CLOUD HANGS OVER DEBUT OF MEDICAL MARIJUANA

Doreen Bishop may soon be able to legally smoke marijuana in
Colorado.

The 52-year-old was first in line when the state health department
opened its doors Friday, the first day of Colorado's new
medical-marijuana law.

After submitting her paperwork and $140 application fee, Bishop should
get her medical marijuana ID card in the mail in about a week.

But Bishop, who says smoking eases the lingering pain from colon
cancer surgery, won't be the first on the state's new medical-pot registry.

Brooks Kelly, a 39-year-old scientist who says he suffers from tumors
that cause chronic pain, lays claim to that honor. Kelly, like seven
other Coloradans, had mailed in his application before Friday.

Amendment 20 allows people who suffer from certain debilitating
illnesses and have a doctor's recommendation to possess and use small
amounts of marijuana - 2 ounces or six plants - to relieve their symptoms.

But the amendment does not establish a mechanism for them to buy the
marijuana, and physicians cannot prescribe it.

Colorado is the ninth state to allow marijuana possession for medical
purposes. But advocates fear the state's laws were jeopardized by a
May 14 U.S. Supreme Court decision that concluded there is no
exception in federal anti-drug laws for medical marijuana.

Colorado Attorney Ken Salazar said the ruling does not invalidate
Colorado's law. But he warned doctors Thursday that they could risk
federal prosecution if they advise patients to use marijuana.

Health department officials were prepared for the law to take effect
Friday, and were ready for lines of applicants or mobs of protesters
or both. Neither materialized.

Only four applicants, including Bishop, showed up in person. And two
of those came by to check on the status of applications they had
mailed in days earlier.

Health department official Gail Kelsey also fielded about two dozen
phone inquiries about the program Friday, and mailed out 19
information packets. About 75 more packets had been sent out before
Friday, according to the health department.

The state expects about 800 applications over the next
year.

Kelsey spent the morning answering calls about the program and
reviewing some of the eight applications she had gotten in the mail.

"No," she told one caller, "we can't help you with the acquisition of
the marijuana. You just have to kind of use your own resources for
that."

Kelsey also rejected one application Friday.

Although Jerry Ives brought along copies of his medical records, he
didn't have a doctor's signature on his application.

Ives, who has debilitating headaches and seizures triggered by a brain
injury he suffered while in the Army, is treated by doctors at the
Veterans Affairs Medical Center.

He hasn't asked his doctors to sign the application, Ives said,
because they are federal employees, and he is afraid doing so would
put them in jeopardy.

Even though his application was rejected Friday, Ives said he still
won't ask.

"I"m not going to do anything against my doctor," Ives said. "I find
it bizarre that the state government and the federal government are
going head to head, and I'm stuck in the middle."

Ives said he plans to look for a private-practice doctor willing to
sign his application.