Pot4Prosperity

According to Reason, William Brownfield, the assistant secretary of state for international narcotics and law enforcement affairs, called for flexibility in interpreting anti-drug treaties. “How could I, a representative of the government of the United States of America, be intolerant of a government that permits any experimentation with legalization of marijuana if two of the 50 states of the United States of America have chosen to walk down that road?” When asked about the federal government’s position on the regulation and taxation of marijuana in Colorado and Washington, Brownfield described a clearly prescribed policy: William Brownfield “The deputy attorney general’s words were that the federal government will not intervene in the application of the laws of Washington and Colorado on marijuana legalization, but will monitor and hold them responsible for performance in eight specifically designated areas…. We have a national interest to ensure that this does not cause undue harm….” “The United States of America reserves the right and can at any time it chooses enforce the law against marijuana and cannabis cultivation, production, sale, purchase, and consumption in Washington state and Colorado. The deputy attorney general in a public document has asserted that for now we will not do that unless it crosses the line in eight specifically identified categories in those two states.” Although there is a long way for the federal government to go in terms of completely eliminating its prohibitionist attitude, those associated have been compelled by the political circumstances in the U.S. to accept that there is value to alternative policies. This is a good sign for countries that have been pressured by the U.S. to mimic and help enforce American prohibition. http://goo.gl/Mj6fwa

Polls have the Oregon initiative up, but the Florida initiative down; a marijuana march in New Jersey takes place on Saturday, Obama nominates a drug reformer to a key Justice Dept. position, a Dutch court sticks a thumb in the government's eye, and more. Let's get to it: [image:1 align:left caption:true]Marijuana Policy      Latest Poll Has Oregon Legalization Initiative Up By Nine Points. An Oct. 8-11 survey taken for Oregon Public Broadcasting has the Measure 91 legalization initiative at 52% of the vote with 41% opposed. If these numbers are true, even if all undecided ended up voting "no," the initiative would still pass. NJ Weedman to Lead Legalization March Saturday in Trenton. New Jersey marijuana activist Ed Forchion, also known as the NJ Weedman, is leading a legalization march this Saturday in Trenton. Click on the link for more details. Medical Marijuana Americans for Safe Access Launches "Vote Medical Marijuana" Campaign. The medical marijuana defense and advocacy group aims to educate voters ahead of next month's elections with a new 30-second online TV advertisement that will air on Sunday cable news programs in Detroit, Philadelphia, South Florida, and Washington state. The campaign also includes an interactive online voters' guide at VoteMedicalMarijuana.org. Check it out at the links. Another Poll Has Florida Initiative Coming Up Short. A a new Tampa Bay Times/Bay News 9/UF Bob Graham Center poll has the Amendment 2 medical marijuana initiative at 48% of the vote with 44% opposed and 7% undecided. Because the initiative is a constitutional amendment, it needs 60% to win. This is just the latest in a series of polls showing the initiative failing to reach that mark. Click on the link for more poll details Drug Policy Obama Nominates ACLU Attorney with Strong Drug Reform Record to Head Justice Department Civil Rights Division. The Obama administration has nominated ACLU attorney Vanita Gupta to head the Justice Department's civil rights division. Gupta has been a stalwart drug reformer, working to obtain justice for the victims of racially biased drug enforcement in Tulia, Texas, currently leading the ACLU's National Campaign to End Mass Incarceration, and speaking out frequently about drug war injustices and against mandatory minimum sentencing. "The war on drugs has been a war on communities of color," she wrote in 2011. She is also a strong supporter of marijuana law reform, including legalization. International Unprecedented Swarm of Overdoses at Vancouver Safe Injection Site—But No One Died. Vancouver's InSite safe injection site has seen 31 overdoses in two days, a record for the facility. The ODs came on Sunday and Monday, and speculation is that a particularly strong batch of heroin, perhaps laced with fentanyl, is responsible. It's worth noting that no one died in the InSite overdoses, where medical attention is at hand. No one has ever died of an overdose at InSite. The batch of heroin has claimed at least one life, though—a 20-something women who died in a hostel on the Downtown East Side. There was no medical