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Mexico’s human rights commission, CNDH, said 5,397 people have been reported missing since President Felipe Calderon declared war on drug trafficking organizations. Many cases of forced disappearances have allegedly been carried out by Mexican soldiers. The United Nations Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances has urged the Mexican government to stop using the army in drug prohibition war operations.

Lawmakers are introducing the North Carolina Medical Cannabis Act to legalize medical marijuana in the state. The bill would allow people with conditions such as cancer, glaucoma, HIV, AIDS and hepatitis C to buy and use medical marijuana. Sponsors believe legalizing medical marijuana would bring $250 million a year into North Carolina within four years of legalization.

Cynthia Willis is part of what is considered the first major court case in the country to consider whether guns and medical marijuana can legally mix. When it's over, the diminutive 54-year-old plans to still be eating marijuana cookies to deal with her arthritis pain and muscle spasms, and carrying her pistol.

Alabama’s illegal drug tax dates back to the late 1980s, when state governments were looking for new ways to crack down on the drug trade. In 1998, according to state documents, Alabama collected $161,947 in taxes on illegal drugs. In 2010, collections were just $1,275. Charles Crumbley, director of the Investigations Division at the State Department of Revenue, said, "Enforcing it was just more trouble than it was worth."

Reports of the Zetas and Maras drug trafficking organizations doing drug deals together or assassinating mutual enemies have been floating around for several years. But human rights workers and police in southern Mexico and Guatemala say they have now formed a more concrete alliance, in which they work together on kidnappings and acts of intimidation and terror.

Recent decapitations and killings have residents on edge over whether local street gangs are mimicking larger drug trafficking organization violence in the nation's capital. "I think of these groups as cells, as franchises," said Alfredo Castillo, attorney general for Mexico state, the suburban area surrounding Mexico City. "As franchises what do they want? They want the know-how, the business model, and in the end, they want their backing in case of an extraordinary problem."

Despite overwhelming public input asking for a looser ordinance that would allow medical marijuana dispensaries to locate in commercial areas throughout San Diego and remain open while they pursued permits, the San Diego City Council voted 5-2 for an ordinance that will close down all dispensaries for at least a year and force them to locate only in industrial zones — inconveniently far from the patients they serve.

A small, unassuming house that has been converted to a business opened its doors, making it the first legal medical marijuana dispensary on the East Coast. Safe Alternatives is housed in Frenchville, Maine on Route 1 with no signage, but plenty of security cameras as required by state law.

Mexican drug trafficking organization members threatened to kill U.S. agents working on the American side of the border. Republican Michael McCaul said a law enforcement bulletin was issued warning that Mexican traffickers were overheard plotting to kill Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and Texas Rangers stationed along the border.

A new Harris Poll indicates that three quarters of Americans support legalization of marijuana for medical treatment (74%), with almost half saying they strongly support it (48%). Significantly fewer Americans say they oppose the legalization of medical marijuana in their state (18%), and even less are not sure (7%) or decline to answer (1%).

Medical marijuana patients and the caregivers who provide the drug for them came out in large numbers to a hearing at the State House in opposition to a bill that would further regulate the industry. They said the proposal, introduced by state Rep. John M. Carnevale, would raise the prices for medical marijuana and potentially limit patients’ access.

Ed Dolan, an economist and textbook writer, discusses the economics of drug prohibition. He says drug trafficking organizations are strong because the US drug war strategy makes them strong.

Michelle Alexander, author of The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, told an audience at the Pasadena Branch of the American Civil Liberties Union, "More African-American men are in prison or jail, on probation or parole than were enslaved in 1850, before the Civil War began." Why have rates of incarcerated black men skyrocketed over the past 30 years? Alexander says it's the war on drugs which focuses primarily on minority communities even though multiple studies have proved that whites use and sell illegal drugs at rates equal to or higher than blacks. Despite this data, four of five black youths in some inner-city communities can expect to be incarcerated in their lifetimes.