# Marijuana crusaders conviction overturned



## HGB (Oct 27, 2006)

Top court unanimously strikes down conviction of pot activist
By BILL GRAVELAND The Canadian Press

CALGARY  A medical marijuana activist says he is raring to be tried again now that the Supreme Court has overturned his 2003 conviction for pot trafficking.

"Im very happy the Supreme Court had the good sense to give me a trial, because I do want a trial by my peers," Grant Krieger said in an interview Thursday.

The top court ruled that the Alberta judge who ordered a jury to convict Krieger went too far and violated his rights.

In a 7-0 judgment Thursday, the court overturned the conviction, in effect sending the case back for a new trial  if the Crown chooses to proceed.

Krieger, who suffers from multiple sclerosis, has legal permission from the federal government to smoke pot for medical purposes. He doesnt have permission to supply it to others  but freely admits that hes done so anyway in an effort to ease the pain of serious illness.

"I want another trial here. I want this issue on the table just like (abortion activist Henry) Morgentalers issue  this has to come out," said Krieger.

"Let the collective conscience speak over this issue and not our laws."

Officials with Alberta Justice werent immediately available to comment on whether a new trial would be ordered.

If it is, it will mark the third time Krieger faces a jury on the same charge of possession of marijuana for purposes of trafficking.

Krieger has endured a long legal odyssey since he was first charged in 1999 after police seized 29 marijuana plants, the fruit of a grow-op he admitted to maintaining at his Calgary home.

He was acquitted by the first jury to hear the case in 2001, but that verdict was later thrown out by the Alberta Court of Appeal.

At the second trial in 2003, Justice Paul Chrumka of Court of Queens Bench instructed the jury that they had no choice, based on the evidence in the case and the letter of the law, except to find Krieger guilty.

Two jurors objected and said their consciences wouldnt permit them to convict. They asked to be excused from the case, but the judge refused.

"They had no choice," recalled Krieger. "Two of the jurors asked to be excused because they were crying and they didnt want to convict me  they said I did nothing wrong."

Justice Morris Fish, writing for the unanimous Supreme Court, said Chrumkas actions deprived Krieger of his right to a meaningful jury trial.


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## shadoed (Oct 27, 2006)

Wish the US was more like our friends to the north!


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## Ravishing_68 (Oct 29, 2006)

Do you really?  I don't want to ever be in a court where the jury is told what they are going to vote.  Yes it was later overturned but, my land!  

I definitely don't want to be more like them as far as health insurance is concerned.  I know many many people from other countries that have come to us for care, not that they wouldn't eventually get care in their country but they would more than likely be dead by the time they got their turn.

There is good and bad in everyone...thats why we need to smoke a bowl on occasion...


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## rockydog (Oct 30, 2006)

Yyes I too wish Our Govm't would open up their eyes and see how much money they are wasting. Though some states have cut funding for the DARE brainwashing campaign.


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## AeroTX (Nov 4, 2006)

You wish the US practiced double jeopardy? No one should go to court over the same issue 3 times. I don't see it ever beign legal the way we woudl liek it to be. Maybe medically speaking, but otherwise, the US gov't will not allow it. The American voice is forever lost in the echo of time... we have peole that speak for us now.


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## night501 (Nov 30, 2006)

wouldnt it make more scence for the us gov to legalize, grade, and tax marijuana and use the money from the tax to fight the real drugs like meth and heroin?


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## Zarnon (Dec 1, 2006)

Ravishing,  no offense but that is a huge myth.  England,  Canada and Japan all spend half per GDP what the US does and they insure everyone.  Compare that to a patchwork of privatized care and huge uninsured population.   

Despite the dollars we pay, all three of these countries are ranked higher than the US by the WHO.  Care to guess where we land?   Where is our mortality rate compared to those countries?  England is light years ahead of our country in health IT.   Visit those countries and ask the average Joe if they would trade their system for ours.  

Our system is a travesty run by hospitals and insurance companies very good at maximizing profits but very poor at delivering cost-effective primary/preventative care.  The thing that saves the most lives for the least dollars.  

Peruse a few articles here...

http://www.dartmouthatlas.org/

Even those with insurance can rack up huge co-pays and 'non-covered' costs.  A Harvard study found that 50% of all bankruptcies in this country were caused by medical bills!  

