PUTTING THE KIND IN KINDBUD

Despite Run-Ins With The Law, Denver's Curies Of Cannabis Light Up For A
Good Cause

The tale of the Colorado Compassion Club begins with a couple of
antagonistic tree trimmers. As the story goes, in the summer of 2004, a
Denver resident, whom we shall call Frank, told a few tree trimmers he
would pay for their services in marijuana. The trimmers knew Frank was good
for it. All they had to do was look into his house to spot his pot-hundreds
and hundreds of plants. When the tree trimmers' work was complete, however,
Frank apparently failed to pay up. So the trimmers took matters into their
own hands, namely making off with some of Frank's marijuana plants.
Incensed, Frank called the cops, which, in hindsight, might not have been
the best decision. When police officers arrived at Frank's home, they were
less interested his tale of mischievous tree trimmers than they were in the
fact that he had hundreds of pot plants growing all over his crib. When the
cops tried to take the plants, Frank told them they'd have to go through
the Drug Enforcement Agency. Bad idea number two. Frank ended up with
federal agents crawling all over his cannabis arboretum.

To lessen the heat, Frank told the authorities he'd rat out others who'd
helped him grow his sizable marijuana garden. Frank's admissions led North
Metro Drug Task Force officers and federal drug agents to the door of a
low-lying red-brick bungalow in a neighborhood of low-lying red-brick
bungalows in east Denver at 10:30 p.m. on June 1, 2004. The home belonged
to Thomas and Larisa Lawrence. Thomas is just over six feet, with
light-blue eyes, brown hair tied in a ponytail and a soul patch plummeting
from his lower lip. Larisa is small and pretty, with straight brown hair.
At the time, both were inside the house celebrating Thomas' grandmother's
72nd birthday.

The officers asked Thomas and Larissa if they could search the premises.
What happened next is in dispute. Larisa says she asked to see a search
warrant. She says the officers responded that they didn't need one because
of the PATRIOT Act-but that they would be happy to get one, provided that
Thomas, Larisa and all their guests didn't mind being locked out of the
house for six hours while they whipped one up. Jeff Dorschner, spokesperson
for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Denver, unequivocally denies such a
conversation ever took place. He says Thomas and Larisa must have given the
officers permission to search the premises.

Whatever the circumstances, the officers searched the house. The
investigation turned up 84 young pot plants in the basement, 12 ounces of
loose marijuana and six pounds of ice in the freezer that contained
marijuana plant matter.

It appeared that Thomas and Larisa were unusually over-achieving stoners,
but that wasn't the case. Thanks to a combination of football injuries and
a degenerative spinal condition, Thomas suffers from migraines and back
pain. He can't stand prescription narcotics, especially since they leave
him too doped up to run his home-improvement business. The only thing that
seems to help is marijuana, which dulls his pain and thins his blood,
leading to less migraines. The "medicine," as Thomas and Larisa call it,
works so well that the two moved from the Washington, D.C. area to Colorado
in 2001 because of the Centennial State's more lenient marijuana laws.

The year before, Colorado had passed Amendment 20, which allows people to
be licensed to use marijuana to alleviate debilitating conditions including
cancer, AIDS, severe pain and seizures. The law allows a licensed marijuana
patient to usually possess no more than six marijuana plants and two ounces
of usable marijuana-much less than what the authorities found in Thomas and
Larisa's house.

But Thomas wasn't just growing for himself, he was providing for other
patients. Word had gotten around that Thomas was growing some good
medicine, and many patients specified Thomas as their state-certified
caregiver. Frank had been one of Thomas' patients, albeit one with whom
Thomas had severed all ties because of a disagreement long before the cops
came knocking on his door. At the time of the raid, Thomas estimates he was
providing medicine for 11 licensed patients and about 20 more who were in
the process of getting licensed-more than enough, he says, to legally
justify his ganja garden.

The feds didn't see it that way. After mulling about the property for
several hours, they confiscated all the marijuana, plus lights, heaters and
books used in the operation. They allowed Thomas to keep his collection of
one-of-a-kind bongs and roach clips. Thanks to the raid, Thomas and Larissa
lost between $5,000 and $10,000 worth of property and gained a reputation
around the neighborhood for being the focus of a federal drug bust. While
Thomas and Larisa have not been charged with any crime, their property
remains confiscated.

Weird science

Whatever the officers hoped to gain from the raid, they didn't stop Thomas
and Larisa from growing their medicine. Instead they caused these Curies of
cannabis to go official-by starting the Colorado Compassion Club.

"We are not trying to say, 'How can we grow as much pot as we can,'" says
Thomas. "We are trying to make sure patients and caregivers have some
access to medicine, and make it as cost effective as possible."

Today there are 587 people licensed to use medical marijuana in Colorado-32
in Boulder-but the law doesn't specify how they are supposed to get the
pot. The most obvious ways of doing so seem to be scoring a dime bag in
Centennial Park or spending hundreds of dollars and six months growing pot
from seed in a closet. But now, through Thomas and Larisa's Colorado
Compassion Club, a consortium of about 70 patients and caregivers that's
rapidly growing, there's another option.

