CROSSING THE LINE

Travelling Stateside? Think Twice If You've Smoked Pot

For most of us, summer means time to travel. But if you're one of the 1.5
million Canadians who have a criminal record for simple possession of
marijuana, you might want to reconsider if you've booked a vacation in the
United States.

"Post 9-11, more people are being questioned, and therefore more people are
being turned away for these types of grounds," says Greg Samuels, a U.S.
immigration lawyer based in Vancouver. There's a lot of stress at border
crossings, and U.S. officials are likely to exercise their considerable
discretion against anyone who's a problem. "It's much more common now."

According to government manuals, U.S. immigration officers are supposed to
deny entry to anyone who's ever violated "any law or regulation relating to
a controlled substance." (They can also refuse anyone convicted of any
crime involving "moral turpitude," which can include anything from murder
to sodomy.)

But it goes further. Even if your criminal record's clean, just admitting
that you once smoked pot is enough to keep you out--as gold-medal
snowboarder Ross Rebagliati learned in February, when U.S. border cops
refused to let him travel to Salt Lake City as part of Whistler's Olympic
bid committee. Rebagliati eventually got in, but had to submit
fingerprints, a doctor's letter certifying he was drug-free, and $195 U.S.
for a temporary "waiver" of his offence, plus have a lawyer plead his case
to immigration officers.

He was lucky: Canadians with criminal records for minor drug offences
usually wait up to 10 months to hear whether they're entitled to a waiver,
which is only valid for one year. And if they ever apply to live or work in
the States, they're often turned down flat. Michael Jacobsen, the Vancouver
lawyer who represented Rebagliati, says he has one client who can't get
into the U.S., even though he's married to an American, because he has two
minor pot convictions. "There can be some really serious impact on their
future mobility."

But if you've got a record and you're still determined to travel south,
there's always a way.

"I go where they don't do a lot of computer work," says one B.C. drug
reform activist, who's made it across the border several times recently to
attend conferences. Avoid airplanes, trains and ferries where your name
ends up on passenger lists, he advises, and never travel by bus, because
customs officers treat bus passengers like dirt.

Instead, he suggests, you're best bet is to cross in a recent-model car,
owned and driven by somebody with a clean record. To Americans, an
automobile is the surest sign of respectability--and you don't need a
lawyer to tell you that.