LOCKYER PUSHING WAYS TO MAKE POT LAW WORK

Health: Authorities, backers of Prop. 215 work together on system to
distribute marijuana for medical purposes.

SAN FRANCISCO Reversing his predecessor's approach to the medical
marijuana initiative passed by voters in 1996, state Atty. Gen. Bill
Lockyer has told law enforcement officials and marijuana advocates
who have fought each other for years to make the law work.

Since February, police chiefs, sheriffs, narcotics officers and
district attorneys have been discussing with cannabis center operators
and medical marijuana advocates the fine points of how best to
distribute marijuana and protect users from prosecution.

To nearly everyone's surprise, the longtime opponents, now working on
a task force together, have found common ground.

"There's kind of an armistice," said Scott Imler, director of the Los
Angeles Cannabis Resource Center in West Hollywood, the largest
marijuana center in the state that is still functioning. "Everybody
seems genuinely interested in trying to implement Proposition 215 in a
responsible way. It is an exciting and vital process." Christy
McCampbell, president of the California Narcotics Officers Assn.,
echoed Imler's assessment.

"We are all just trying to reach common ground on how to deal with an
extremely complex issue," said McCampbell, whose organization
represents 7,000 narcotics officers across the state and opposed
Proposition 215 during the 1996 campaign.

What remains to be seen is whether the group can devise ways to make
the law work that will win Gov.

Gray Davis' support and not bring down the wrath of the federal
government. Last year, the U.S. Justice Department won a court order
shutting most of the state's cannabis clubs on the basis that federal
lawwhich says it is illegal to possess, sell or distribute
marijuanasupersedes state law.

The Justice Department is skeptical of the work Lockyer's medical
marijuana task force is doing, but for now has no comment on its efforts.

"They are trying to implement a marijuana statute that the Department
of Justice and the federal government believe to be illegal and
unconstitutional," said one department source, speaking on condition
of anonymity.

Lockyer himself concedes that whatever recommendations his task force
makes may not be fully implemented unless and until the federal
government reclassifies marijuana as a drug with some therapeutic use.

"There are those who believe that the federal government will ignore a
wellregulated state system," Lockyer said, "but I haven't seen any
evidence of that yet." Davis has said that he voted against
Proposition 215, but so far has made no public comment on Lockyer's
efforts. The attorney general said he doesn't know whether the
governor will support the task force's recommendations.

Michael Bustamante, spokesman for Davis, said that the governor
"respects the decision of voters with issues that come before the
electorate, and clearly voters have spoken as it relates to the law."
Marijuana is smoked or ingested by people suffering a variety of
ailmentsincluding cancer, AIDS and spastic muscle conditions. Some
doctors and patients say the drug quells nausea, eases pain and
restores appetite.

Among the options the task force is considering is a proposal for a
statewide registry of medical marijuana patients. The state Department
of Health Services would create the registry and issue identification
cards to medical marijuana users. The cards would indicate to local
law enforcement officials that the bearer was using medical marijuana
with a doctor's recommendation.

The tiny Northern California town of Arcata employs such a system.
Police Chief Mel Brown has issued about 100 identification cards to
city residents who have met with him and given him their doctors' names.

After checking with the doctors, Brown said, he issued
photoidentification cards bearing his signature.

"It keeps me from paying my officers overtime to show up in court, it
keeps these people from being arrested, it keeps patients and doctors
from being dragged into court," said Brown, who also is serving on
Lockyer's medical marijuana task force.

Proposition 215 allows patients who need marijuana to treat pain or
ease other symptoms of a variety of illnesses to use it, with a
doctor's recommendation.

But thenAtty. Gen. Dan Lungren and the federal government took a dim
view of the law when it passed three years ago, charging that it was a
ploy to legalize a federally banned substance.

Lungren personallyand successfullycrusaded to shut down the state's
largest club, operated in San Francisco by Proposition 215 author
Dennis Peron. And Lungren welcomed the Justice Department's assault on
cannabis clubs in federal court.