attention on hand for her. "Heroin overdoses don’t need to be fatal," said Gavin Wilson of the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority, which runs InSite. "They’re reversible if caught in time." Guatemala Weighing Softer Drug Punishments. President Otto Perez Molina has told Reuters that the country is considering reducing drug sentences for small-time offenses as part of its push to liberalize its drug policy. "We have 17,000 prisoners in our jails. Many of them are linked to drug trafficking. Some of them are indeed criminals. And there are some who are in for minimal amounts of consumption or possession,"Perez said. "So I think there are steps we could take time to analyze,"he added, when asked about the possibility of easing sentences to lighten the strain on Guatemala's overstretched penal system. The government received an interim report from a commission studying possible drug policy changes last month, and Perez said final recommendations would be ready sometime in the first half of next year. He also said that his government is considering regulating medical marijuana and opium poppy production for medical purposes. Dutch Court Refuses to Punish Marijuana Growers. A court in Groningen has found two people guilty of growing marijuana, but refused to punish them, instead criticizing the government's policy that criminalizes pot growing but allows its sale in the country's famous cannabis coffee shops. "The court finds the suspects guilty, but no punishment will be applied," the court said in its ruling. "Given that the sale of soft drugs in coffee shops is tolerated, this means that these coffee shops must supply themselves and so cultivation must be done to satisfy these demands. The law does not state how this supply should be done," the court said. The Groningen growers had been open about their activities, and the court found they had acted within the spirit of the marijuana laws, acting "in the interests of public health and so as to not disturb the public order."  http://goo.gl/nivjdg

The Current reported that a debate on the ordinance to make marijuana legal in South Portland will be held next week on Wednesday, October 22, from 7:00-8:30 p.m. in the auditorium of the South Portland High School, 637 Highland Avenue. The South Portland School Department and Social Studies Department have arranged the event to give concerned residents the opportunity to educate themselves on the issues surrounding the referendum in South Portland prior to Election Day on November 4. If the referendum passes, it will allow residents to use and possess up to one ounce of marijuana, as well as allow the possession of paraphernalia. Those participating in the debate include David Boyer, the Maine political director for the Marijuana Policy Project, who will be arguing in favor of the passing of the ordinance, South Portland Police Chief, Edward Googins, who will be arguing against the passing of the ordinance, and Susan Sharon, of Maine Public Radio, who will be moderating the debate. Please support the South Portland referendum by attending the debate and encourage friends, relatives, and neighbors to do the same! http://goo.gl/DvHDzH

A major report on CBD cannabis oil products come out, San Diego may soon get its first legal dispensary (it's only been 18 years!), patients in the Northeast grumble, the Illinois program gets lots of applicants, and more. Let's get to it: [image:1 align:right]National On Monday, Project CBD released a report on CBD cannabis oil products that raises a number of questions about the safety, reliability, and legality of mass-marketed CBD oil products, some of which are available in Internet marketplaces. The report found that some products contained toxic solvents, some had little actual CBD in them, and some entities that claimed to obtain CBD from industrial hemp crops in other countries were probably not telling the truth. Click on the link to go directly to the report. California On Tuesday, a federal court judge issued a preliminary injunction barring Lake County officials from ussing warrantless raids to seize and destroy medical marijuana plants. Patients have sued to block the enforcement measures linked to Measure N, an ordinance that severely restricts medical marijuana grows in the county. Judge Thelton Henderson ruled that the patients have demonstrated a strong likelihood of prevailing at trial on their claim that the raids violate their Fourth Amendment rights. On Wednesday, what would be San Diego's first legal dispensary won a key approval. A Green Alternative has applied to open its doors in Otay Mesa and won approval from a city hearing officer for its plans. Unless someone appeals the decision, the shop should be open by year's end. Connecticut On Monday, Connecticut patients demanded whole buds, not ground-up whole plant material. State medical marijuana regulations