PROTESTERS TAKE AIM AT MEDICAL MARIJUANA LAWS

The pungent smell of marijuana smoke permeated the entrance of
Peterborough's Superior Court of Justice Thursday as a group of
activists took aim at Canada's marijuana possession laws.

Members of the group toked up in protest on the courthouse's front
steps, arguing marijuana possession laws were invalid for a six-year
period beginning in 2003.

The group was supporting two local men - Mark McDonald and Benny
Almud - who have been charged with marijuana possession for the
purpose of trafficking.

"They have been charged with something, which.is no longer alive
anymore," activist John Turmel said on the front steps of the courthouse.

Both McDonald and Almud say they were using marijuana at the time of
their arrests for medicinal reasons and since their arrests have both
received medical approval to possess it legally.

McDonald said he was arrested in December 2008 with 36 grams of bud,
1,410 grams of bud and stock mixture, 43 drying plants and 40 pounds
of marijuana shake.

All the marijuana was for medicinal use, he said. A spinal condition
causes him severe pain, which he can offset by using about 15 grams
of marijuana per day, he said.

"In comparison to the prescription drug they give me, which is
stronger than morphine, the marijuana is a lot easier on my body,"
McDonald said.

Police seized some 142 marijuana plants when officers raided Almud's
Smith-Ennismore-Lakefield township home in July.

Suffering from multiple ailments including cancer, heart problems and
chronic pain, Almud said marijuana is the only drug that can help him cope.

"I wasn't trafficking," Almud said. "I was just trying to get enough
marijuana for six months or a year (for medicinal purposes)."

His granddaughter Sabrina Almud, who was jointly charged on the
offences, was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time and had
nothing to do with the drugs, Almud added.

Turmel, who accompanied the accused as part of the organization
Canadian Cannabis Legal Defence Resource, argues the men were charged
during a period of time between 2003 and 2009 when Canada's marijuana
laws were constitutionally invalid.

Longtime medicinal-marijuana advocate Terry Parker also joined
McDonald and Almud in Peterborough court Thursday.

"I'm here for moral support," he said.

In a landmark case in 2000, Parker won the right to smoke pot for
medicinal purposes.

That legal victory gave medicinal-marijuana users the right to posses
less than 30 grams of pot but the presiding judge delayed the
ruling's effect for one year in hope the federal government would
introduce a medicinal marijuana law.

But the government did not. Instead, the cabinet issued regulations
for access to medicinal marijuana one day before the year-long grace
period ended in 2001.

In early 2003, the Supreme Court of Ontario ruled those medical
access regulations were unconstitutional because they were failing to
provide a legal supply of the drug.

As a result of the ruling, marijuana possession charges were stayed
for about 4,000 people. The government changed the medicinal
marijuana regulation again in 2003, which Turmel and his group argue
made the laws invalid once more until new changes in 2009.

The accused and their supporters were not granted an opportunity to
present their case to the court Thursday and their cases were
adjourned to July 19.