POT 'PRINCE' COMES TO TOWN

Legalization Activist Marc Emery Stops In Edmonton On Farewell Tour

Smokey grey clouds circled overhead and rose from a downtown park
teeming with pro-pot supporters yesterday, who gave the country's
"prince" a royal sendoff.

Marc Emery made the fifth of his 32-stop farewell tour yesterday. The
man dubbed "Prince of Pot" will be hitting every major Canadian city
before turning himself in to U.S. authorities in the fall.

"This is a lifelong battle, even if pot is legal one day, there will
always be some tyrant trying to recriminalize it," he said, adding his
impending incarceration is for a "victimless" and "transparent" crime.

The marijuana legalization activist is ending a four-year flight from
extradition.

He's sought on three charges for selling pot seeds across the border
via mail, through his pot culture magazine Cannabis Culture.

"Essentially, I sold seeds to consenting adults in the United States,"
he said, adding U.S. authorities determined the four-to-six million
seeds he sold in the U.S. would have yielded 1.1 million pounds of
pot.

"They say that makes me the largest trafficker in the history of the
U.S. criminal justice system. They decided if they can take me down,
it will stop the movement. It won't."

Officials have agreed to drop two of three charges in exchange for a
guilty plea.

Emery expects to serve five years in an American prison for one count
of drug trafficking, though he hopes he'll be able to serve his time
in a Canadian prison.

"I don't think of myself as suffering. My destiny is secure. I've been
doing this for 20 years, and we've made a lot of progress," he said.
"Canadians need to know ending prohibition is the most valuable
political act of our time."