News Brief

In a guest piece for the Chronicle, law professor John Calvin Jones dissects the case of a New Jersey man who ended up headed for prison for growing marijuana after police were called because he and his girlfriend were too loud during sex. He has some useful tips for people who want to know how to exercise their rights and avoid ending up like this guy.

It's official!! The California Regulate, Control, and Tax Cannabis Act of 2010 initiative has qualified for the November ballot. Californians will be voting on legalizing weed this year!

An Atlanta cop gets nailed, a Tarheel State two-fer, and the de rigeuer dope-smuggling jail guard.

Canadians who support marijuana decriminalization outnumber opponents by 20 percentage points, according to a new poll. 20% aren't sure.

New Jersey MS patient John Ray Wilson was convicted of growing marijuana in December. The state legalized medical marijuana in January. But Wilson was still sentenced to five years in prison last week.

New York City is about to pay big time -- again! -- for forcing people accused of minor crimes, including public marijuana possession, to undergo humiliating strip-searches. This is the third time in nine years the city has had to pay out for this practice. Will NYC ever learn?

Will Rhode Island be the next state to decriminalize marijuana possession? It just took a big step in that direction this week, as a special legislative commission endorsed the idea.

M-Cat is not a college entrance exam, but a nickname for mephedrone, an amphetamine-like drug derived from khat that is legal and increasingly popular in Britain. Now, after the deaths of two young men on Sunday were (indirectly) linked to its use, calls to ban it are increasing.

The number of people doing time in state prison declined last year for the first time since bell-bottom jeans were in fashion, although just barely. Could we be seeing the first rumblings of a seismic shift in prison population trends?

Mexico's prohibition-related violence took nearly another 300 lives this past week, including three US citizens connected to the US consulate in bloody Ciudad Juárez. That pushes the death toll since President Calderon sent in the army little more than three years ago over the 18,000 mark.