Update: Bernie Ellis and the "Save Bernie's Farm" Effort

[Courtesy of David Steele] Subject: To Bernie's friends and family -- an update on his situation To everyone -- Bernie has asked me to communicate with all of you since he cannot do so himself. Last Tuesday, Bernie met with the staff of the halfway house to request permission to attend the "Save Bernie's Farm" benefit, being held to raise money to offer the government a settlement to drop their effort to confiscate his farm. Instead of receiving permission to attend, Bernie has been detained at the halfway house ever since. He has not been allowed to work and it looks like he will not be allowed to return to work (costing him $1,000 in salary). He will also not be allowed to attend his weekly support group and his monthly pass to visit his farm has been denied. He has been put on double work details at the "house", and his only opportunity to leave the "house" will be to attend church services at St. Ann's Episcopal Church (419 Woodland Street; he attends the 10:30 am service). However, Bernie can still receive mail (c/o Diersen Charities, 808 Lea Avenue, Nashville, TN 37203) and he can have visitors at the "house" on Saturdays from noon to 2:00 pm and on Wednesdays from 6:00-7:30 pm. He would also appreciate receiving emails from any of you which he will be able to read once he is released on May 10 (something which he is praying will still happen.) This turn of events is no doubt due to the considerable media attention his case has received in recent weeks. For those of you outside the Nashville area, here are links to the three latest stories: the (Nashville) Tennessean's Sunday front-page story last week, the Channel 5 story on Monday and the cover story in the Nashville Scene on Wednesday: http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070422/NEWS0201/704220432 http://www.newschannel5.com/Global/story.asp?S=6415164 http://www.nashvillescene.com/Stories/Cover_Story/2007/04/26/Marijuana_Martyr/index.shtml Although Bernie was unable to attend, the "Save Bernie's Farm" benefit was a great success. Thanks to the support of the "house" guards, Bernie was able to call into the benefit on a cell-phone and to speak to the almost-full house of supporters via speaker-phone. The music was wonderful, the speakers were inspiring and the networking and education around the issue of medical marijuana were priceless. Channel 4 sent a film crew and did another story on Bernie's case. And thanks to WRFN-FM, the benefit was heard by people all over the globe. (I believe the benefit has been archived and will be available at www.radiofreenashville.com for the foreseeable future.) And finally, the traffic to Bernie's web-site has increased markedly in recent weeks and support continues to be registered there in the form of letters of support and in contributions. Although Bernie cannot thank you himself, he wanted me to tell all of you that he feels your good thoughts and prayers and he appreciates all of it. With your continued support, Bernie will be released on May 10, and he wants to invite all of you to his "coming home" party on May 19 at his farm. In the meantime, please keep doing what you have been doing to support Bernie and to spread the word on his case. And write or email Bernie to let him know what you have learned as you have shared his journey -- he will compile those messages and send them out to all of you when he is released. Until that day, keep working for compassion and common sense wherever you can. After all, we are the ones we have been waiting for. David Steele (a friend of Bernie)