New Hampshire House urges feds to allow hemp

GARRY RAYNO
State House Bureau
 
CONCORD – The House Wednesday voted 260-41 to urge the federal government to allow cultivation of hemp for industrial purposes.
After years of trying to legalize the growing of hemp in New Hampshire, supporters did win a small victory Wednesday with House Resolution 20, although it does not have the rule of law, but is an expression of the House’s wishes.
 
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http://www.unionleader.com/article/20120215/NEWS06/120219963

Oklahoma parole board agrees to give Spottedcrow, guilty seller of $31 in pot, early hearing

Patricia Spottedcrow sits on her bunk in a dorm at the Dr. Eddie Warrior Correctional Facility in Taft in December. Spottedcrow is one year into her eight-year prison sentence for selling a small amount of marijuana to a police informant with her children present in Kingfisher. JOHN CLANTON/Tulsa World file
Patricia Spottedcrow sits on her bunk in a dorm at the Dr. Eddie Warrior Correctional Facility in Taft in December. Spottedcrow is one year into her eight-year prison sentence for selling a small amount of marijuana to a police informant with her children present in Kingfisher. JOHN CLANTON/Tulsa World file
 
By GINNIE GRAHAM World Staff Writer
 
A Kingfisher woman serving an eight-year prison sentence on a first-time offense for selling $31 in marijuana is getting a chance at parole after the board unanimously agreed to hear her case early.
Patricia Spottedcrow, 26, is scheduled to appear on the Pardon and Parole Board’s docket April 17-20 in Oklahoma City.
Board member Marc Dreyer of Tulsa had asked for a pre-docket investigation report on Spottedcrow. After reviewing the findings, he made a motion at the January board meeting to speed up her parole hearing.
Others agreed.
“I thought her case was worthy of consideration,” Dreyer said.
Spottedcrow was arrested and charged for selling the marijuana to a police informant in December 2009 and January 2010. Her mother, Delita Starr, 51, was also charged.
Because children were in the home, a charge of possession of a dangerous substance in the presence of a minor was added.
In blind pleas before a judge, Spottedcrow received a 12-year sentence and her mother received a 30-year suspended sentence. Neither had prior criminal convictions.
At the time, Kingfisher County did not have a community sentencing program, such as a Drug Court or Women in Recovery.
When Spottedcrow was booked, after her sentence was handed down, marijuana was found in the jacket she was wearing. She pleaded guilty to that additional charge and was sentenced to two years running concurrent with the previous sentence.
After her story was published in the Tulsa World, a groundswell of support grew. Supporters expressed concern with possible racial bias, unequal punishment among crimes, women in prison, effects on children of incarcerated parents and extreme sentences for drug offenses.
In October, a Kingfisher County judge took four years off her sentence.
 
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http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=487&articleid=20120216_11_A1_CUTLIN935224
 

Meat worker gets more than $20k for personal grievance

By Matthew Backhouse
 
A seasonal meat worker who was not re-hired due to suspected cannabis use, despite passing a drug test, has been reinstated and paid more than $20,000 in compensation.
Melissa Mackie worked for four seasons at the South Pacific Meats plant in Invercargill, starting in 2006, but was not re-hired for a fifth season in 2010, an Employment Relations Authority (ERA) finding released today said.
It is standard practice for seasonal meat workers to be laid off at the end of each season and re-employed the next.
Plant manager Malcolm Hampton wrote to Ms Mackie on July 19 to advise her that offers of employment for the new season would be contingent on employees returning a negative drug test.
 
Ms Mackie passed the test but Mr Hampton wrote to her on July 30 to inform her she would not be re-hired.
Mr Hampton said the decision not to re-hire her was based on staffing needs at the time and the fact she suffered a workplace shoulder injury at the end of the previous season.
But he also cited her partner Henry Kingi’s recent conviction for growing cannabis, which he said raised concerns she may be a cannabis user herself, despite having returned a negative test result.
 
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http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10785718

Thermopal Hemp Fiber Boards Offer A Sustainable Choice

LEUTIRCH, GERMANY – In addition to the HPL composite board “Hanffaser Composite”, Thermopal is now also offering the lower-priced “Decor-Hanffaser” decorative hemp fiber board as a direct-coated melamine resin board. “This means that customers will now also find a high quality, user-orientated selection among our sustainable hemp fibre products,” said product manager Christina Müller-Witzemann.
The use of hemp fibre shives that occur during the processing of a hemp plant make the core material much lighter than standard boards. This makes it the perfect addition to the wood material specialist’s program of lightweight boards.
 
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http://www.woodworkingnetwork.com/news/woodworking-industry-trends-press-releases/Thermopal-Hemp-Fibre-Boards-Off-Sustainable-Choice-139309993.html?ref=993
 

Colorado House bill allowing study of hemp’s soil-cleaning potential has panel’s backing

By John Ingold
The Denver Post

 
A bill to study the benefits of growing industrial hemp cleared its first hurdle in the state legislature Monday.
The bill, from state Rep. Wes McKinley, D-Cokedale, received unanimous support in the House Local Government Committee despite questions about whether it would create a showdown with the federal government, which considers it illegal to grow hemp. The study, which would be funded with private money, would look at whether industrial hemp is effective at sucking pollutants from the soil, as some research suggests it might be.
“We simply don’t have the data,” said Erik Hunter, a Ph.D. candidate at the Colorado School of Mines who studies using plants to clean soils — a process known as phytoremediation. “We would be creating a new body of data.”
Hunter noted that hemp was planted at the Chernobyl nuclear-disaster site in the hopes of cleaning radiation from the ground. On that premise — and on the potential for other uses of hemp for food, textiles and fuel — lawmakers were intrigued.
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http://www.denverpost.com/recommended/ci_19958149

Attorneys General light up pot debate

 
MATT KIELTYKA

METRO CANADA

 
Four former B.C. Attorneys General have joined the crusade to legalize marijuana.
Colin Gabelmann, Ujjal Dosanjh, Graeme Bowbrick and Geoff Plant all signed onto the Stop the Violence B.C. coalition Tuesday and sent a letter to both Premier Christy Clark and NDP opposition leader Adrian Dix to endorse legalizing, regulating and taxing marijuana.
Doing so will curb gang violence and crime, raise tax revenue and ease the load of the court system, they say.
“We should be prosecuting murderers and gangsters, not young people for small amounts of possession,” Dosanjh said.
“It’s not a smart way to deal with crime and there’s a significant consensus that is evolving in this country and in the U.S.”
 
 
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http://www.metronews.ca/ottawa/canada/article/1098116–attorneys-general-light-up-pot-debate
 

West Virginia lawmaker wants to legalize medical marijuana

By CRISSY CLUTTER, WOWK-TV

 
It’s been a called a gateway drug by some. Others claim it’s the only treatment that works.
The debate over legalizing medical marijuana has come to West Virginia. Monday, Del. Mike Manypenny, D-Taylor, presented House Bill 4498.
The bill would allow patients with a wide variety of serious, debilitating conditions, such as cancer, HIV/AIDS, glaucoma, multiple sclerosis, Crohn’s disease and severe pain, to use medical marijuana with prescription from a doctor.
 
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http://www.statejournal.com/story/16934793/wva-lawmaker-wants-to-legalize-medical-marijuana