"War on Drugs" & Decriminalization Efforts

 
In the endless "war on drugs," the government may have found a way to disrupt Pagan festivals. 
PLEASE, if you attend a Pagan festival, leave contraband at home. cl.]

Drug Reform Coordination Network Press Release
 DEA Uses Rave Act to Block Benefit

 An agent of the federal Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) used threats of Rave Act prosecutions to intimidate the owners of a Billings, Montana, venue into a canceling a combined benefit for the Montana chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws http://www.norml.org and 
Students for Sensible Drug Policy http://www.ssdp.org last week.

The Rave Act, now known officially as the Illicit Drug Anti-Proliferation Act, championed by Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE), was ostensibly aimed at so-called raves, the large electronic music concerts often associated with open drug use, but was so broadly written that opponents argued it could be applied against any event or venue where owners or organizers did not take sufficiently repressive steps to prevent drug use.  Opposition to the bill stalled it in the Senate last year, but this year Biden stealthily inserted it into the enormously popular Amber Alert Bill, which passed last month and was signed into law by President [sic] Bush.

While the Billings event was advertised as a benefit concert for two local groups interested in drug law reform -- not as a drug-taking orgy -- it still attracted the attention of the DEA.  On May 30, the day the event was set to take place, a Billings-based DEA agent showed up at the Eagle Lodge, which had booked the concert.  Waving a copy of the RAVE Act in one hand, the agent warned that the lodge could face a fine of $250,000 if someone smoked a joint during the benefit, according to Eagle Lodge manager Kelly, who asked that her last name not be used.

"He freaked me out," Kelly told DRCNet.  "He didn't tell us we couldn't have the event, but he showed me the law and told us what could happen if we did.  I talked to our trustees, they talked to our lawyers, and our lawyers said not to risk it, so we canceled," she said.  "I felt bad.  I knew the guys in the bands."

Primary event organizer Adam Jones was unavailable for comment, having been arrested and jailed by his probation officer for switching work-study jobs at Montana State University-Billings without first informing him.  He is on probation for possession of psychedelic mushrooms.  It has been speculated, but not yet confirmed, that the probation officer, described in unprintable terms by several local sources, was responsible for siccing the DEA on the benefit.

"The DEA guy kept talking about Adam Jones," Kelly said.  Jones apparently got the hint.  In a message relayed from jail, Jones announced that we was resigning from SSDP and NORML and foregoing further drug reform efforts until he is free from the clutches of the state.  That probably spells the temporary demise of Teachers Against Prohibition http://www.teachersagainstprohibition.org, a group that education major Jones founded after having run smack up against drug war reality with his arrest 
http://www.drcnet.org/wol/278.html#teachersagainstprohibition.

DEA Denver regional office spokesman Bill Wyman confirmed to DRCNet that an agent had visited the Eagle Lodge to warn of possible RAVE Act violations and their consequences, but deferred a more detailed response to Special Agent in Charge Jeff Sweet, whom Wyman promised would call back shortly.

We're stilling waiting for that call.

"This confirms all our fears about the RAVE Act," said Bill Piper of the Drug Policy Alliance <http://www.drugpolicy.org>, which spearheaded opposition to the bill, succeeding in blocking it last year.  "This isn't about drug parties or raves, it's about having a club to hold over people's heads, whether it's hemp festivals, circuit parties, dances, whatever.  The RAVE Act is being used to suppress political speech.  This is exactly what Senator Biden said would not happen, and now it's happening," he told DRCNet.

Biden's office did not respond to repeated DRCNet inquiries about 
whether the Montana intimidation effort was what he intended the act to accomplish.

But Biden wasn't alone in his silence.  None of the three members of the Montana congressional delegation, Sens. Max Baucus (D) and Conrad Burns (R), and Rep. Dennis Rehberg (R), responded to DRCNet inquiries either.

Other national drug reform organizations also expressed shock and outrage.

"This looks like the first application of the RAVE Act, and this is a very scary precedent, said NORML Foundation head Allen St. Pierre.  "Preemptively shutting down a First Amendment-protected event is something that just doesn't happen in America," he told DRCNet.  "This is absolutely what we feared and predicted would happen if the RAVE Act passed.  Isn't Montana known for being resistant to federal encroachment?  This should make them mighty uneasy."

"This is just more evidence that the current administration is engaged in a culture war targeting medical marijuana patients, glass blowers, festival goers and young people," said SSDP national director Shawn Heller.

"Wow," said Marijuana Policy Project communications director Bruce Mirken.  "This appears to be a clear violation of the purpose and intent of the law.  The RAVE Act's sponsors said repeatedly it was to crack down on people knowingly allowing open drug use," he told DRCNet. 
  
 "To use it to crack down on reform organizations is an outrageous First Amendment violation.  If laws, no matter how wrongheaded, aimed at drug use and distribution are used to intimidate efforts to discuss reform or raise money for reform, we are getting really Orwellian.  I really hope the folks up there sue and sue hard."