require that the plant be ground up, and that's not sitting well with some patients and activists. Homogenizing the plant results in "the degradation of the cannabinoids, the actual essential oils that are in the flower," explained Peter Mould, executive director of Connecticut NORML, who has posted a petition at change.org (search for "medical marijuana CT") asking state regulators to allow the sale of whole buds. Florida On Tuesday, another poll had the medical marijuana initiative coming up just short. A new poll with a large sample and small margin of error has Amendment 2 coming up short. According to the SaintPetersBlog poll, a slim majority (52%) supports the initiative, but that's not enough because, as a constitutional amendment, it needs 60% of the vote to pass. The poll sample consisted of 3,128 Florida registered voters who said they were planning to vote in the election and has a margin of error of +/- 1.8%. The poll is roughly in line with other recent surveys that have shown Amendment 2 polling in the 50s. Guam Last Wednesday, the Guam Election Commission moved to end legal challenges to the medical marijuana initiative vote. The commission has asked the US District Court on the island territory to dismiss the petition for a writ blocking the vote filed by local attorney Howard Trapp. Trapp has argued that the legislature cannot send an initiative to the voters, but the Election Commission and the Guam Supreme Court have already rejected his claim. Illinois Last Wednesday, more than 6,000 Illinoisans had applied for medical marijuana cards. The Department of Health reported that some 6,300 state residents have applied for permission to use medical marijuana, with cancer, fibromyalgia, multiple sclerosis, and spinal cord injuries being the most common health conditions mentioned. But the department also noted that the vast majority of applications were incomplete; only 800 have submitted complete applications, which include a doctor certification form and background check information. People whose applications are incomplete will be notified and then will have 21 days to complete them. Massachusetts On Tuesday, patients protested over the slow pace of medical marijuana implementation. Several dozen patients and advocates rallied outside the Department of Public Health in Boston Tuesday to call on the department and the governor to get the state's medical marijuana program moving. Voters legalized medical marijuana nearly two years ago, but: "We have zero cannabis plants in the ground to serve the patients," said Mickey Martin, a medical marijuana activist. "It's unacceptable to make patients wait." The protestors are calling for the state to immediately open up the program, get dispensaries up and running, and ease restrictions on "hardship cultivation" so more patients can grow their own. For extensive information about the medical marijuana debate, presented in a neutral format, visitMedicalMarijuana.ProCon.org.]. http://goo.gl/HS4dWG

A pill-popping, prescription-forging North Carolina narc, a pair of lying New York City narcs, a crack-slinging Baltimore schools police officer, and a pot-growing California prison guard are among the corrupt cops in the news this week. Let's get to it: [image:1 align:right]In Elizabethtown, Tennessee, a Carter County sheriff's jail guard was fired September 28 after he was caught bringing drugs and contraband into the jail. The sheriff didn't announce the firing until last week. Officer Kenneth Turner has yet to be charged in the case, but the state Bureau of Investigation is looking into it. In New York City, two former Yonkers narcotics officers were arrested last Wednesday for lying about drug activity in order to obtain search warrants. Former narcs Neil Vera and Christian Koch are accused of lying to a Yonkers City Court judge to convince him to sign a search warrant in a drug raid that resulted in a man's death. Dario Tena fell to his death from a window during the raid. The two former officers pleaded not guilty to one count of felony perjury. In Sacramento, a California state prison guard was arrested last Wednesday when an investigation into gang activity resulted in the seizure of 617 marijuana plants. Guard Eddie Lay, 32, is charged with cultivation of marijuana for sale. Four others were also arrested, and police seized guns, 248 pounds of packaged pot, and more than $5,000 in cash in addition to the plants. In Houston, a former Houston police officer pleaded guilty last Thursday to playing a role in a drug conspiracy. Marcos Carrion admitted to providing security for a drug deal involving 10 kilograms of cocaine in exchange for $2,500. He also admitted agreeing to provide security for future dope deals. He copped to one count of conspiracy to possess with the intent to distribute five or more kilos of cocaine and is looking at a mandatory minimum of 10 years in prison. In