Drug War Chronicle

Holland may be famous for its marijuana coffee houses, but pot cultivation remains illegal -- unless you are a patient who can demonstrate a medical necessity, the Dutch Supreme Court has ruled.

Britain's advisory panel on drug policy is about to undertake a review of the scheduling of ecstasy as a Class A drug, the most serious classification. The move comes after several reports saying the popular stimulant should be downgraded.

Brazilian police are killers, both on and off the job, according to a new report from the UN's Special Rapporteur on extra-judicial, summary, and arbitrary executions.

The FBI's annual Uniform Crime Report is out. Serious crime is down across the board, but drug arrests held roughly steady. Marijuana arrests actually increased by 5% to more than 872,000 -- nearly 90% of them for simple possession.

A Texas constable and probation/parole officers in Massachusetts and North Carolina are in the spotlight this week.

In its annual act of diplomatic hubris, the US government this week released its list of "major" drug producing and trafficking countries. Only three of them -- all political foes of Washington -- were found wanting.

The government must obtain a search warrant based on probable cause before forcing wireless service providers to divulge historical cell phone tower location information, a federal district court hearing a drug trafficking case has ruled.

With less than two months before Massachusetts voters go to the polls to vote on a marijuana decriminalization initiative, initiative supporters have filed criminal complaints against the organized opposition.

A Nebraska shop-keeper must stand trial for selling salvia divinorum, even though it's not illegal in Nebraska.