Global Ganja Report

The US Justice Department on Jan. 13 issued a report charging the Chicago Police Department with a pattern of civil rights abuses. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said the federal probe, covering the period from 2012 to 2016, found that the Chicago police force "engages in a pattern or practice of use of excessive force that violates the Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution." The Fourth Amendment protects citizens from unreasonable search and seizure.

The Hawaii chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union on Jan. 10 filed a complaint with the US Justice Department, demanding an investigation into the state's dangerously overcrowded prisons and jails. The complaint charges that horrific conditions at the facilities constitute a violation of the prisoners' Eighth Amendment protections against cruel and unusual punishment. "What you have is cells that were designed for two inmates that now are housing four or five inmates," said Mateo Caballero, legal director for the Hawaii ACLU. "You have inmates sleeping on the floor next to leaky faucets or toilets. The conditions of jails and prisons in Hawaii have not improved in the last 30 years."

After the first day of Senate confirmation hearings for Jeff Sessions, president-elect Trump's choice to lead the US Justice Department, cannabis advocates are parsing his testimony for clues as to what the incoming administration's stance will be on whether to continue to give breathing room to state-level legalization and medical marijuana laws. The Los Angeles Times takes an ominous view, writing in a headline: "Sessions leaves door open to reviving federal war on pot."

A rather sensationalistic piece in the New York Times last month luridly headlined: "Drug 85 Times as Potent as Marijuana Caused a 'Zombielike' State in Brooklyn." Apparently, emergency medical technicians called to a "mass casualty event" in Brooklyn's Bushwick neighborhood reported multiple people at the scene, "all of whom had a degree of altered mental status that was described by bystanders as 'zombielike,'" according to a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine. Blood and urine samples drawn from eight of the 18 men hospitalized that day revealed they had taken a synthetic cannabinoid called AMB-FUBINACA, originally developed by the pharmaceutical company Pfizer, with the street names "AK-47" or "24 Karat Gold." It is said to be 85 times as potent as the main agent in natural cannabis, THC, or tetrahydrocannabinol.

Cannabis advocates have been cautiously awaiting the moment of reckoning when the incoming Trump administration reveals how it will handle the growing groundswell for legalization. Now the DC Cannabis Coalition announces that it will make the point by smoking a joint—in public, on Inauguration Day. USA Today reports that the group plans to start handing out joints at 8 AM Jan. 20 in DC's Dupont Circle. Then, marchers will walk to the National Mall for the main rally—and light up. “The main message is it’s time to legalize cannabis at the federal level," said Adam Eidinger, founder of DCMJ, the group that pushed for the successful legalization initiative in the District of Columbia in 2014.

From Oregon comes the ominous news of the first violent robbery on a state-licensed cannabis grow since the recent wave of legalization initiatives. The Oregonian reported Dec. 30 that James Bowman, 56, a licensed cultivator in the town of Wimer, was tied up and severely beaten when four masked intruders raided his home two weeks earlier. Bowman suffered a broken nose and black eyes in the Dec. 16 attack, while the assailants made off with his entire harvested crop—filling a rented U-Haul truck with hundreds of pounds. Bowman was discovered hours later by two of his workers. The robbers left the door to his house open, with Bowman tied up inside.

Denver-based AmeriCann is planning to develop what will be the United States' largest medical marijuana facility in Freetown, Mass. At one million square feet, the Massachusetts Medical Cannabis Center is planned for a tract in the Bristol County town formerly slated for a brewery by the Boston Beer Co. Boston Business Journal reports that AmeriCann bought the property this fall for $4.475 million. AmeriCann CEO Tim Keogh said the facility will be "the place in the northeast US for the creation of a wide variety of exciting new advanced products for medical cannabis patients."

The Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case that could set limits on the federal government's sweeping powers to seize property in drug cases under "criminal forfeiture" laws. Tony and Terry Honeycutt were charged with federal drug offenses after selling quantities of iodine-based water disinfectant at their camping and hunting store in Chattanooga—because the substance can also be used in the manufacture of methamphetamine. Tony, the actual owner of the store, pleaded guilty, and had $200,000 seized—the amount believed equivalent to his proceeds from the sales of the chemical. Terry fought the charge, and lost. The government then sought an additional $70,000 from him. In Honeycutt v. United States, Terry is arguing that he is not liable for the proceeds because he wasn't an owner of the store.