Baltimore, a former Baltimore school police officer was sentenced last Friday to two years in federal prison for dealing in cocaine. Napoleon McLain, 31, had pleaded guilty to conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute cocaine base. He admitted buying various ounces of cocaine base and reselling them to others between December 2012 and August 2013. In Wilmington, North Carolina, a former New Hanover County sheriff's narcotics lieutenant was sentenced Monday to seven years in state prison for stealing evidence and forging court orders to obtain prescription medications. Joseph Antoine LeBlanc, 42, had pleaded guilty to a hundred felony charges including four counts of embezzlement; four counts of obstruction of justice; four counts of altering, destroying or stealing criminal evidence; four counts of obtaining property by false pretense; 28 counts of uttering forged papers; 28 counts of forgery; and 28 counts of obtaining a controlled substance by misrepresentation, fraud, forgery, deception or subterfuge. Another 40 counts of trafficking opium or heroin and 21 counts of possession of a controlled substance were dismissed. LeBlanc admitted forging the names of local judges and assistant DAs to obtain the prescriptions. http://goo.gl/t7pNMk

A report on decriminalization in California has good news, state-level pot legalization could be an impetus for the US to modify international drug treaties, pain pill deaths are down (but heroin deaths are up), New Zealand has a different take on employee drug testing, and more. Let's get to it: [image:1 align:left caption:true]Marijuana Policy Report: California Decriminalized, and Nothing Bad Happened. A new report from the Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice examines California's experience with marijuana since decriminalization went into effect at the beginning of 2011. It finds that "marijuana decriminalization in California has not resulted in harmful consequences for teenagers, such as increased crime, drug overdose, driving under the influence, or school dropout. In fact, California teenagers showed improvements in all risk areas after reform." There's lots of good number-crunching and analysis. Click on the second link to read the whole thing. Afroman Revised: Good Things Happened "Because I Got High." California rapper Afroman burned up the charts in 2001 with his catchy lamentation about the perils of being a stoned-out couch potato, but now, thanks to NORML and Weedmaps, he's back with a new version of "Because I Got High," and he's singing a different tune. He eased his glaucoma thanks to the "cannabis aroma" and he can deal with anxiety attacks without Xanax, be sings. The song's new lyrics praise the benefits of marijuana in a number of ways, all supported by scientific evidence, says NORML, which has been working with Afroman for several years. Click on the title link to view the video. Medical Marijuana Massachusetts Patients Protest Over Medical Marijuana Implementation. Several dozen patients and advocates rallied outside the Department of Public Health in Boston Tuesday to call on the department and the governor to get the state's medical marijuana program moving. Voters legalized medical marijuana nearly two years ago, but: "We have zero cannabis plants in the ground to serve the patients," said Mickey Martin, a medical marijuana activist. "It's unacceptable to make patients wait." The protestors are calling for the state to immediately open up the program, get dispensaries up and running, and ease restrictions on "hardship cultivation" so more patients can grow their own. Drug Policy Brookings Report Sees Marijuana Legalization as Chance to Update International Drug Treaties. A report from the Brookings Center for Effective Public Management, "Marijuana Legalization is an Opportunity to Modernize International Drug Treaties," says that the Obama administration's tolerance of legal marijuana in the states creates tension with international drug control treaties and that, as state-level legalization spreads, the US should consider "narrowly crafter treaty changes" to "create space within international law for conditional legalization." The US could, for now, argue that even allowing state-level legalization is compliant with the treaties, but that argument will not hold water if legalization spreads, the authors say. Click on the report link to read the whole thing. Opiates Prescription Pain Reliever Deaths Drop for First Time in Years, But Heroin Deaths Up. For the first time since 1999, deaths from prescription opiates declined in 2012. The number of prescription opiate ODs quadrupled to nearly 17,000 by 2011, before dropping to 16,007 in 2012, a decline of 5%, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Federal officials are crediting crackdowns on "over-prescribing" and the expansion of prescription drug monitoring