Cannabis News Stop the Drug War!
  Danger Grew Along with Pot
Posted by CN Staff on March 04, 2007 at 06:18:21 PT
By Kirk Mitchell, Denver Post Staff Writer 
Source: Denver Post  

medical Colorado -- The powerful lamps that threw light on some 50 marijuana plants at Ken Gorman's home were as distracting to neighbors as a blinking neon sign.

Unlike most pot growers, Gorman didn't bother to cover his windows with tar paper to conceal his lucrative cultivations. And neighbors complained to the cops about the bright lights.

Gorman, 59, was well-known as a medical-marijuana provider and a spirited advocate for legal pot. Everyone knew what he was doing - including criminals who robbed him a dozen times, apparently viewing him as easy prey.

Then, on Feb. 17, someone shot Gorman to death.

Police still haven't said whether Gorman was killed for his pot, or his money. They have no suspects, Denver police spokeswoman Virginia Quiñones said Friday, adding that the killer did not take any of Gorman's marijuana plants.

But when Gorman's fellow marijuana activists are asked about his death, they talk about pot.

"What Ken did broke every rule," Allen St. Pierre, executive director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, said Friday. "He was zealous in a very nonconformist way. He ... would broadcast he was growing marijuana. He was almost maniacal."

Unwitting Martyrs?

The 2000 campaign that won Colorado voter approval of Amendment 20, permitting use of marijuana for medicinal purposes, was led by ardent activists who were so focused on their cause they may not have realized the risks of their openness about growing it themselves, St. Pierre said.

"I have sat down with people and asked them, 'Do you know what you are doing?"' St. Pierre said. "Some are absolutely naive about the product they have."

Their idealism could make them martyrs for a trade still deemed illegal by federal law and largely dominated by criminals, he said.

Amendment 20 allows people with certain debilitating diseases, including cancer and AIDS, to grow as many as six marijuana plants and to possess up to 2 ounces of pot. But the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment doesn't tell sick people where they can get seeds or marijuana.

"How many people make their own jam or beer?" St. Pierre asked. "People buy it. It's the same with marijuana."

Snipped:

Complete Article: http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_5351678

Source: Denver Post (CO)
Author: Kirk Mitchell, Denver Post Staff Writer
Published: March 4, 2007
Copyright: 2007 The Denver Post Corp
Website: http://www.denverpost.com/
Contact: openforum@denverpost.com

Related Articles & Web Site:

NORML
http://www.norml.org/

Killing Highlights Risk of Selling Marijuana
http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread22702.shtml

CannabisNews Medical Marijuana Archives
http://cannabisnews.com/news/list/medical.shtml


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Comment #7 posted by afterburner on March 05, 2007 at 22:40:43 PT
ONDCP - Leader of the Pack
"Prohibition kills, and every law enforcement and politician that supports continued cannabis prohibition is DIRECTLY RESPONSIBLE FOR THE DEATHS RESULTING FROM SAID PROHIBITION!"

ONDCP Gloats Over Ken Gorman's Death http://stopthedrugwar.org/speakeasy_main/2007/mar/04/ondcp_gloats_over_ken_gormans_de

Appalling!

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #6 posted by BGreen on March 04, 2007 at 15:34:32 PT
My neighbors have HUGE outdoor gardens
They grow all kinds of vegetables that you can buy down at the store, and as a result, NOBODY steals from their gardens NOR puts a bullet in their heads.

Prohibition kills, and every law enforcement and politician that supports continued cannabis prohibition is DIRECTLY RESPONSIBLE FOR THE DEATHS RESULTING FROM SAID PROHIBITION!

The Reverend Bud Green

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Comment #5 posted by Truth on March 04, 2007 at 14:29:44 PT
not.....
"Thirty-three square feet of lit soil in a closet can lead to strong-arm robbery and murder," he said.

No, prohibition leads to strong=arm robbery and murder. Remember Al Capone?



[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #4 posted by afterburner on March 04, 2007 at 13:02:26 PT
I Have Noticed the Same Thing in Canada
{ The 2000 campaign that won Colorado voter approval of Amendment 20, permitting use of marijuana for medicinal purposes, was led by ardent activists who were so focused on their cause they may not have realized the risks of their openness about growing it themselves, St. Pierre said.

