LONG ARM OF THE DRUGS LAW

Twenty-two years ago Deborah Aaron was arrested and charged with possession
of 54.4g of cannabis resin. The offending lump was found inside a leather
pouch lying on the stairs in her house and, Mrs Aaron still claims, it
belonged to her boyfriend and not to her, writes Vanessa Thorpe.

As a result of her subsequent conviction in a British court, she now faces
deportation from her Los Angeles home in September. The US immigration
office has told her that she must leave her three children, her husband and
her job and return to England when her current humanitarian visa runs out.

"I just find it absurd that this is happening to me," she told the
Independent on Sunday this weekend. The arrest and my treatment at the time
were bad enough, but the fact that this incident is still threatening to
ruin my life is just so terrible."

Now 42, Mrs Aaron works for a non-profit-making organisation which offers
aid to the poorest members of the Jewish community across America, and her
husband, David, works in a furniture store. Her lifestyle since the drugs
conviction, she argues, has been almost exemplary. She can see no reason why
she should not be allowed to continue working in Los Angeles and living with
her family, who are all American citizens.

"Since 1976, I think I have had a couple of speeding tickets and a parking
ticket," she added wryly. "So, I suppose I am quite obnoxious really."

Mrs Aaron's lawyer, Jessica Croxton, who runs a small practice in Santa
Monica, is battling to keep the family together. "I plan to make a federal
court challenge to prevent her deportation by making constitutional
argument, and then I hope to persuade the British authorities that the case
was mishandled in the first place," she said.

When 20-year-old Deborah Gabbay, as she then was, was first arrested, Ms
Croxton believes she was denied important rights. She claims she was not
permitted to make a phone call to a friend or a solicitor and she was kept
in a cell for nine hours. "She appears to have had an initial confession
coerced from her and when she did have legal advice this was not dealt with
properly," said Ms Croxton.

"I wanted to plead not guilty," Mrs Aaron explained, "but my lawyer told me
it would be better to go along with my initial confession that I had once
smoked cannabis, and come away with a 10 pound fine. That is what I did and
that is what is now causing me such a problem." If Mrs Aaron succeeds in
persuading governments on either side of the Atlantic to alter their view,
it will be the first time that the case law on cannabis convictions and US
citizenship has changed since John Lennon secured his Green Card because of
his exceptional status and because of the small amount of drugs involved in
his British conviction.

Mrs Aaron's plight has come to a head now because of a new law introduced by
the US government in April last year. The Illegal Immigration Reform and
Immigrant Responsibility Act, known as IRAIRA, means that her humanitarian
waiver is now only available in cases where it can be shown to be in the
national interest for an immigrant with a criminal record to stay in America.

e-mail your comments to cannabis@independent.co.uk

Checked-by: Melodi Cornett