By October, there was only one largescale marijuana distribution center
still operating in California: Imler's, which serves more than 500 people.
The other clubs had been shut by the courts, but Imler's lowkey operation,
his cooperation with local law enforcement and his tight screening
procedures kept him out of trouble.

Medical marijuana users and providers had reverted to growing plants
individually or buying the drug on the streets.

Days after he was sworn in, Lockyer said one of his top 10 law
enforcement priorities was the implementation of Proposition 215. He
formed the task forcechaired by state Sen. John Vasconcellos (DSanta
Clara) and Santa Clara County Dist. Atty.

George Kennedyin January and charged it with finding ways to safely
provide patients with medical marijuana.

"Prop. 215 has gaps and ambiguities that make it difficult to
implement," Lockyer said. "It can be amended, just like any other law.
I would hope that the task force agrees on clarifying language that
would provide more medical supervision of the program and answer local
law enforcement's desire to have clear rules." Amendments would
require a twothirds vote of the Legislature, but not a new ballot initiative.

Lockyer said the policy change is a priority because "the attorney
general has a duty to try to effectuate the people's will. And I voted
for Prop. 215.

"Having watched my mom die of leukemia when she was 50 and a little
sister die of leukemia when she was 39, it just always seemed odd to
me that a doctor could give them morphine but couldn't give them
marijuana." Lockyer said he also will lobby the federal government to
reclassify the drug so that physicians can legally prescribe it. He is
scheduled to attend a national conference of attorneys general in
Washington this month.

Justice Department spokesman Brian Steel said he had no comment on
Lockyer's approach. He said the department is reviewing medical
marijuana laws passed in November in Alaska, Washington, Oregon,
Nevada and Arizona.

The federal government is set to release a report March 17, by the
Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, on whether
there is any medicinal value to smoking or ingesting marijuana.

The longawaited reportwhich surveys past research efforts and includes
testimony from patients and doctorsis expected to say that there may
be some medical benefits to some patients, but more research is
needed. Some medical marijuana advocates see it as a first step toward
federal reclassifying of the drug.

In the meantime, they are applauding Lockyer for not waiting for a
change in federal policy.

"Certainly, the change from the Wilson administration is dramatic,"
said Bill Zimmerman, executive director of Americans for Medical
Rights and author of "Is Marijuana the Right Medicine for You?" The
nonprofit organization campaigned for passage of Proposition 215 and
has spearheaded medical marijuana campaigns in other states.

Zimmerman says he met with Lungren after the proposition passed, "and
I felt a little bit like Lucifer in that office." Now, he said,
"patients and advocates feel they can get a hearing instead of having
doors slammed in their faces." Zimmerman, who serves on the task
force, says that many of the law enforcement officials who are
participating introduced themselves at the first session by saying
they had voted against the proposition but now were committed to
making the law work.

"My own personal philosophy isn't relevant," said Kennedy, the Santa
Clara district attorney and cochairman of the task force. "The law
passed overwhelmingly. It doesn't make any difference what my views
are." Karyn Sinunu, Kennedy's deputy and chief of Santa Clara County's
narcotics unit, also serves on the task force, as does attorney Gerald
Uelmen, who has represented cannabis clubs and their operators.

Uelmen and Sinunu debate legal issues at the meetings, then square off
in Santa Clara Superior Court, where Uelmen is representing a cannabis
club operator charged with seven felonies.

"I don't think it is particularly awkward," Uelmen said of serving
with his court opponent. "We have a very different view of the
prosecution of Peter Baez, but we're in basic agreement that medical
marijuana is a good idea and that we should do what we can to
implement it." A spokesman for Vasconcellos said the senator expects
the panel to come up with recommendations by the end of April.

"The primary goal of the senator is to ease the distribution crisis
that occurred on Lungren's watch," said Rand Martin, Vasconcellos'
chief of staff. "Nobody in their right mind can argue that voters
thought that people with cancer were going to have to go out on the
street and buy their drugs from dealers in dark alleys."