POT PARTY SUPPORTERS PROTEST ARREST OF LEADER

VANCOUVER -- All the cliches of a pot protest were there: the
hackey-sac games, tie-dye T-shirts and small clouds of smoke floating
above the crowd of about 200 people.

What wasn't to be expected at Saturday's Vancouver rally against the
arrest of three Canadian B.C. Marijuana Party members was the support
it received from visiting Americans.

Party leader Marc Emery, Michelle Rainey-Fenkarek, financial agent for
the party and Greg Williams, an employee of Pot-TV, all face charges
of conspiracy to manufacture marijuana, distribute seeds and engage in
money laundering.

Emery was arrested by RCMP on Friday in central Nova Scotia and was to
spend the weekend in a Halifax-area jail before being returned to
Vancouver. Rainey-Fenkarek was released on bail Friday while Williams
remained in custody in Vancouver.

The U.S. wants the three extradited to the U.S. to face the
charges.

Nick Frey, who was visiting from Los Angeles, stumbled across the
protest while walking through Vancouver's "pot block," a city street
that houses mostly marijuana-themed stores.

"I resent my (Drug Enforcement Administration) for infringing on
Canadian policy," he said.

"It's not my problem because I don't smoke pot but people should be
alarmed. People should be able to do what they want to do."

Nebraskan Scott Tanner echoed the sentiment. "Our government has
overstepped its bounds," he said. "Whatever happens on this side of
the border, it's none of our business."

The uplifting psychedelic rock music blaring from the B.C. Marijuana
Party headquarters in downtown Vancouver didn't reflect the mood inside.

Signs at the entrance to the storefront, which doubles as a bookstore
and sells marijuana paraphernalia, told the U.S., politely and not so
politely, where to go.

A donation box was set up inside asking for help for Emery,
Rainey-Fenkarek and Williams as they face extradition for trial in the
United States for selling marijuana seeds on the Internet and by mail.

A conviction on the charges carries a sentence ranging from 10 years
to life in prison. Officials in Seattle said the three were indicted
by a U.S. federal grand jury in May following an 18-month
investigation by American police into the sale of marijuana seeds on
the Internet and by mail.