Montana activists are also worried but undaunted.  Missoula Hempfest organizer and Montana NORML spokesman John Masterson told DRCNet the threat of RAVE Act prosecutions was being carefully considered.  "The Hempfest committee just spent most of our last meeting talking about this," he said.  "We have more than 5,000 people each year in a Missoula city park.  Is the DEA going to come after the city?  We are meeting with local attorneys to discuss this, but we're not talking about canceling Hempfest.  Screw that."

And the drug reformers are mobilizing.  A conference call among 
NORML, SSDP, MPP, Montana NORML and the Montana ACLU was set for Thursday night or this morning.  "We may have a coalition up to fight this by the end of the day," St. Pierre said Thursday.  "The Drug Policy Alliance warned us the RAVE Act would be used to suppress free speech, and they haven't been proven wrong.  Looks like we have our first case."

Source: http://www.stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/290/dearave.shtml
PERMISSION to reprint or redistribute any or all of the contents of The Week Online is hereby granted. We ask that any use of these materials include proper credit and, where appropriate, a link to one or more of our web sites. If your publication customarily pays for publication, DRCNet requests checks payable to the organization. If your publication does not pay for materials, you are free to use the materials gratis. In all cases, we request notification for our records, including physical copies where material has appeared in print. Contact: Drug Reform Coordination Network, P.O. Box 18402, Washington, DC 20036, (202) 293-8340 (voice), (202) 293-8344 (fax), e-mail drcnet@drcnet.org. 

Supreme Court to Hear Case of Dispute Over Religious Group's Use of Banned Drug

The Supreme Court agreed in April, 2005 to decide whether the government can ban the importation of a hallucinogenic tea, central to the religious rituals of a small Brazil-based church. The Uniao Do Vegetal religion combines elements of Christianity and indigenous Brazilian religion. It has 150 members in its American branch.

The case may lead to the court applying to an illegal entheogen, the law that ordinarily requires the federal government to refrain to the maximum extent possible from interfering with religious practices.

The tea, hoasca, is made from Amazonian plants that produce dimethyltryptamine (DMT),  a controlled substance under both federal law and an international narcotics trafficking treaty.  While the chemical can also be produced in a laboratory, the plant doesn't grow in the United States, and it followers of the Uniao Do Vegetal religion use only the naturally occurring version.

The Bush administration brought the appeal to the Supreme Court after the 130 members of the church's American branch won a federal court injunction to prohibit the government from blocking  the importation of their tea and from seizing the sacred drink.

Source: Linda Greenhouse, The New York Times April 19, 2005
 
Utah Supreme Court OKs 
Non-Native Americans Use of Ceremonial Peyote
By Rev. Chuck Weibel

Non-American Indian members of the Native American Church may legally use peyote in religious ceremonies. This was the ruling in a unanimous decision of the Utah Supreme Court on June 22nd, in the case of Utah v Mooney.

James and Linda Mooney, although not members of any federally recognized tribe, run the Oklevueha Earthwalks Native American Church. As such, they regularly dispense buttons of peyote cactus, a ceremonial intoxicant, to participants in Church ceremonies.

The six-acre Church complex was raided by officers who found about 12000 peyote buttons. In October, 2000 the Mooneys were then charged with drug distribution, 10 first-degree felony counts of operating a controlled-substance criminal enterprise, and one second-degree count of racketeering. The case did not come to trial, due to a defense pretrial motion to dismiss.

Federal law allows the use of peyote by tribal Indians and members of the Native American Church. The Mooneys' Church is recognized by the Native American Church, although they are not members of a federally recognized tribe.

Attorneys for the State of Utah argued that Utah state law does not have such an exception for peyote use by Native Americans, and that such an exception would not apply to the Mooneys in any case.

Justice Jill Parrish, in the written decision, affirmed that, "Use of the hallucinogenic drug is limited to bona fide religious ceremonies as part of the Native American Church." As Utah law incorporates the federal statute, but does not specifically add a restriction of peyote use to members of federally recognized tribes the Court ruled that the State of Utah cannot restrict use in that manner.

The court further said that the Utah statute is ambiguously worded, so that- "we interpret the Act in a manner that avoids a conflict with federal law and does not risk depriving the Mooneys of their constitutional rights to due process." In effect, the Mooneys were exercising their constitutional right to the free practice of religion, and had had no notice that their actions might violate state law.

The Court also cited the equal protection clause of the US Constitution, stating that permitting
exemptions for some individuals and not others would violate that principle.

James Mooney was serving as an election worker for Utah's primary elections, and so was not available for comment. A statement released by his attorney, Kathryn Collard, said that the decision "will help to preserve the religious diversity on which our nation and this state were founded and this is a very good thing."

Ms Collard further stated, "The decision was a victory for the free exercise of religion, due process and equal protection under the law"

Assistant Attorney General Kris Leonard said that her office had not yet fully reviewed the decision. Any action they might take would depend upon that review, so she did not yet know what it might be.

Leonard added that, "Utah law is constantly changing,. My guess is that they will probably consider this in the next (legislative) session or maybe at some point in the future."

James Mooney claims Native American descent, although this is not legally substantiated. The Mooneys have practiced Native American religion for years. They provided religious programs and services to Utah prison inmates before starting their church in Benjamin, about 50 miles southwest of Salt Lake City, in 1997.

Source: http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/news.aspx?id=13562

Updated June 12, 2005