Government's
Drug
Test
Ruled
Inadequate,
Todd
McCormick
Remains
Free
Pending
Trial
4/30/99
Todd McCormick, a medicinal user of marijuana and activist, remains free on bond today after a federal judge ruled that a newly-developed urine test -- designed to distinguish between marijuana and the legal pharmaceutical Marinol -- did not pass muster. McCormick, who is free on $500,000 bond -- money that the government would have kept had they been able to prove that McCormick used marijuana, awaits trial in September on charges relating to his cultivation of marijuana in Bel Air, California. The test, which purportedly distinguishes metabolites found only in the urine of people who have ingested marijuana from the ones present in the urine of people who have ingested Marinol, was created specifically to test McCormick. After two days of testimony, however, the government could not convince the court that the test was scientifically valid, and that based upon its findings, the government ought to be allowed to keep McCormick's cash bond and incarcerate him. "The judge made a fair and a just decision," McCormick told The Week Online. "I was the first person in history to have the test administered to me, and it clearly wasn't valid." In a stroke of irony, one of the urine tests that McCormick was forced to undergo was administered on July 4th, 1998. The connection was not lost on McCormick. "[Being drug tested on Independence Day] is just another sad example of where America has come to" he said. "I've battled a potentially fatal disease for most of my life. I've had over 25 surgeries. For years, before my arrest, I'd used marijuana with the support of my doctors. I've never hurt a soul. And here comes the government on July 4th to make me pee in a cup so that they can determine if my body chemistry is up to their standards in an effort to steal both my money and my freedom. I would say that their behavior was outrageous, but the truth is that to me, a person who loves and believes in the principles embodied in the nation's founding, it was really overwhelmingly sad."
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