"I have sat down with people and asked them, 'Do you know what you are doing?"' St. Pierre said. "Some are absolutely naive about the product they have." }

Many activists are Federal Medical Marijuana [sic] Exemptees who see the end of Cannabis Prohibition as inevitable and imminent. Consequently, they naively take too many chances, ignoring at times federal reluctance to approve and support cannabis medicine fully and the law-enforcement-fuelled backlash. Most now have their eyes wide open due to the steady march of the Conservative minority government to imitate and implement a US-style War on Plants in Canada. The activists continue to fight for the right to medicate. God bless them.

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #3 posted by ekim on March 04, 2007 at 09:44:27 PT
any one read the nytimes
http://select.nytimes.com/2007/03/04/opinion/04brooks.html?pagewanted=all Neither Clinton, Nor Obama - New York Times Bill Richardson

------------------------------------------------------------ HB 1009 Cannabis growing act needs to be passed now.

Department of Energy to Invest in Biorefineries Compiled By Staff March 1, 2007 www.miagbiz.org The U.S. Department of Energy announced Wednesday that it intends to invest $385 million in six biorefinery projects over the next four years. The projects will produce motor fuels from agricultural waste, trash, and woodchips, Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said at a press conference.

The companies proposing the projects are Abengoa Bioenergy Corp., a division of Abengoa SA of Spain; Bluefire Ethanol Inc.; Iogen Corp.; Alico Inc.; Range Fuels; and Broin Cos. The companies could receive funding to cover as much as 40% of the cost of the projects.

According to current plans, the biorefineries would be located in California, Iowa, Kansas, Florida, Idaho and Georgia.

Bodman says the investment will help cellulosic ethanol move closer to becoming a commercially viable alternative to gasoline and corn-based ethanol by lowering production costs. "$1 a gallon, I think, is a reasonable target," he says.

[ Post Comment ]
 
Comment #2 posted by fight_4_freedom on March 04, 2007 at 09:05:42 PT:

Editorial in today's Saginaw News
Flint pot vote raises awareness Sunday, March 04, 2007

MEDICAL MARIJUANA advocates are hailing -- or is it inhaling? -- a victory Feb. 27. By a 1,777-1,101 vote, Flint became the fifth Michigan city to approve legally puffing pot for health reasons. Use remains illegal under state andfederal law. Officials reminded Flint residents not to start loading up their hookah pipes -- or face the consequences.

Other Michigan cities that have approved medical pot-use measures are Ann Arbor, Detroit, Ferndale and Traverse City. Lansing is the next target, says NORML, a pro-marijuana outfit, and the goal is to get a medical dope initiative on the statewide ballot.

Medical marijuana use is legal in 11 states. Pass the Cheetos.

Whether marijuana is safer or a more effective painkiller than, say, OxyContin is debatable, but some users think so. Cancer patients who have tried it say pot works best at inducing appetite. It has beneficial uses, and we're sympathetic to those who use it legally.

The biggest fear coming from law enforcement circles is that legalized medical marijuana use could lead to additional abuse and wider recreational use. Yet the abuse of prescription drugs, the International Narcotics Control Board said last week, is about to exceed the use of "practically all illicit drugs with the exception of cannibis." The board, an offshoot of the United Nations, said the number of Americans abusing prescription drugs nearly doubled between 1992 and 2003, to 15.1 million from 7.8 million people.

Marijuana's link to the drug culture of the 1960s and '70s, the hippies, and its potential as a gateway to other more potent illicit drugs, has colored many Americans' perception of "weed." As Americans are inclined to relegate cigarette smokers to the streets for solid health reasons, recreational pot use is unwise.

Medical uses, however, are another matter. A free and compassionate society ought to understand common sense trumps perceptions of a drug that may be less dangerous than prescriptions. It's time to take a deep breath -- inhale -- and place sick people ahead of ideology.

The Flint vote and the others before it indicate that more people realize marijuana, like other drugs used properly, is not always evil.

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #1 posted by doc james on March 04, 2007 at 08:32:43 PT
I didn't know Ken Gorman
but anyone who would grow weed as open as this man did has a few screws missing. He didnt bother to cover his windows and by not doing so, even though people knew of his green thumb, it was like a neon sign saying come and rob me I grow pot that is worth as much as gold. Not much future in doing business like that. I do salute him for being the st8 up person that he was but some of his friends should have saw his weaknesses and hipped him to it. It was probably a so-called friend that kiilled him I must add. Sad but probably true.

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