AT RALLY, JUDGE CALLS DRUG WAR 'HOPELESS'

Reno (AP) - A Superior Court judge sharply criticized the drug war and
renewed his call for the decriminalization of marijuana at a pro-marijuana
rally Saturday.

Judge James Gray of Orange County, Calif., said the drug war has cost
billions of dollars and resulted in the United States having the world's
highest incarceration rate -- with no end in sight to rampant drug abuse.

The former federal prosecutor said he has never smoked marijuana, but
supports the strictly controlled distribution of pot to adults.

"We have made an illness into a plague. (This is) a failed and hopeless
system," Gray said.

"I believe people should be entitled to do what they want to their bodies,
but that they should be held accountable," he added.

Gray, 58, a lifelong Republican until he became a Libertarian earlier this
year, has been a judge for 19 years. He's the author of "Why Our Drug Laws
Have Failed and What We Can Do About It."

More than 60 people attended the "Rally for Cannabis Liberation" at Reno's
Idlewild Park.

The rally was sponsored by Cures not Wars, a pro-marijuana group that was
to hold similar rallies around the country this weekend.

Group spokeswoman Michelle Buck of Reno said the purpose of the rally was
to raise awareness that tens of thousands of Americans are in prisons for
non-violent drug crimes.

Of particular concern, she said, are thousands who have been arrested for
legally or illegally supplying medical marijuana.

Some people held signs that read "Free Ed Rosenthal." The Oakland, Calif.,
man's arrest last year was among a string of federal raids of medical
marijuana suppliers in California.