New York City settles with a Black woman whose child was seized because of her marijuana use, the 6th US Circuit Court of Appeals reins in vehicle seizures in Detroit, and more.

The Vancouver safe injection site. Pressure is growing for one in Glasgow, Scotland. (vch.ca)

North Carolina Tribe Approves Marijuana Legalization Measure. Members of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians voted overwhelmingly Thursday to approve a referendum permitting the use and sale of marijuana on tribal land. According to preliminary results, the measure was passing with 70 percent of the vote.

The tribe had already approved regulations for the cultivation of marijuana for medicinal purposes but has not yet begun engaging in sales of medical marijuana products.

The state does not permit marijuana to be used or sold for either medical or recreational purposes, and US Rep. Chuck Edwards (R-NC) urged members to reject the referendum: "To allow our citizens to travel only a few miles to buy and use this common gateway drug … would be irresponsible, and I intend to stop it." To that end, he filed a federal bill last week to without certain federal funds from states and tribes that permit adult use marijuana.

New York City Settles with Mother Whose Child Was Seized Over Marijuana Use. The city's child welfare agency agreed to pay $75,000 plus attorney's fees to a Black woman after child welfare workers forcibly removed a woman’s newborn baby based solely on a positive test for marijuana that she did not consent to. The woman, Chanetto Rivers, alleged racial discrimination.

"I didn’t just bring this lawsuit for myself, but for every Black family that ACS [the Administration for Children's Services] has ripped apart," Rivers said in a statement. "They know what they did was wrong." 

An ACS spokesperson said that marijuana use by itself will not be a basis for charging child abuse or neglect. "A case should not be indicated solely because a parent is using marijuana, but instead CPS should assess the impact, if any, on the safety and well-being of the child," the spokesperson said. 

That is in line with stated ACS policy: "Positive marijuana toxicology of an infant or the mother at the time of birth is not sufficient, in and of itself, to support a determination that the child is maltreated, nor is such evidence alone sufficient for ACS to take protective custody of (remove) a child or file a case in Family Court."

But Rivers' lawsuit alleges that child welfare workers continued to interfere in her parenting even after two judges ordered the agency to reunite her and her child. She was subjected to "needless court proceedings" for months, the suit alleged.

"We are glad that Ms. Rivers was able to call attention to ACS’s deplorable history of racial discrimination against marginalized families," her attorney said. "ACS continued to rely on outdated racist stereotypes and tropes about Black parents."

Asset Forfeiture

Federal Court Severely Curtails Detroit Civil Asset Forfeiture Program. Wayne County, which includes Detroit, has long been notorious for seizing cars from people it claims were involved with drugs or prostitution, but now a federal appeals court has severely curtailed that program.

The 6th US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled last week that the program's severe restrictions on property owners' ability to appeal seizures violated the due process clause of the 14th Amendment. The ruling only applies to the Wayne County program, but with a similar case on the US Supreme Court docket, a broader precedent may soon be set.

Under the Wayne County program, police would seize vehicles of people driving or parking in areas where illegal drug use and/or prostitution was suspected and offer them a deal: Pay a $1,000 fine and get their vehicle back right away or appeal the seizure—a process that takes months and could result in the loss of the vehicle anyway.

The appeals court ruled that the months-long delay before people could challenge a seizure was too long and that hearings needed to happen within two weeks.

International

British Royal Pharmaceutical Society Backs House of Commons Call for Safe Injection Sites. At the end of August, the House of Commons Home Affairs Committee recommended legalization of safe injection sites for drug users, and now the Royal Pharmaceutical Society has backed that call.

The Home Affairs Committee called for a pilot safe injection site in Glasgow. The Home Office rejected a similar proposal in 2020. But both the committee and the society pointed to successful safe injection sites elsewhere.

"We believe we can apply that learning here and provide clean, safe spaces for those injecting drugs," said Claire Anderson, president of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society. "This will bring illegal drug users closer to mainstream health and addiction support services, and provide an opportunity for health professionals to engage in treatment and prevention. This in turn will help to save lives, reduce harm and reduce drug deaths," she added.

Singapore has executed one drug offender with another set for later this week, the Florida ACLU joins the fight for a marijuana legalization initiative, and more.

The gallows. Singapore's implement of choice for dealing with drug traffickers, even small-time ones. (Pixabay)

Florida Supreme Court Grants AG's Request for More Time to Challenge Marijuana Legalization Initiative. The state Supreme Court on Monday granted a request from Attorney General Ashley Moody (R) for more time to challenge a marijuana legalization initiative from Smart & Safe Florida. She now has until August 2 to make her argument that the initiative does not meet state requirements to be on the November 2024 ballot.

Smart & Safe Florida opposed the seven-day extension, arguing instead for a two-day extension, but the Supreme Court gave Moody the whole seven days.