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2005/bankruptcy_study.html

We talk up our system and bring up long waits as a modern-day medical horror story.  Yet the reality in this country is that you will rarely get to see your PCP without a lot of advance notice.  You will see someone else, or a nurse practitioner or maybe they'll just tell you to go to the ER where you may incur even larger costs.  

If you get an appointment you will see a doc who is double or triple booked;  who spends, on average three and half minutes per patient.  

Argh... need Tums now....

Trivia Question;  What is the only class of citizens in the US constitutionally entitled to healthcare?

Night,  you're totally right.  It may happen in America,  but I am not sure if it will in my lifetime.


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## Ravishing_68 (Dec 1, 2006)

First off, not offended at all.  I love a good debate.
Secondly, the majority are taken care of yes, what I've seen repeatedly is people that have come here for urgent matters such as rapid squamous cell carcinoma, which is a cancer that can kill you in less than two months, left untreated.  So if you're appointment is in 12 weeks, you are SOL. I don't believe one is better than the other system, just different where both could benefit improvements.
Third, I believe the answer is children and the elderly.

~Rav eace:


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## GreenThumb (Dec 12, 2006)

Back in the 1960's U.S. insurance companies sent agents and even a few doctors north to Canada to stop the implementation of Universal Health Care.
Now if the U.S. system of health delivery was so much better why in the world would they spend millions of dollars to stop an inferior system?


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## Zarnon (Jan 17, 2007)

BTW,  I apologize for leading this thread so far off topic.  I'll probably leave this as my last comment!  - Z

I guess it depends on what you consider taken care of.   One of my gigs is doing volunteer medical work with disadvantaged people for three years and prior to that I worked in a large medical group. 

Try to get in with your primary care physician if you are in large multispecialty group when you're ill.  It's rarely going to happen.  Usually you will see someone else, it may not be a doctor.  

We also do a terrible job at our 'top 20' chronic illnesses.  Some of the myths that we say are 'compliance issues' are really people not understanding.  I have the links and research for those studies.  Granted,  I think some people want to be comfortable being sick rather than truly get well, but that's not the majority IMHO.

The stuff isn't opinion.  We spend more for a lower quality of healthcare by most measurable standards.   We are not the number one healthcare delivery system in the world in any area other than cost.

When we have a system that is the number one cause of financial ruin for people I think that's something to be ashamed of.

There is a huge class of uninsured and it is not the very poor (who usually qualify for some sort of medical care).  It's the struggling low to middle class people who are literally one major medical incident from catastrophe.


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## fatman (Feb 1, 2007)

im in the usa n have severe phantom pain from leg amputation.this year will b my first grow.i need the MEDICATION.it really helps.now im on neurontin 3,600 milligrams a day.i never thought i would b strung out......and on a drug that dont even get u high.thanks u dumb *** ,under edgucated n no compasion basterds.i WILL grow n if caught i WILL go to thje supreme court n fight this crap.i just dont care any more about the most stuoid *** law ever.come get me j edgar
                           fatman  
           i can handle any thing but tempation


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## offgrid (Feb 5, 2007)

in a way, the jurors ARE told how to vote in a trial.  first the jury pool is heavily biased...nobody too educated, nobody too aware of what's going on.  second, everyone believes there are only two options in a court case:  either guilty or not guilty; however, there is a THIRD option called jury nullification, whereby the jury finds that the law itself is a bad law and not applicable to this case.  if you ever show that you know about this third option,  you will be dismissed from the jury.  

this is why our friends in canada have an advantage right now.  sure, it looks like double jeopardy, but really there's so many loopholes and legalities here in the states that we might as well have double jeopardy too.  if we were able to get this issue out into the open, where people can see the idiocy of the drug war, we'd be better off.

i asked a reasonably intelligent friend about legalization of drugs, and she insisted they remain illegal...many because she had a problem controlling herself when she was younger.  i tried to get her to explain the rationale behind her thought process, but she couldn't do it.  she kept coming back to the argument of "well, it should be illegal...just because."  

until we break the murky darkness of irrationality and ignorance surrounding this issue, it's just going to continue to fester and cause even more problems. ditto with health care (america needs to join the rest of the civilized world and get universal health care).


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