HIGH COURT REJECTS MEDICAL MARIJUANA

Medical Necessity Is Not A Defense Against Federal Charges, Ruling States.

WASHINGTON -- A unanimous Supreme Court Monday thwarted California's ailing
marijuana users, ruling that medical necessity offers no defense to federal
prosecution.

The closely watched ruling leaves intact California's Proposition 215,
which permits medical marijuana use under state law. But the 8-0 ruling
also leaves those same users vulnerable to potential -- if relatively rare
- -- federal legal action.

"We need only recognize that a medical necessity exception for marijuana is
at odds with the terms of the Controlled Substances Act," Justice Clarence
Thomas wrote for the court.

He added: "The statute reflects a determination that marijuana has no
medical benefits worthy of an exception, outside the confines of a
government-approved research project."

The ruling means a federal civil lawsuit initiated by the Clinton
administration can proceed against the Oakland Cannabis Buyers Cooperative,
which serves patients afflicted with AIDS, multiple sclerosis and other
serious ailments. Group organizers vowed to continue the fight.

"The decision is not the end of the line by any means," cooperative
attorney Robert Raich said at a news conference following release of the
ruling.

He said additional constitutional issues left unresolved by the court
opinion can be brought up when the case returns to the lower courts
handling the matter.

Justice Stephen Breyer recused himself from the case, because the original
trial judge, U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer, is his brother.

Others involved with the Oakland Cannabis Buyers Cooperative were more
emotional in their responses to the court's ruling, with Jeff Jones,
cooperative executive director, calling it "heavy-handed and misguided."

The cooperative Jones founded is still open, distributing advice but not
marijuana.

"If I didn't have a certain amount of cannabis in my system, I would die,"
said cooperative member Angel McClary, who said she can't stomach
conventional medicines for her seizure disorder. "I would starve to death."

Doctors concerned

Dr. Jack Lewin, chief executive officer of the 34,000-member California
Medical Association, added in an interview that the ruling was "worrisome"
because of the potential to interfere with medical advice.

The California medical group, along with California Attorney General Bill
Lockyer and other organizations, had filed a friend-of-the-court brief
urging support for the medical-necessity defense.

The interested parties are now wondering about law-enforcement consequences
of the ruling.

The consequences, in part, could be symbolic. As Raich noted, more than 99%
of marijuana prosecutions take place under state rather than federal law.

Some states also are particularly sympathetic to medical marijuana.
California voters approved Proposition 215 by a 55.6% to 44.4% margin.

Washington, D.C., and eight states have likewise passed medical-marijuana
measures.

Closure sought

The Clinton administration challenged California's measure by filing suit
against the Oakland cooperative in 1998.

The government sought to shut down the cooperative but did not seek
criminal penalties.

But the eight-page opinion delivered Monday by Thomas, accompanied by a
concurring opinion written by Justice John Paul Stevens, made clear that
medical necessity would protect against neither criminal nor civil charges.

The ruling overturned a decision by the San Francisco-based 9th U.S.
Circuit Court of Appeal.

Though Thomas and other conservative justices have periodically overturned
congressional actions, in this case the court deferred to Congress.

Thomas said Congress made a "determination of values" that included the
assessment that marijuana has "no currently accepted medical use at all."

Other defenses

This deference to Congress means courts, under the ruling Monday, can't
consider evidence about the medical necessity of a defendant's marijuana use.

Other defenses, though, can still be raised. Stevens, writing for himself
and Justices David Souter and Ruth Bader Ginsburg in his concurring
opinion, tried to make sure the sweep of Monday's ruling didn't go too far.

In particular, Stevens sought to clarify that while the medical-necessity
defense might not apply to marijuana distributors -- like the Oakland
cooperative -- it could still conceivably apply to individual users.

"This case does not call upon the court to deprive all such patients of the
benefit of the necessity defense to federal prosecution," Stevens wrote.