programs. The decline in prescription opiate ODs follows a tapering off of the rate of increase that began in 2006. Before that, ODs had increased at a rate of 18% a year beginning in 1999; after that, the rate of increase declined to 3% through 2011. But with the crackdowns has come an apparent shift to heroin among some prescription opiates, and with that is a rising heroin OD death toll. Heroin ODs jumped 35% from 2011 to 2012, reaching 5.927 that year. Prescription Drugs Pennsylvania Prescription Drug Monitoring Bill Goes to Governor's Desk. A bill that would establish a prescription drug monitoring database has passed the House. Senate Bill 1180 already passed the Senate in May, and after a pro forma housekeeping vote there, goes to the desk of Gov. Tom Corbett (R), who has said he will sign it. The legislation would track all prescriptions for Schedule II through Schedule V drugs, which is a bit too far for the ACLU of Pennsylvania. The rights groups said it had privacy concerns, and that low abuse potential Schedule V drugs should not be tracked. Law Enforcement "Baby Bou Bou" SWAT Raid Protestors March to Atlanta Federal Courthouse. Supporters of Bounkham "Baby Bou Bou" Phonesevahn, the Georgia toddler severely burned by a flash bang grenade during a botched SWAT drug raid, marched to the federal courthouse in Atlanta Tuesday to press for federal action in the case. A local grand jury refused to indict any of the officers involved. The group, included a lawyer for the family, met with US Attorney Sally Quillian Yates to discuss possible federal charges. Yates' office said it is considering the case. International New Zealand Arbitrator Throws Out Positive Marijuana Test Firing. The Employment Relations Authority has overturned the firing of a man forced to take a drug test after an anonymous caller told his employer he had been smoking pot in a parking garage. The Authority held that the company was not entitled to force the man to take a drug test. The company was ordered to pay $14,000 in damages and lost wages. Colombia Massacre Opens Window on Black Market Synthetic Drug Trade. Eight reported drug traffickers involved in trying to dominate the trade in synthetic stimulants were gunned down outside Cali recently, and TeleSur TVhas a lengthy and interesting report on what it reveals about the fragmented nature of the drug trade there and the role of the new synthetics in it. The new drugs, such as 2CB, known colloquially as "pink cocaine," are popular with elite youth, and are now apparently being produced in-country. The lucrative trade is leading to turf wars, with the Cali killings being the most evident example.  http://goo.gl/0dNpBL

Vanita Gupta According to the Washington Post, President Obama plans to nominate top lawyer from the American Civil Liberties Union, Vanita Gupta, to head to the civil rights division of the Department of Justice. Gupta is a longtime civil rights lawyer and deputy legal director of the ACLU, as well as the director of the Union’s Center for Justice. She stated in a New York Times op-ed about ending mass incarceration: “Those who seek a fairer criminal justice system, unclouded by racial bias, must at a minimum demand that the government eliminate mandatory minimum sentences, which tie judges’ hands; rescind three-strikes laws, which often make no distinction between, say, armed assault and auto theft; amend “truth in sentencing” statutes, which prohibit early release for good behavior; and recalibrate drug policies, starting with decriminalization of marijuana possession and investment in substance-abuse prevention and treatment.” According to administration officials, Gupta will be appointed acting head of the civil rights division Wednesday by Attorney General Eric Holder. H/T Tom Angell http://goo.gl/DvfJde

Bangor Daily News reported that South Portland and Lewiston, Maine voters, on November 4, will decide whether to make marijuana legal for the use and possession of up to an ounce for citizens 21 years of age and older. David Boyer, Maine political director for the Marijuana Policy Project, said he believes South Portland will pass the ordinance. “Prohibition has been a failure,” he said. “It’s done nothing to stop the flow of marijuana into the communities.” He added that “58 percent of Americans are ready to move forward with a more sensible marijuana policy,” citing a 2013 Gallup poll. “It’s illogical to punish adults for a substance that’s less harmful than alcohol,” Boyer also stated. Edward Googins South Portland Police Chief, Edward Googins, on the other hand, vehemently opposes the ordinance. “This issue for me as a police chief is that the initiative is not a good thing for our community or anywhere else,” Googins said. According to the chief, marijuana is more dangerous because it “continues to create and perpetuate other problems in society.” “Claims that marijuana is safer than alcohol are so bogus it’s not even funny,” he also stated. The fact that Chief Googins believes that alcohol is safer than marijuana demonstrates just how misguided the opposition really is. In reality, studies show alcohol to be more toxic, more addictive, and more harmful to the body. The use of alcohol is also more likely to result in violence and injures than marijuana. Overall, the negative impact on the consumer, as well as on the community at large, is more significant when it comes to alcohol consumption; all the more reason to give responsible adults the option to legally use the safer substance. http://goo.gl/9A4otI

