PRISONER OF POT

Canada's Marijuana Crusader Caught In U.S. War On Drugs

VANCOUVER -- For years, his seed catalogs were scrutinized by
discerning cannabis cultivators across the U.S. and Canada.

There was Blue Heaven pot, capable of producing a "euphoric,
anti-anxiety high," or Crown Royal, whose "flower tops come to a flat
golden crown, sparkling with gems of THC."

The difference between Marc Emery's pot seeds and countless others on
the market was that if you bought Emery's, he'd use the money to
launch a cannabis tsunami across North America that would set the war
on drugs adrift like a cork on a massive sea of weed.

"Plant the seeds of freedom, overgrow the government," Emery urged
his clients. With a pot plant on every patio, he declared, violent
drug gangs would see their livelihoods disappear and police would be
reduced to "running around... chasing all these marijuana plants."
Sooner or later, he promised, "they will simply give up and change the laws."

Well, not yet. Emery, who U.S. authorities fingered in 2005 as one of
the top 46 international drug-trafficking targets, was ordered
extradited by the Canadian minister of justice last month and
relinquished to federal marshals in Seattle. He now faces a likely
five years in U.S. federal prison.

"In fact I have done these things, so I admit my guilt," Emery said
in an e-mail after pleading guilty in U.S. District Court to one
count of conspiracy to manufacture marijuana. "We are winning,
especially in the United States, and I can take a lot of credit for
that.... When I am gone, or even locked up here in the U.S., my
historical legacy is secure."

Here in "Vansterdam," where cannabis cafes, head shops and even a
supervised needle-injection site are prominent features of downtown,
pot is a multibillion-dollar industry. And Emery, a longtime fixture
at political forums and downtown rallies, is widely seen as one of its titans.

The extradition of the 52-year-old self-proclaimed Prince of Pot has
sparked a sovereignty outcry across Canada, where supporters, civil
rights advocates and even several members of Parliament have demanded
to know why he was handed over to the U.S. for an offense that Canada
seldom prosecutes.

"It seems like the American war on drugs is just reaching its arm
into Canada and saying, 'We're going to scoop you up,'" said
Vancouver MP Libby Davies. "The whole thing has struck people as
being over the top, harsh, unwarranted -- and at the end of the day,
what are they trying to prove?"

Emery became a target for police in both nations -- in Canada because
his appearances on international television shows was an irritant to
police; in America because his seed business, which at one point
reached revenues of $3 million a year, was supplying
marijuana-growing operations in at least nine states.

"Marc Emery happened to be the largest supplier of marijuana seeds
into the United States," said Todd Greenberg, the assistant U.S.
attorney in Seattle who is prosecuting Emery's case.

Emery believes he caught the eye of the Drug Enforcement
Administration not because of his seeds but because of what he did
with his revenue. Emery channeled most of the millions he earned into
marijuana legalization and defence efforts across North America. The
Prince of Pot's seed money has helped start "compassion clubs" for
medical-marijuana users across Canada, launch the Pot-TV Internet
network, and fund lobbying organizations and political parties in
North America, Israel and New Zealand.

The Prince of Pot's blog posts from the SeaTac detention centre go
out regularly on the Internet to his supporters. What he wants to do
next, though his attempt to get a recorded phone call out has so far
only gotten him stuck in solitary confinement: Potcasts.