuana but because he hadn't notified his supervisor about his use of a controlled substance.
But when asked whether MDC has an employee policy on medical marijuana, Powdrell said at the time that the jail's legal folks were still working on that.
So, are they still working? That's unclear.
And the answer on medical marijuana use for its employees? That's still a no.
"There is a conflict between state law and federal law which we believe still needs to be addressed," Powdrell said. "Our policy, as it now stands, does not allow for medical marijuana use. Also, all the relevant case law that we have found is consistent in holding public safety employees to a higher standard in not allowing medical marijuana use."
Which leads one to wonder whether MDC and other like-minded employers would prefer its employees "zombified," as Stanley described it, and facing unknown long-term side effects with less effective prescription drugs or unstable and unpredictable because they forgo treatment altogether — or unemployed.
This, then, is a new kind of reefer madness, a conflict between what works and the right to work based partly on hysteria and antiquated misconceptions and partly on federal law that still considers marijuana, medical or otherwise, illegal.
So far, the courts nationally have sided with employers, holding that while medical marijuana laws may protect the user from criminal action, they don't trump workplace drug policies.
While it is true that employees, especially those in security jobs, must be held to a standard that keeps them clearheaded and capable, it is also true that Stanley and many medical marijuana users are not the stereotypical stoner dudes toking doobies in bathrooms. As Stanley has said, he smokes before bed or off the clock when a panic attack strikes — much like anyone might with prescription medication — and his work production has never been compromised.
Stanley said that although there has been no progress in his efforts to get his MDC job back, he has been heartened by the outpouring of support.
"Knowing that we haven't been cast out by the public has been reassuring," he said. "We just hope that the county follows suit as well."
Lujan Grisham, at Tuesday's teleconference, said she wants to do everything she can to promote medical marijuana as a tool to treat military vets in all 50 states.
She might start first with MDC right in her own state.
News Hawk- Truth Seeker 420 MAGAZINE ®
Source: abqjournal.com
Author: Joline Gutierrez Krueger
Contact: » Contact Us | ABQ Journal
Website: » Veteran battles for pot policy help | ABQ Journal
