SANTA CRUZ DEPUTIZES COUPLE IN U.S. POT CASE

A Santa Cruz couple backed by civic leaders after federal drug agents
busted their medical marijuana operation have earned a new
distinction. They've been named city deputies.

In a direct affront to the federal government, the City Council voted
unanimously this week to deputize Mike and Valerie Corral, co-founders
of the Wo/Men's Alliance for Medical Marijuana, and authorized them
under city law to cultivate, distribute and possess marijuana for
medicinal purposes.

"We're just trying to give them a little bit more support and
legitimacy," Vice Mayor Scott Kennedy said Thursday. "We don't support
drug trafficking. We don't support marijuana. But we do support what
they're doing for the terminally ill and terribly suffering."

U.S. Drug Enforcement agents in September raided the couple's medical
marijuana dispensary, which distributes pot to about 200 patients. No
charges have been filed against the Corrals.

Outraged city officials in the Northern California seaside town, long
a hotbed of the medical marijuana movement, threw their support behind
the Corrals. The city received national attention when the council
hosted a medical marijuana distribution ceremony Sept. 17 on the steps
of Santa Cruz City Hall.

Federal drug officials say the couple's new status in the eyes of the
Santa Cruz council does nothing to change the glaring conflict between
U.S. law, which considers marijuana illegal under all circumstances,
and California's 1996 approval of pot as medicine.

"If this is being done to circumvent federal law, it certainly won't
work," said Richard Meyer, a Drug Enforcement Administration spokesman
in San Francisco. "The U.S. government hasn't changed the law on
marijuana. It's still illegal to cultivate or distribute it."

Though unusual, the deputizing of the Corrals is not unique. One
medical marijuana provider has been deputized in Oakland, and two in
San Francisco.

But the couple, who did not return calls for comment, face greater
difficulties because of the Sept. 5 raid on their dispensary. City
officials remain concerned that the U.S. attorney could still file
charges or attempt to shut down the alliance through the civil courts.

Kennedy said the Corrals stand apart from other medical marijuana
providers in Santa Cruz because their program has taken greater pains
to cater only to the very ill who come bearing recommendations from
doctors.

"They're very conscientious, very impressive in terms of their
integrity," he said. "They enjoy a high level of confidence, both in
the medical and law enforcement community, which can't be said about
any of the other medical marijuana distributors."

But city officials worry most about the patients, Kennedy said, and
the possibility that they would be stripped of needed medicinal relief
if the dispensary were shut down.

"While the DEA equates them to a drug cartel, I think they're more
comparable to a pharmacy," Kennedy said.

The Corrals are still attempting to retrieve 167 plants that agents
seized from their medical marijuana garden near Davenport, a coastal
town a few miles northwest of Santa Cruz. The city has agreed to join
the couple in a civil suit against the federal government in the
aftermath of the raid.

With their new status as deputies, the Corrals hope they will be
afforded the same sort of protection under federal law that allows a
city police officer to legally carry and sell drugs while engaged in a
drug sting. Their twist on that U.S. statute is that the couple would
be upholding state and local laws that allow for medical marijuana.
The legal strategy has not been tested in federal court.

Kennedy said the council's decision to deputize the couple is largely
symbolic, but it ratchets up the "contest of wills" between Santa Cruz
and the federal government over the fate of the Corrals. "We're
serious about this," he said. "I think it raises the ante."