A Commentary:
The Likely Reason Why Medical Marijuana Defendants Can't Use That as a Defense in Oklahoma Courts
If there is such a thing as compassionate conservatism in Oklahoma, then the least thing Oklahomans can do about the medical marijuana issue is to simply pass a law to ban courts in Oklahoma from denying medical marijuana patients using medical necessity as a defense against criminal drug charges. I don't know how the legal system gets by with doing such a thing. But the motivation behind it possibly arose decades ago in 1976 when the feds lost big time in a celebrated case. That was when the feds charged Robert Randall for cultivating marijuana. In his defense, Randall used the Common Law doctrine of necessity. His necessity was a medical one to use marijuana to treat his glaucoma. To strengthen his defense, he had already undergone exhaustive tests at UCLA and John Hopkins Hospital, indicating no other glaucoma drug could halt deterioration of his eyesight. The judge, in believing evidence for banning marijuana for medical use was unfounded, dismissed charges against Randall.
He then petitioned the government to enable him access to medical marijuana. He was not denied. But Randall did not celebrate his victory as America's first legal medical marijuana patient in silence. He advocated other ill people needing help with medical marijuana should do what he did. In response, the feds tried to put a stop to Randall's access to medical marijuana. He came back with a lawsuit against several government agencies. The feds quickly settled out of court. The settlement provided a legal basis for the Food and Drug Administration to set up the Compassionate Investigational New Drug Program. Initially, only available to patients afflicted by marijuana-responsive disorders and orphan drugs, the concept was expanded to include HIV-positive patients in the mid-1980s.
Due to the growing number of AIDS patients throughout the late 1980s and the resulting numbers of patients who joined the Compassionate IND Program, the Bush administration closed the program in 1992. Some people suspected the program was undermining the FDA's status of marijuana as a schedule one drug, meaning a drug having much potential for misuse with no accepted medical value, and so not allowed to be doctor prescribed. Thirteen medical marijuana patients were grandfathered in to prevent lawsuits from them. Today, it's believed only four of them remain. Each get around 300 free joints at taxpayer expense in a tin can from the feds every month. While not conducted by the government, they were given extensive medical examinations in 2002. Nearly all abnormalities found were believed related to diseases the marijuana was treating, rather than due to smoking marijuana itself. One of those patients, Irvin Rosenfeld, can be seen testifying in a video with a link to it in the upper right column of this page.
It's the 21st century now, and it's highly unjust that only a handful of patients in this country can fully look forward to living their lives free of any criminal charges related to personal use of medical marijuana. Who knows if the next U. S. President will also not want to prosecute medical marijuana patients at the federal level?
Recently, in California, a number of clinical, scientific medical studies of the type rarely done before have come out with findings that justify using marijuana as medicine for a number of serious ailments that cause chronic pain or muscle spasms. With that in mind, in Oklahoma, it's time to put PATIENTS before politics. After all, the infamous suicide "Doctor" Kevorkian had some clients who didn't want to live any longer with multiple sclerosis or Lou Gehrig's disease, the kind of serious ailments believed good for marijuana treatment. Did they ever resort to marijuana? I don't know, but perhaps if they did, some would be alive today.
"Any sane person who knew they were going blind, who know marijuana could prevent them from going blind would break the law to obtain marijuana. And that activity was not criminal, but rather an act of self preservation." Robert Randall from 1976 in his successful use of necessity as a defense against charges of marijuana cultivation, a defense not allowed in Oklahoma. Randall, pictured left, died in 2001, still with sight.
Below is a photo showing marijuana growing at a Mississippi University farm. The buds from the female plants will be harvested. This is where it's believed marijuana for the remaining legal federal medical marijuana patients originates as well as a marijuana source for research institutions willing to meet strict requirements for obtaining and storing it. From a Freedom of Information Act inquiry, requested by Robert Randall in 1978, the estimated cost to taxpayers for cultivation and production was $0.90 per ounce with 2/3 of cost attributable to security.
Free the Weed For Medicine!
Activist Ladies Offer Legislators Advice on Medical Marijuana--"Get Busy!"
