ACTIVIST ADDRESSES COURT AFTER TOKING SOME HASH

OTTAWA -- David Malmo-Levine, fortified by a quick toke of hash and dressed
from head to toe in clothing woven of hemp, took his crusade against federal
marijuana laws to the Supreme Court of Canada yesterday.

The 31-year-old Vancouver man, one of three people appealing convictions for
breaking pot laws, couched his argument simply as he addressed the nine
poker-faced judges who patiently heard him out.

Nobody should be incarcerated, he said, for exercising a "right to
relaxation and well-being" that doesn't harm anybody else.

"We should not let anyone in this country point their finger, yell
'criminal,' and then lock up thousands of people . . . this court must
protect human autonomy, which is in essence the right to pick and choose our
own tastes, our own pleasures."

Malmo-Levine, a self-described justice and freedom activist, made his pitch
amid an array of lawyers who offered more learned arguments for striking
down the current prohibition on pot use as an infringement of the Charter of
Rights.

He later acknowledged, during a break in the hearing, that he'd taken some
unusual steps to prepare for his day in court.

"I took a couple of hits off some bubble hash," he said, explaining that the
specially filtered cannabis resin helped him wake up and focus his mind.

"I was happy, hungry and relaxed, but I was not impaired."

Malmo-Levine wants the court to strike down all criminal sanctions against
marijuana, including penalties for growers and traffickers.

Lawyers for the others involved in the case -- including Christopher Clay of
London -- framed the question more narrowly, concentrating on whether people
convicted of simple possession should face jail time and be saddled with a
criminal record.

"I don't mean to stand here and suggest there is a constitutional right to
smoke marijuana," said Toronto lawyer Paul Burstein.

But he did argue the government has been overstepping its legal authority
for the last 80 years by keeping a law on the books that provides for jail
terms in simple possession cases -- even though judges rarely impose such
sentences nowadays.

John Conroy, representing a Vancouver-area man busted for smoking a joint in
his van at a seaside parking lot, offered a similar assessment.

"If somebody lights up a marijuana cigarette in their own home, or even out
at the beach, where does the government get an interest in that?" asked
Conroy.

Justice Minister Martin Cauchon and Prime Minister Jean Chretien both have
said the government will introduce legislation to decriminalize possession
of small amounts of pot.