Gilbert police made another medical-marijuana raid last week — this one at the office of a Tempe advocacy group where patients sold pot to other patients.About 4 p.m. last Thursday, cops — some in masks — entered the small office of the Medical Marijuana Advocacy Group, in an industrial complex at…
Arizona’s medical marijuana program is presenting a strange, new world for law enforcement. Before a single state resident had a registration card issued by the Arizona Department of Health Services, police in Mohave County were seeing pot-possession cases that would normally be routine suddenly dumped by prosecutors. Yesterday, we wrote…
Twenty Gilbert police officers, some in masks and riot gear, stormed a home last week after receiving a tip that the owner was in possession of an ounce of marijuana. The homeowner, Ross Taylor, is a card-carrying patient under Arizona’s new medical-marijuana law, which allows people to qualify to possess up to…
Would-be marijuana dispensary owners and their lawyers filed lawsuits today in an attempt to reverse Governor Jan Brewer’s attack on a voter-approved law. Last month, Brewer directed state Attorney General Tom Horne to file a federal lawsuit against the new law, which voters narrowly passed in the November election. Horne admitted to…
Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne discussed a plan to launch legal action against the state’s medical marijuana law during a January sit-down meeting with the law’s biggest opponent. Carolyn Short, who led last year’s unsuccessful campaign to defeat Proposition 203, refers to the meeting in a February 16 letter to state Department of Health…
Larry Miller, 38, tried to rob medical marijuana from a Phoenix man yesterday afternoon, which was a colossal mistake — the man he tried to rob fatally shot him.According to the Phoenix Police Department Miller and another man contacted a guy who’d been advertising himself as a medical marijuana salesman.The…
Governor Jan Brewer followed through today on her threat to attack Arizona’s voter-approved medical marijuana law, but advocates of democracy are fighting back. Numerous defendants have signed on to oppose Brewer’s suit, including the backers of Prop 203, the Arizona Medical Marijuana Association. The American Civil Liberties Union will cover the…
The effort by Arizona Governor Jan Brewer and state Attorney General Tom Horne to steamroll voters in their attempted quashing of the new medical marijuana law won’t work — not entirely, anyway. Qualified patients can possess up to two-and-a-half ounces of weed legally in Arizona since the passage of Prop 203 –…
Arizona Governor Jan Brewer and state Attorney General Tom Horne have both actively campaigned to keep the federal government out of Arizona — until it comes to voter-approved medical marijuana.Brewer and Horne are about to ask a federal court to make a ruling on the legality of Arizona’s medical-pot program,…
Governor Jan Brewer ought to just come out and admit it: She’s thwarting the will of voters who approved Arizona’s Medical Marijuana Act in November. Her frontal assault on the law, announced yesterday, is buttressed by her bias against the concept of medical marijuana — an opinion she made clear before voters narrowly approved Proposition 203. As we reported…
Governor Jan Brewer and Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne are preparing to file a declaratory judgment in federal court that would put a halt to Arizona’s medical marijuana program.The move comes after U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke warned Arizonans in a letter to the Department of Health Services that Arizona’s voter-approved…
Arizona leaders are preparing to ask to the feds to put a halt to Arizona’s medical marijuana program. *UPDATE: Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne says no dispensary permits will be issued until a federal court rules on the legality of the program. He’s not sure how long that could take.*…
-year-old Matthew Keller became — by all accounts — the first person to be arrested in Arizona for possession of “Spice,” a synthetic form of marijuana outlawed in the Grand Canyon State in February. He was charged with a felony.After getting pulled over by a Yavapai County sheriff’s deputy last…
Federal agents may bust anyone participating in a “large” pot-growing operation, despite Arizona’s voter-approved medical marijuana law, says Arizona U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke in a letter to the state. In a recent letter to Will Humble, the director of the state Department of Health Services, Burke reiterates that the feds will look the other…
For the second time this month, a random person in a Philadelphia suburb received an unanticipated brick of weed in the mail from an Arizona address. Just two weeks ago an elderly couple in the town of Upper Darby, Pennsylvania, opened a package with an Arizona return address with five…
Arizona is well-known as a corridor for smuggling marijuana, and out-of-towners often like to take home a souvenir. Weed, however, is not allowed on airplanes, so stoners are occasionally forced to mail their cannabinoid keepsakes to their out of state homes (click here and here for a couple examples). When…
Most people approved to use marijuana legally in Arizona complain of chronic pain related to back problems, severe headaches, injuries or arthritis, new stats show. The Department of Health Services is keeping close track of nearly every facet of the program, and will also soon release the number of recommendations…
A well-publicized medical marijuana expo at University of Phoenix Stadium over the weekend attracted fewer people than some disappointed vendors expected. Others, however, called the Green Relief Convention and Expo, which took place Thursday, Friday and Saturday, a success. A few thousand people showed up to check out the dozens of vendor booths…
hempbeach.com Thursday was the first day for hopeful medical-marijuana patients to apply for their voter-mandated medicine, and spokeswoman Laura Oxley tells New Times that the Arizona Department of Health Services approved 44 out of the 65 applications processed by 3 p.m. The department had 110 applications for medical pot by the end…
As New Times noted yesterday, if you smoke pot, and have any of the symptoms that could potentially qualify you for a medical-marijuana card, you’d be an idiot to not at least try to get one.Our advocacy of medical marijuana, however, has apparently pissed off at least one reader, who…
The final rules for medical marijuana are too tough on patients and may encourage a lawsuit, says one Valley doctor. Edgard Suter, an East Valley nuclear medicine physician who has been an outspoken advocate for medical marijuana, decried an addition to the draft rules that requires doctors to state the underlying condition causing “chronic…
If you ever smoke or use marijuana, it’s time to see the doctor. The Arizona Medical Marijuana Act is the law of the land, and now the state Department of Health Services has provided a map to legal immunity for anyone interested in possessing pot. The final rules from…
