Santa Rosa Court Orders Police To Return
19 Pounds Of
Medicinal Marijuana
Morning
Edition, March 6, 2007 · Police in
the Northern California city
of Santa Rosa will find themselves in an odd
position Tuesday — in
front of a Superior Court judge, defending themselves
on contempt
of court charges.
by David Gorn
Morning
Edition, March 6, 2007 · Police in
the Northern California city of Santa Rosa will find themselves in an odd
position Tuesday — in front of a Superior Court judge, defending themselves
on contempt of court charges.
It all stems from the police department's refusal to give up 19 pounds of
confiscated marijuana. And it highlights an interesting question: What are
police supposed to do, when the California medicinal marijuana law conflicts
with federal drug laws?
The case started when Shashon Jenkins was standing one day on the back
balcony at his old apartment building, when the calm and quiet of one morning
in suburban Santa Rosa was harshly interrupted.
"When I looked over, and peered over the balcony, officers were
running into the next apartment, guns drawn," he said. "Officers
ordered me back inside my house."
Police were raiding Jenkins' neighbor for narcotics. They caught sight of
Jenkins on the balcony, holding a stem of marijuana in his hand. So after
their raid next door, the officers crowded onto the stairwell outside Jenkins'
apartment, and came knocking.
"It was very tense, seven firearms, very intense," Jenkins said.
Police raided Jenkins' home, arrested him, seized a number of lights for
growing plants and 45 full-grown plants. In all, it was more than 19 pounds of
pot. Later, at Jenkins' hearing, he produced witnesses and paperwork to
confirm that he legally uses medicinal marijuana to treat chronic back pain.
He also has caregiver status — that means he grows medical marijuana for
those patients unable to grow it themselves — and so the district attorney
dropped the case.
The judge ordered police to return Jenkins' belongings, including the
armload of marijuana. Police said no.
One of these policemen is Sgt. Eric Litchfield. Litchfield said it's
galling to hand back such a large supply of pot. He said the medical marijuana
law is "vague and poorly written, at best, and is in complete conflict
with federal law, which we're also bound to uphold and maintain as well."
Under federal law, marijuana is illegal to possess under any circumstances.
But in California and 10 other states, it's legal for some medical patients to
smoke it.
Marsha Cohen, a law professor at University of California Hastings Law
School, says the one big uncertainty in California's measure is that it's
unclear on the economics of medical marijuana — who can possess large
quantities of marijuana, how large those quantities can be and all the details
of how pot should be bought and sold.
"So instead of dealing with the question of where this marijuana would
magically come from, they simply finessed that and did not provide for either
the purchase or the sale of marijuana in the original proposition," she
said.
That's the sticking point for law enforcement and for the courts. No one is
supposed to profit from medicinal marijuana sales, and the fear is that
ignoring large growers of pot is tacitly condoning drug trafficking.
The court will try to work out the details and limits of marijuana
enforcement, beginning Tuesday afternoon in Sonoma County.
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