CIRCUS ATMOSPHERE ON COMMERCIAL DRIVE IN WAKE OF POLICE RAID

The air was thick around Commercial Drive's Da Kine cafe yesterday
afternoon, and it wasn't the bounteous dope smoke. Skittery tension
and valid paranoia have displaced the carefree attitude that was the
norm at the cramped headshop prior to last week's already-legendary
police raid.

Dozens of armed coppers, in battle dress and balaclavas, stormed the
"smoke and beverage shop" around dinner time Thursday, scooping up 9.5
kilos of pot, 450 grams of hash and over $63,000 in ready cash. The
owner and seven staff members were charged with various drug offences
and sent to jail overnight. Owner Carol Gwilt was hit with an
additional charge of possessing proceeds of a crime. Which is pretty
heavy -- like up-to-two-years-less-a-day heavy.

The area is still crawling with cops. And, unlike every other car,
they aren't honking their support.

I'm of a mind that people who want to smoke dope responsibly should be
left to it. Frankly, I couldn't care less and I think most British
Columbians would agree. Decriminalize the stuff already, control it
and tax it and remove the violent criminal element.

But that hasn't happened yet. And until it does, well, you're going to
get raided if you openly sell marijuana over your cafe counter,
especially if your top cop is a hardliner like B.C. Solicitor-General
Rich Coleman.

The curious and the converted congregated around Da Kine yesterday
afternoon, waiting for something cool or heavy to happen. Cop cruisers
repeatedly parked and circled. A steady stream of people, of all ages
and both sexes, streamed into Da Kine. Suburban youngsters, abuzz with
the thrill of the illicit, pulled up by the carload.

"The laws are based on falsehoods, real simple," said Da Kine
"management team member" Lorne McLeod. "There are millions of
Canadians burdened with a criminal record for simply indulging in an
alternative product."

McLeod said the cafe has suffered "the thuggery of the police gang"
and added he wants his children to be able to smoke pot "in a
reasonable manner, without fear of some goons coming crashing through
the door."

Owner Carol Gwilt, a daily toker, said she believes in the
legalization of pot to her "core."

"I'm not concerned about it [fines and/or jail]," she added. "If
that's what they need to do, that's what they need to do. This is how
women got the right to vote; this is how black people got to sit at
the front of the bus."

Such is the mind set of the marijuana missionary.

Still, Gwilt may want to lay off the fatties Oct. 6. That's the day
she appears in provincial court to answer those charges; the same day
a city hall panel sits in review of her cafe business licence.