By DAVID FERRARA
LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL
Steven Ficano wept as the clerk read the verdict: not guilty on both counts.
He embraced his lawyers, who had tears in their eyes. A few members of the jury cried, too.
For almost three years Ficano has faced two felony counts, one of which could have sent him to prison for up to 10 years.
With red eyes, the 65-year-old Las Vegas man and his wife hugged and thanked each of the 12 Clark County jurors as they left the courtroom at the conclusion of his four-day trial.
The jurors took about an hour to acquit Ficano on charges of possession of marijuana and possession of marijuana with the intent to sell.
Prosecutors had argued that Ficano kept far more than he was legally allowed at his northwest valley residence and that he planned to sell the pot.
But Ficano’s lawyers, Dustin Marcello and Mike Miceli, brought in three of Ficano’s neighbors — a firefighter, a former police sergeant and a school district employee — who all said they did not believe he would sell the drug.
The defense noted that much has changed since charges were filed in October, 2012.
“We’re not used to treating it as a medicine,” Marcello said. “Well, those days are over.”
Full Article:
http://www.reviewjournal.com/news/pot-news/jury-acquits-medical-marijuana-patient-felony-charges
Category: Cannabis News Corner
Man with life sentence for pot has sentence commuted
BY KEVIN S. HELD AND ANTHONY KIEKOW
JEFFERSON CITY, MO (KTVI) – Governor Jay Nixon commuted the sentence for Missouri’s only man serving life in prison for non-violent marijuana-related offenses.
Jeff Mizanskey, now 62, was arrested during an undercover drug bust in Sedalia in 1993. He was sentenced in 1996 under the state’s Prior and Persistent Drug Offender Law, which is a three-strike system.
At the time of Mizanskey’s arrest, police were after a drug dealer who hired two men to smuggled more than 100 pounds of marijuana across state lines. When police followed the smugglers to a hotel where the dealer was, they found Mizanskey, who already had two strikes on his record. The third gave him life without parole.
Full Article:
http://fox2now.com/2015/05/22/man-with-life-sentence-for-pot-has-sentence-commuted/
Pine Ridge reservation farmer banned from growing hemp seeks reprieve
By The Associated Press
PINE RIDGE, S.D. — Alex White Plume planted industrial hemp on his Pine Ridge farm more than a decade ago, but never harvested a crop. Now, he says it’s time to grow again.
White Plume, an Oglala Sioux tribal member, wants to grow hemp again on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation thanks to guidelines laid out by the federal Department of Justice in December allowing tribes to decide whether to grow and sell marijuana, South Dakota Public Broadcasting reported earlier this spring.
Full Article:
http://www.thecannabist.co/2015/05/11/pine-ridge-alex-white-plume-industrial-hemp-farming/32351/
Feinstein’s game-changing vote for medical marijuana
By Debra J. Saunders
The Senate Appropriations Committee passed an amendment today to stop the federal government from preventing Veterans Administration doctors from prescribing medical marijuana for American veterans. The Daily Caller reports:
Republican Sen. Steve Daines and Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley forwarded the amendment for inclusion in the Military Construction, Veterans Affairs and Related Agencies Appropriations Act. Specifically, if passed by Congress, the bipartisan amendment would disallow the VA from spending funds to enforce a prohibition against physicians filling out medical marijuana recommendation forms in states where the drug is legal.
The 18-12 vote represents “the first time we’ve ever won a vote on a positive marijuana reform measure in the Senate,” quoth Marijuana Majority chairman Tom Angell. Most amazing of all, Sen. Dianne Feinstein voted for the measure.
Full Article:
http://blog.sfgate.com/djsaunders/2015/05/21/difis-game-changing-vote-for-medical-marijuana/
Please help #SaveWAMM
Greetings WAMM supporter:
As you may have read recently in the Santa Cruz Sentinel, the WAMM collective faces the potential loss of the land where, since 1993, we’ve grown low-cost or no-cost cannabis for seriously ill patients otherwise unable to afford medicine. The loss of this land could mean the end of the collective forever, cutting hundreds of seriously ill patients off from their only supply.
And so we’ve launched a #SaveWAMM! crowdfunding campaign to raise enough money to keep WAMM on the land and growing for our members. We’ve already raised over $10,000 from more than 120 grassroots donors and we’re just getting started!
