Apr 28, 2016

April 28, 2016 By Terrie Best – San Diego ASA San Diego, CA  – The County Board of Supervisors met Wednesday to vote on staff recommendations to extend a moratorium against new medical marijuana activity in San Diego County. The 45 day moratorium was put in place on March 16 and was largely a knee-jerk reaction to a group of community members...

Mar 17, 2016

March 17, 2016 Terrie Best – San Diego Americans for Safe Access San Diego, CA – The County Board of Supervisors met yesterday and the patient community barely escaped a ban on medical cannabis. The ban would have affected unincorporated areas of the county, such as Julian, Ramona and many other rural parcels where it would otherwise be safe and...

Mar 4, 2016

  March 4, 2016 By Terrie Best – San Diego Americans for Safe Access San Diego, CA – It is hard to say exactly when the San Diego District Attorney’s Office lost their cannabis extraction case against legal patient John Mazula. His friends would say it was when the DA chose John to victimize; many activists say it was when John hired brilliant...

Mar 2, 2016

March 2, 2016 By Terrie Best – San Diego Americans for Safe Access San Diego, CA – Today in the on-going trial of John Mazula – a medical cannabis patient charged with manufacturing concentrated cannabis – we heard the last of the prosecution’s case. This consisted of the same testimony we’ve been hearing from various narcotic experts all...

Feb 27, 2016

February 27th, 2016 By Terrie Best – San Diego Americans for Safe Access San Diego, CA – Before the superior court in El Cajon is a medical cannabis concentrates case which comes down to this single question for the jury: “Was butane gas used in the defendant’s manufacturing process or wasn’t it?” All of the typical traps San Diego District...

Oct 29, 2015

October 29, 2015 By Terrie Best – San Diego Americans for Safe Access San Diego, CA – The second medical cannabis trial of legal patient Robert Orlosky was to have begun Tuesday in San Diego superior court. Then came a welcome victory in Department 57 when Judge Charles Rogers put a stop to a mulish prosecutor and dismissed all the charges against...

Aug 29, 2015

By Terrie Best – San Diego Americans for Safe Access August 28, 2015 San Diego CA – In one of the most depressing statements from a judge I’ve heard, Judge Jay Bloom of the San Diego Superior Court vilified cannabis patient witnesses from the bench while at the same time insisting DEA agents are bound to tell the truth on the witness stand or risk...

Apr 1, 2015

By Terrie Best – San Diego Americans for Safe Access April 1, 2015 San Diego, CA – Today in court, absent their clients, attorneys Michael J. McCabe and Heather Bugan argued a motion to dismiss the charges in a medical cannabis case. The argument was based on a much-publicized federal spending bill that is proving promising for cannabis patients.  The...

Mar 11, 2015

By Terrie Best – San Diego ASA March 11, 2015 San Diego, CA – Legal medical cannabis patients Mark Gillingham, Jeff Russell and Deviyon Carter were in court today to suffer a preliminary exam at the hands of a San Diego prosecutor in a medical cannabis cultivation case. All three men are patients, have doctor recommendations and are entitled to collectively...

Nov 8, 2014

November 8, 2014 By Terrie Best, San Diego Americans for Safe Access Babbette Kurtz, a resident of northern California got a taste of border town, USA when she, a state legal cannabis patient, was stopped and arrested while her Jeep, medical cannabis and possessions were confiscated at a US Border Patrol checkpoint in San Diego County.  The stop happened in...

Oct 27, 2014

October 27, 2014 By Terrie Best – San Diego Americans for Safe Access San Diego, CA – Last week, a well-known local activist and small business owner was effectively shut down when Police raided his office, stole his legal medical cannabis and ordered the electric meter removed. Very little explanation was given. The bizarre story began very early...

Oct 4, 2014

October 4, 2014 By Terrie Best – San Diego Chapter – Americans for Safe Access San Diego, CA – If the California Narcotic Officers’ Association didn’t break your heart as a cannabis patient with their discovered and widely circulated “Marijuana is NOT Medicine” Training Manual, a new article found in their Summer 2014 Newsletter will surly...

Oct 3, 2014

SAN DIEGO, CA – On Wednesday October 1st – in a move that is sure to stifle access to medical cannabis for the city’s sick and dying patients – the San Diego City Council’s Public Safety Committee instructed the city staff and the city attorney to shutter all unlicensed dispensaries through civil – and criminal –...

Jul 7, 2014

By Terrie Best –  San Diego Americans for Safe Access San Diego, CA – Many years from now, if I ever have the occasion to single out my most telling turning point in the undoing of medical marijuana prohibition in my town, it might be today.  Not because an important memo was released or some great local legislation is one notch nearer to becoming...

Jun 24, 2014

By Terrie Best San Diego Americans for Safe Access San Diego, CA – Three medical cannabis patient defendants were sentenced on felony manufacturing and possession charges after butane canisters and hash oil were discovered in their home – the friends were free to go yesterday when the judge sentenced them to summary probation and a couple weeks of...