POT PROTESTER SMOKED OUT

OPP ARREST ORGANIZER ON EVE OF ORILLIA EVENT

ORILLIA -- A plan for a mass pot protest at a Canada Day celebration here
was almost snuffed out when the organizer was busted in a police raid.

Ron McInnes, 50, of Orillia, spent weeks handing out flyers and organizing
a marijuana demonstration at Couchiching Beach Park during the town's
Canada Day festivities yesterday.

He trumpeted the event, proclaiming hundreds of pot smokers planned to join
him in the "smoke-out.''

Whisked away

But on the eve of his glory he was whisked away in handcuffs before he had
a chance to spark up a festive joint.

McInnes was arrested at his home and business, The Pot Shop. He's in
custody and is to appear for a bail hearing today on charges of possession
of a controlled substance, production of a controlled substance, and two
counts of promoting and selling instruments for illicit drug use.

Despite the bust, several pot-smoking supporters fired up joints amidst the
hoots, cheers, and applause of hundreds of bystanders as police swarmed the
park yesterday.

"It's time to make a statement,'' said Mike Lancaster, 35, of Orillia, the
first to light. "This shouldn't be a crime.''

Two Ontario Provincial Police officers briskly cuffed his hands behind his
back and took him away.

"If people want to taunt us like this, we're not going to bury our heads in
the sand,'' said Inspector Jim Dixon, commander of the local OPP detachment.

"This is a family day and there is no way we are going to sit back and
watch it be ruined.''

Tim Kors, 30, of Bracebridge, looked almost jubilant as police cuffed him
and hustled him away from the throng of hooting fans.

"This is a free country and all I was doing was having a smoke,'' Kors
proclaimed.

Just metres away, two women sat by the water and puffed away, undetected by
police because of the hubbub of other arrests. "My doctor knows I'm doing
this,'' said Ina Kealy, 40, of Caledon, as she deeply inhaled and rolled
the weed. The former musician said she has used marijuana medicinally
because she has lupus and arthritis. Her friend Freda Little, 54, a Toronto
aromatherapist, smoked along with her.

McInnes's 72-year-old mother, Margaret Nicholson, stood among the crowd and
said she's ticked off her son couldn't be there to carry out his plan.

"They came in his house last night like a swarm of bees,'' she said. "They
even brought the dogs in to sniff around.''

Copyright (c) 1998 The London Free Press a division of Sun Media Corporation.

Checked-by: Mike Gogulski