POT ACTIVIST PREPARES FOR THE COURT FIGHT OF HIS LIFE

Ted Smith, marijuana activist and founder of the Vancouver Island
Cannabis Buyers Club, has launched a constitutional challenge to
Canada's drug trafficking laws.

Smith told the Weekend Edition he and attorney Bob Moore-Stewart plan
to argue that the nation's trafficking laws are both "arbitrary and
disproportionate", in that they don't distinguish between selling a
controlled substance (in this case, marijuana) versus giving or
sharing that substance with others.

Their draft constitutional question notice (sent last week to B.C.
Attorney General Graeme Bowbrick and Attorney General of Canada Anne
McLellan) comes on the heels of two incidents in November, 2000, in
which Smith was arrested by Saanich and Victoria police, and charged
with possession of a controlled substance and trafficking in a
controlled substance.

The first arrest took place at the University of Victoria. Smith was
charged with trafficking and possession for the purpose of
trafficking after police witnessed him passing a marijuana joint to
another person, during what Smith says was a weekly meeting of the
Hempology 101 Club of UVic Students' Society.

The second arrest occurred one week later, as Smith prepared to give
away several hundred "pot cookies" at the Victoria Public Library
courtyard on Broughton St. He was charged with possession for the
purpose of trafficking in that instance.

The constitutional argument (which will be heard before the criminal
trials for the two cases move forward) alleges that the inclusion of
marijuana in the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act is no longer
appropriate, considering that present knowledge of the drug does not
support the stand that it is harmful to human health.

"The effect of this overbreadth of the law by the inclusion of
marijuana as a prohibited substance under the Controlled Drugs and
Substances Act is arbitrary and disproportionate, and based on
irrational and unproven and unfounded fears," the argument states.

Furthermore, "health-related costs of cannabis use generally, whether
smoked or eaten, are negligible when compared to the costs
attributable to tobacco and alcohol consumption."

Smith further alleges that he was "singled out" for arrest at UVic
"because he is a political activist".

The challenge also details what Smith and Moore-Stewart believe are
irregularities in court proceedings to date.

Smith has attempted twice to have all pre-trial and trial proceedings
take place in open court and has twice been denied. A closed
pre-trial conference is scheduled to take place Feb. 20, at which
time Smith expects a date for the constitutional argument to be set.

Despite the prospect of a year or two (or more) in court, Smith is
upbeat about his pending tangle with the legal system.

He says it's time for Canada's laws regarding marijuana to be put
under the microscope - and he doesn't mind being a test case.

"I was prepared to give something away that would have made them feel
better," he says of the pot cookies arrest. He notes that the
sentence for trafficking is five years less a day, the same as that
for rape.

"The question is, 'Should the individual doing so be considered as
malicious as a person who rapes another?'" he asks.

If he loses the constitutional argument, Smith says he fully expects
to go to trial on the charges. He says that, should he win, the
federal government will be forced to re-evaluate the way it deals
with marijuana in this country.

"If I win," he says, "the trafficking laws in Canada are null and void."