If the high court approves the initiative or fails to issue a ruling by April 1, 2024, would be set to appear on the November 2024 ballot. Since it takes the form of a constitutional amendment, it will need 60 percent of the vote to pass.

Florida ACLU Joins Fight Over Getting Marijuana Legalization Initiative on the Ballot. The ACLU of Florida filed a brief on Monday backing the Smart & Safe Florida marijuana legalization initiative and calling out the state Supreme Court for the way it has handled ballot initiatives in recent years, turning the process into an "acrobatic exercise."

"The ACLU is arguing that the Supreme Court now has a history over the last several years in Florida of striking down these initiatives," ACLU attorney Will Cooper said. "If the Supreme Court really does want to let the people speak and get out of the business of striking these initiatives down and acted by the people of Florida, I think they certainly have a sufficient basis to let it stand," he added.

In the past five years, the Supreme Court has reviewed nine initiatives, striking down four of them, as well as refusing to review another initiative, effectively killing it. In the five year period before that, the high court reviewed seven initiatives and struck down none of them.

International

Peru's Surging Cocaine Trade is Overrunning Remote Indigenous Territories. In Ucayali department, which is a lowland jungle region bordering Brazil, coca has arrived, and the trade is threatening the reserves of the isolated tribespeople who inhabit the area. It is an area largely bereft of state services, including an anemic state security apparatus, a situation that has created "an open door" for the drug trade, say drug experts and indigenous communities.

Coca production has expanded from the Valley of the Apurimac, Ene, and Mantaro Rivers (VRAEM) to far Ucayali, where land under cultivation has spiked nearly five-fold in the past five years. Nearly 35,000 acres of coca was grown on land belonging to some 295 native communities. Nationally, coca cultivation increased by 18 percent from 2021 to 2022.

"Ucayali has practically wide open borders and strategic positioning," said Frank Casas, an expert on Peru's drug trade. "Within the last three years, the region has become a high production area, and not only in terms of coca, but also in the production and commercialization of cocaine to international markets."

Singapore Hangs Drug Offender, Another Hanging Set for Friday. Singapore authorities hanged a 56-year-old man, Mohammed Aziz Hussain, after he was sentenced to death in 2018 for trafficking less than two ounces of heroin. And it is set to hang a woman, Saridewi Djamani, 45, on Friday for trafficking slightly more than an ounce of heroin in 2018.

The local Transformative Justice Collective and international human rights groups called on the government to halt the pending execution and end the resort to the death penalty. It had been under a moratorium during the coronavirus pandemic, but has returned with a vengeance last year with 15 drug offenders executed since then.

"Singaporean authorities must immediately stop these blatant violations of the right to life in their obsessive enforcement of misguided drug policies," Adilur Rahman Khan, secretary-general of the International Federation of Human Rights, said in a statement.

A joint statement by Transformative Justice Collective and other groups noted that Law Minister K. Shanmugam reportedly acknowledged in a 2022 interview that Singapore's harsh policy on drugs has not led to the arrest of the so-called drug kingpins.

"Instead of disrupting drug cartels… the government of Singapore deliberately retains capital drug laws that, in practice, operate to punish low-level traffickers and couriers, who are typically recruited from marginalized groups with intersecting vulnerabilities," the statement said.

Virginia's GOP governor indicates he is not interested in legal marijuana sales, a New York city has to pay for firing a medical marijuana patient, and more.

Pennsylvania Poll Has Declining but Still Majority Support for Marijuana Legalization. A new poll from the Muhlenberg College Public Health Program has support for marijuana legalization at 50 percent, but that number also marks the a decline in support for legalization. Support peaked at 58 percent in 2021 and dropped to 56 percent in 2022. But the survey also has a relatively high margin of error, +/- 6 percentage points, meaning the drop could be a polling artifact instead of revealing a true decline.

The poll comes on the heels of the announcement last week that a bipartisan pair of state senators have introduced a marijuana legalization bill, Senate Bill 846.

Virginia's GOP Governor Says No to Legal Marijuana Sales. In 2021, Democratic lawmakers approved marijuana legalization but failed to reach an agreement on a legal marketplace, deferring resolution of the issue to the next legislative session. But that session flipped control of the legislature and the governorship to Republicans, who are much less interested in legalizing sales.

Now, the administration of Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) has given its clearest indication yet that he is not interested in getting a retail market up and running. "Governor Youngkin has stated that he is not interested in any further moves towards legalization of adult recreational use marijuana," Joseph Guthrie, Youngkin's commissioner of the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Safety, said during a recent state meeting on marijuana.