Sorry, run-of-the-mill stoners: Prospective Colorado Compassion Club
members need to be either a licensed marijuana patient or in the process of
obtaining a license. Thomas, Larisa or other caregivers in the club work
with club patients, discussing their conditions and what type and dose of
marijuana might be appropriate. Everything is recorded on extremely
detailed paperwork-so if there's ever another raid, Thomas and Larisa will
have the proof they're not drug lords. The club provides members from
Carson City to Grand Lake with medicine or helps them build and maintain
their own grow rooms. It's all based on donations, and the club is hoping
to get nonprofit status. If a member can't pay in cash, they volunteer time
helping the club produce medicine, or donate clippings from their own
plants, if they grow their own.

Thomas and Larisa's bungalow is the club's center of operations, a sort of
communal hospital-cum-greenhouse-cum-pharmacy. Club members stop over all
the time to help out, chill out or toke up. The living room feels like a
rain forest, filled with large plants, ceremonial masks, roaming cats and
dogs and an unmistakable heavy aroma in the air. But the important greenery
lies downstairs, in a small room with bare white walls. This is where the
magic happens.

"I think the love and care we put into the plants produces a different
quality of medicine. You have to love the plant," says Thomas, as he stands
in the basement room. Around his feet spreads a thick carpet of young
marijuana plants, each labeled by type-Chocolate Chunk, Ultimate Indica,
Chronic Maple Leaf, Humboldt Snow, G13, White Lightning-Thomas cracks up in
the middle of listing the varieties-Bubblegum, Bubble Funk, Shiskaberry,
Dutch Treat. A fan blows gently through the leaves, and a large circular
metal grow light hangs overhead, traveling slowly back and forth on a
motorized track attached to the ceiling. There's a stereo in the
corner-some volunteers like to play rock for the plants; Thomas prefers
hip-hop.

In the room's closet, Thomas runs his genetics lab. Here, tiny plant
clippings grow in small containers, all part of Thomas' experiments in
cloning and cross-breeding the cannabis to produce varieties with specific
medicinal qualities-some to increase hunger, some to dull pain, some to
ease muscle spasms.

When the plants are large enough, Thomas will move them to a large
greenhouse in the backyard. There they will grow for most of the summer;
when they're harvested, they'll probably be over six feet tall. Neighbors
warn their kids to stay away from the unusual greenery poking over the fence.

Along with marijuana and hash for smoking, the club produces brownies,
muffins and fudge, all made with a specific amount of cannabis, so patients
can take regular dosages-"Take two pot brownies and call me in the
morning." While most tokers just use cannabis flowers, the Colorado
Compassion Club also harvests the plant's leaves, which offer many of the
same medicinal qualities with less of the intoxicating side effects. So if
you don't feel like smoking, there's a myriad of other ways to take your
medicine: teas, tinctures, topical rubs, lotions, cooking oils, creams,
compresses and even hard candy.

"It doesn't have to be about sitting around and taking bong hits," says
Larisa. "Though it is your right to do so."

If Thomas is the mad scientist in the basement, Larisa is the Mother
Theresa in the living room. She prefers working with the patients, finding
out how to best meet their needs, helping them cope. She says she's watched
many people heal before her eyes.

Busted-again

For Thomas and Larissa, running the Colorado Compassion Club is a full-time
job-especially since they aren't about to receive much support from local
authorities.

Thomas learned this the hard way in January. He was driving home one
evening when a cop pulled him over. The officer found an ounce of "Kahuna
Salad" marijuana and two pipes in the glove compartment. Since Thomas
didn't have his caregiver license on him, the cops were somewhat skeptical
when he told them it was medicine.

Once again, Thomas' medicine was taken by the Man-but this time, he was
determined to get it back. In February, Thomas walked into the police
station with a court property disposition for his weed and pipes. The
police laughed in his face. They said his disposition was fake, that he was
trying to steal illicit drugs from the cops. Not even a call from the City
Attorney's Office could sway the officers. There was no way the Denver
police were going to start handing out Mary Jane to needy citizens.

A month later, on March 4, Thomas returned to the police station, armed
with a new court order, his lawyer and the press. He picked up the phone in
the station lobby and said, "Hi. I need to pick up some property."

This time the police were more cooperative. Thomas became the first person
ever to receive drugs from the Denver police.

"What happened was a victory for all patients and caregivers in Colorado.
It was a victory for everyone who voted to get the law enabled," says
Thomas. The only problem with the returned medicine, Thomas told a
journalist at the scene, was "It's a little dryer than I'd like."

Thomas and Larisa have big plans for the Colorado Compassion Club. Both are
taking naturopath courses, and talk all the time about creating a wellness
center for the club, where members have access to health spas and even
hospice rooms. Reaching that goal won't be easy, especially since the
Colorado Compassion Club probably hasn't seen the last of its run-ins with
the authorities.

One possible reason federal attorneys have yet to charge Thomas and Larissa
for the 83 plants they found in their house last year could be because they
are waiting for an upcoming decision in the Supreme Court case Ashcroft vs.
Raich, which will decide on the federal government's ability to supercede
state medical marijuana laws. If the court rules in the fed's favor, people
like Thomas and Larisa could be looking at federal prosecution-maybe even
prison time.

Thomas isn't too worried. He doesn't expect to be thrown in the clink for
growing some supreme weed.

"Here in Denver, I don't see them being able to convict me under a jury of
my peers," he says, relaxing on his living room couch while, behind him, a
few visiting club members sit around the kitchen table, munching on
take-out fried chicken and packing a glass bong. "All I am trying to do is
help people who can't help themselves."