The State Department's point man on international drug affairs signals a new flexibility in US policy, Bolivia's coca farmer President Evo Morales wins reelection, the DC initiative wins more endorsements, the Florida medical marijuana initiative is in danger, and more. [image:1 align:left caption:true]Marijuana Policy DC Initiative Picks Up Labor, Working Families Endorsements. DC's Measure 71 marijuana cultivation and possession legalization initiative has been endorsed by two labor unions and a District-based activist group. The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and the United Commercial Food Workers (UCFW) have come on board, citing the elimination of racially discriminatory enforcement and the removal of barriers to job opportunities. So has DC Working Families, a progressive social justice activist group.   Northern California Marijuana Summit Being Planned in Advance of 2016 Effort. Aware that a well-connected California marijuana legalization initiative is coming in 2016, some Northern California counties are laying the groundwork for a regional summit on the issue. Mendocino County CEO Carmel Angelo told county supervisors last week that the impending legalization initiative had led her to have discussion with other county CEOs about forming a Northern California Cannabis Summit next year. The proposed meeting would discuss possible economic, regulatory, taxation and policy implications to prepare for 2016 legalization. Medical Marijuana Latest Poll Has Florida Initiative at 52%--It Needs 60% to Win. A new poll with a large sample and small margin of error has the Amendment 2 medical marijuana initiative coming up short. According to the SaintPetersBlog poll, a slim majority (52%) supports the initiative, but that's not enough because, as a constitutional amendment, it needs 60% of the vote to pass. The poll sample consisted of  3,128 Florida registered voters who said they were planning to vote in the election and has a margin of error of +/- 1.8%. The poll is roughly in line with other recent surveys that have shown Amendment 2 polling in the 50s.     Drug Policy State Department's Drugs Point Man Signals US Flexibility on Drug Reform. In a speech last week at the United Nations, Assistant Secretary of State William Brownfield, the head of the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs ("drugs and thugs"), made it clear that the US is willing to embrace flexibility, up to and including drug legalization in other countries, in the face of rising calls for international drug reform. Brownfield succinctly laid out the US approach: "First, the - respect the integrity of the existing UN Drug Control Conventions. Second, accept flexible interpretation of those conventions. The first of them was drafted and enacted in 1961. Things have changed since 1961. We must have enough flexibility to allow us to incorporate those changes into our policies. Third, to tolerate different national drug policies, to accept the fact that some countries will have very strict drug approaches; other countries will legalize entire categories of drugs. All these countries must work together in the international community. We must have some tolerance for those differing policies. And our fourth pillar is agreement and consensus that whatever our approach and policy may be on legalization, decriminalization, de-penalization, we all agree to combat and resist the criminal organizations - not those who buy, consume, but those who market and traffic the product for economic gain. Respect the conventions; flexible interpretation; tolerance for national polices; criminal organizations - that is our mantra." Click on the link to read the entirety of his remarks. Houston Mayor Calls for "Complete Rethinking" of Nation's Drug Laws. Ten minutes into an interview with Dean Becker of the Drug Truth Network, Houston Mayor Annise Parker (D) unloaded on drug prohibition. ":I agree with you that we need a complete rethinking of the nation's drug laws," she told Becker. "We have seen over and over again that outright prohibition doesn't work. We saw that in the '20s when the prohibition in this country fueled the rise of organized crime. At the same time we don't want in any way to send a message that