And so we’ve launched a #SaveWAMM! crowdfunding campaign to raise enough money to keep WAMM on the land and growing for our members. We’ve already raised over $10,000 from more than 120 grassroots donors and we’re just getting started!
Next week, we’re launching a major media campaign to make this story go viral, and I hope I can count on your support. To get the maximum press coverage possible, we must show this campaign is going to succeed by getting even closer to our goal.
And the most effective way for us to raise funds is for you to reach out to those close to you, and help them understand how important WAMM is in your life and for the community.
The official campaign page offers a detailed 20-year history of the collective, including how WAMM survived a DEA raid in 2002, two weeks later handed out free marijuana to terminally ill members on the steps of City Hall surrounded by thousands of supporters, and then successfully sued the federal government.
Or please consider sharing this short video with your friends and loved ones.
I’d love to hear your feedback on the crowdfunding campaign. And here’s three other ways you can help WAMM at this crucial moment:
1) Please consider making even a small a donation now, in the earliest stages of the campaign, as that will encourage others to follow your example and help get things rolling…
2) Please reach out directly to friends, family and others you know who would be inclined to support WAMM and encourage them to join you in doing so.
3) Please share the campaign on your social media (using #SaveWAMM) and encourage others to do so. Include your own personal reason for supporting WAMM.
Or please consider sharing this short video with your friends and loved ones.
I’d love to hear your feedback on the crowdfunding campaign. And here’s three other ways you can help WAMM at this crucial moment:
1) Please consider making even a small a donation now, in the earliest stages of the campaign, as that will encourage others to follow your example and help get things rolling…
2) Please reach out directly to friends, family and others you know who would be inclined to support WAMM and encourage them to join you in doing so.
3) Please share the campaign on your social media (using #SaveWAMM) and encourage others to do so. Include your own personal reason for supporting WAMM.
And if saving WAMM isn’t enough, for a generous donation you can have a garden tour and Italian feast of cannabis infused food prepared by my 92-year old mother, the now famed Marijuana Nonna (as seen on VICE, with over 1.3 million views!).
With gratitude,
Valerie Corral
National Geographic on marijuana science: An embarrassment of riches
By David Downs
Microscope image of cannabis trichomes, which contain the plant’s main active ingredients, the cannabinoids. (By David Downs)
The June issue of National Geographic features an in-depth look at the science and medicine of cannabis that’s guaranteed to open a few minds.
NatGeo hangs out with the discoverer of THC, Raphael Mechoulam, who reports: “We have just scratched the surface … we may well discover that cannabinoids are involved in some way in all human diseases.”
Full Article:
Weed K-Cups Let You Start the Morning Stoned
National Geographic loves weed so much, they’re devoting an entire print issue to it
By Xeni Jardin
The high times, they are a-changing: editors of National Geographic chose cannabis as the theme of their next print issue.
The first article to hit the web examines the cannabis treatments for child epilepsy as a likely path toward legalization. “The drug’s ability to reduce seizures in some children has softened opposition to research and may someday lead to changes in government policies.”
Who can argue with a natural, effective way to help children suffer less? It works.
Full Article:
http://boingboing.net/2015/05/15/national-geographic-loves-weed.html
Activist lit up joint on live TV because ‘interview was stressful’
Watch Texas’ First Big TV Ad for Pot Decriminalization
As California goes, so goes the nation — and the nation is waking up to the ravages of cannabis prohibition.
Over in the Lone Star state, a last-minute push to get weed decriminalized will includebroadcast television ads aimed at persuading voters and their representatives.
In the ad, a folksy Texas Hill Country resident, veteran cop and narcotics detective says cannabis is safer than alcohol and limited law enforcement resources should focus on crimes for which there are victims — like rape, murder, and robbery.
“I know of no instance in my entire career where someone was acting out under the influence of marijuana,” Detective Russell Jones says. “People under the influence of alcohol are much more problematic. Law enforcement officials have more important things to do with their time than arrest people for marijuana possession. They need to be there to protect the public, to respond to crimes such as robbery, burglaries, rape, and murders.”
Full Article:
http://www.eastbayexpress.com/LegalizationNation/archives/2015/05/12/watch-texas-first-big-tv-ad-for-pot-decriminalization