Medical Marijuana

Minnesota Adds 19 New Qualifying Conditions, Waives Fees for Patients. Irritable bowel syndrome and obsessive-compulsive disorder are among the 19 different medical conditions just added to the state's very lengthy list of qualifying conditions for medical marijuana. That went into effect July 1.

Also in effect as of July 1 is the waiving of registration fees for patients. Until now, it cost $200 a year. And patients can now be certified by a health practitioner, expanding the number of medical personnel who can make recommendations.

"They will enter that into our patient registry and then you are sent a link to go ahead and register for the medical cannabis program," said Office of Medical Cannabis Director Chris Tholkes. "As of July 1st, there is no longer an annual fee of 200 dollars. It's now zero to participate in our program."

New York Town Must Pay $200,000 After Firing Medical Marijuana Patient. The city of Amsterdam must pay almost $200,000 to a city worker fired after failing a drug screening for marijuana. A jury found that the city discriminated against Thomas Apholz, a wastewater treatment plant worker who was first suspended and then fired after the drug test.

The state legalized medical marijuana in 2014. State law grants registered medical marijuana patients disability status, which gives protection from employment discrimination for using medical marijuana.

After he was fired, he filed suit in state Supreme Court in Montgomery County, alleging unlawful employment discrimination and failure to accommodate his disability as required by the New York Humans Rights Law. And now he has won.

Maryland saw a big opening weekend for legal marijuana sales, Oklahoma medical marijuana operators are suing regulators over a new fee schedule, and more.

Buckeye voters could finally vote on freeing the weed in November. (Creative Commons)

Maryland Celebrates 4th of July Weekend with More Than $10 Million in Marijuana Sales. With legal weed going into effect on July 1, Marylanders embraced it enthusiastically over the holiday weekend, generating more than $10 million in sales over the 4th of July weekend. Adult use sales accounted for about 85 percent of that figure. Adult use sales are estimated to reach $275 million this year and $2.1 billion by 2027.

Ohio Marijuana Legalization Campaign Hands in Signatures. The Coalition to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol handed in more than 222,000 signatures Wednesday for its proposed marijuana legalization initiative. If the signatures are verified by state officials, legalization will appear on the November ballot.

This is the second round of signature gathering for the effort. A successful first round put the issue before the state legislature, which had four months to approve legalization but failed to do so. That provided the opening for the campaign to move to phase two: putting the issue directly before the voters -- provided they came up with enough signatures to qualify. It looks like they did: The campaign only needed 124,000 valid voter signatures and now has a cushion of 98,000 signatures. State officials will make that determination by July 20.

The initiative would legalization the possession of up to 2.5 ounces by people 21 and over, as well as allowing for the home cultivation of up to six plants, with a maximum of 12 per household. There would be a 10 percent tax on retail sales. Some licenses will be reserved for people who qualify under social equity provisions.

Medical Marijuana

Oklahoma Medical Marijuana Regulators Sued over New Fees. Several medical marijuana businesses have filed a lawsuit against the Oklahoma Medical Marijuana Authority (OMMA) over a new law that will increase fees for marijuana businesses. Legislators passed a package of bills designed to reign in the state's Wild West medical marijuana scene and eliminate "bad actors," including House Bill2179, which it broadens licensing requirements for medical marijuana dispensaries, commercial growers, and processors. In effect since last month, the bill mandated new fees ranging from $2,500 to $50,000, based on a tiered fee schedule.

Plaintiffs argue that while lawmakers aimed to weed out illegal grow operations, the new fees will only hurt legitimate businesses. "The state is hitting the good guys and it's only helping the bad guys," said plaintiff Jed Green.

The lawsuit charges that the fee increases are unconstitutional under state law because it passed with less than three-quarters majority support, which is required for any tax increases. It also notes that the bill passed during the last five days of the legislative session, even though the state constitution says revenue-related bills cannot be passed during that period.

International

Mexico's Morelos Sees Violence Flare After Anti-Cartel Vigilante Leader Killed. Morelos anti-cartel vigilante leader Hipolito Mora and two of his men were gunned down last Thursday, sparking a new round of violence in and around the city of Apatzingan, which has been embroiled in a long-running conflict between rival drug trafficking organizations, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel and the Viagras. Roads in and out of the city were blocked over the weekend as cartel gunmen pulled trucks and buses across roads. Shoot-outs also took place in and around the city, leaving at least one more person dead.

The Mexican government has tolerated Viagras control of Apatzingan as a means of keeping the Jalisco cartel out, but residents of the agricultural hub are left paying higher prices for goods than anywhere else in Mexico because Viagras extortion drives prices up. The Jalisco cartel is now battling the Viagras along the banks of river just 15 miles south of the city.

Mora was one of the last leaders of the citizens' anti-cartel armed movement that emerged in the area a decade ago. His death is likely the death knell of any hope of reviving armed civilian resistance to the cartels in the area.