N.J. LAWMAKER TO CONTINUE MARIJUANA BID

Despite The Court's Blow, He Said He Wanted The Drug Legal For The
Seriously Ill. No Impact Was Seen In Pa.

TRENTON -- A New Jersey state senator said yesterday's U.S. Supreme
Court decision undermining states' medical-marijuana laws would not
deter his efforts to make New Jersey the 12th state to legalize the
drug for the seriously ill.

State Sen. Nicholas Scutari (D., Union) said his work as Linden's
city prosecutor had taught him the dangers of recreational drug use
but the benefits of marijuana's medical application for patients with
cancer, AIDS and other diseases. He introduced his proposal in
January and argues that it may yet win legislative approval.

"I've seen firsthand the debilitating effect of recreational drug
use, and that is not what this is about," Scutari said. "States have
their own independent rights, and I don't believe this decision will
affect my bill or its chances in the Legislature."

Supreme Court justices ruled 6-3 yesterday that California and other
states' laws sanctioning medical marijuana did not protect users from
a federal ban on the drug.

Advocates in New Jersey said the ruling might have little effect,
since local and state authorities are more likely than the federal
government to prosecute drug offenses.

"We're essentially in the same position we were yesterday - we'd
always assumed the federal government would retain its right to
prosecute," said Roseanne Scotti, director of Drug Policy Alliance
New Jersey, which supports Scutari's bill. "If anything, this ruling
may encourage states to move forward with their laws to encourage
federal lawmakers to act."

Scotti said states such as Alabama and Connecticut were closer to
passing medical-marijuana laws than New Jersey, where Scutari's
proposal has gained little traction and faces opposition from law enforcement.

Terrence Farley, first assistant prosecutor in Ocean County and
spokesman for the New Jersey Narcotics Task Force, said the court's
decision gave him ammunition to fight Scutari's proposal and others like it.

He said he considered medical-marijuana use "nonsense" but noted he
opted not to prosecute a wheelchair-bound Ocean County woman with
multiple sclerosis who used the drug and advocated for its medical
application before she died in 2003.

Law-enforcement officials in Harrisburg could not recall any
prosecutions of doctors or patients for using marijuana for medical
purposes in Pennsylvania.

Kevin Harley, spokesman for Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom
Corbett, said Corbett supported the court's decision.

"For the pain relief that marijuana can deliver," he said, "there are
other prescription drugs that can provide similar relief without
opening a Pandora's box."

Nor could Pennsylvania lawmakers recall any legislation that would
have legalized medical marijuana. One senior Senate staffer said the
subject had not been discussed since the early 1980s, when Mayor
Street's brother Milton Street, then a state senator, shook up the
Capitol by introducing a bill to legalize marijuana.

Deborah McGregor, medical director of the Philadelphia AIDS
Consortium's Comprehensive Health Institute, predicted desperate
patients would continue to find marijuana on their own.

For others, she said, "it would be the last of all possible choices."