illegal drugs are approved or appropriate, but we need to figure out a way to go to managing these drugs rather than simply saying, 'Don't do it or we are going to treat all illegal drugs the same.'" There is more; click on the title link to hear the whole thing. . International Bolivia's Coca Farmer President Cruises to Easy Reelection. Coca farmer union leader Evo Morales has easily won reelection to an unprecedented third term as Bolivia's president. He won 59.5% of the vote, more than doubling the vote total of his nearest challenger in a five-man field and obviating the need for a run-off election. Although it remains one of the hemisphere's poorest countries, Bolivia's economy has flourished under the rule of Morales and his Movement to Socialism (MAS). The US has criticized Bolivia over its coca policies, but that didn't seem to be much of an issue in the elections.  http://goo.gl/KF4VKG

A half year ago, Project CBD assigned a writer to investigate and report on Medical Marijuana Inc., a penny stock umbrella company that markets “hemp oil” products infused with cannabidiol (CBD), a medicinal component of the cannabis plant. Originally we had hoped to shed light on the complex financial machinations of Medical Marijuana Inc., a subject that had been addressed by a few stock market analysts but not by journalists in general interest publications. Project CBD was poised to publish Aaron Miguel Cantú research when we heard complaints from several sources that people were getting sick, in some cases “violently ill,” when they ingested “Real Scientific Hemp Oil,” Medical Marijuana Inc.’s flagship product. We decided to delay the release of our report until we had a chance to look into whether there was any truth to these allegations. Our investigation proceeded in an unanticipated direction, involving analytical lab tests, hemp oil production tours, and a crash course in scientific data regarding toxic solvents, heavy metals, and other contaminants. We have presented our findings in this report. These findings should not be construed as justification to attack the medical marijuana community or impose ever-more capricious restrictions on patients and providers. Nor do we wish to cast aspersions on companies that are working with industrial hemp to create CBD-rich products. We believe that industrial hemp is not an optimal source of CBD, but it can be a viable source of CBD if certain hemp cultivars are grown organically in good soil and safe extraction and refinement methods are employed. 2014 marked the first year that industrial hemp was grown legally (albeit for research purposes) in the United States in a long time. There’s no doubt that the surge of national interest in CBD has been a key factor in catalyzing the rebirth of industrial hemp in the United States. Project CBD maintains that federal law should be changed to facilitate CBD production from the most prolific natural source of cannabidiol available—CBD-rich cannabis with little THC. This would entail legalizing the whole plant, not just a single compound or a single strain. Project CBD wishes to acknowledge the following people who helped in various ways with this report: James Neal-Kababick of Flora Research Laboratories, Dr. Noel Palmer of PhytaTech, Daryl Bornhop, Jahan Marcu, Brandon Krenzler, Jason Cranford, Felicia Carbajal, Brittany Warrior, Michael Hayes, Vanessa Waltz, Michelle Sexton, Fred Gardner, Josh Hartsel, Chris Boucher, Regina Nelson, Angela Bacca, and Cecilia D’Anastasio and Rick Carp of the Emerging Journalist Fund. Martin A. Lee Director, Project CBD HEMP OIL HUSTLERS Somewhere in San Diego on a Friday night in February 2014, six fidgeting men in identical white t-shirts sat clustered together on adjacent sofas, facing a computer webcam.1 ASPIRE HIGHER, their shirts behooved viewers. “Can you feel it?” asked the group’s bespectacled leader, Christopher Hussey. A solemn hush fell over the room. “It’s the calm before the storm.” “The Kanna-storm,” added one of the other men, prompting light chuckles from his compatriots. The group was on Google Hangout with men and women from across the country, all of whom had come together that night to celebrate their progress in building what they called “the Kannaway Nation.” Like a band of partisans, these men discussed how many people they’d roped into their ranks in the last few months, marveling at their success and confidently forecasting even cheerier prospects for the future. Yet despite abundant use of words like “revolution,” “nation,” and “movement,” these men were not calculating how to build the ranks of a nascent political vanguard. They were trying to recruit more people into a multi-level marketing company called Kannaway, which relies on a loose network of independent distributors to sell products.2 Kannaway has little infrastructure beyond a website, PDF promotional materials, and various “hemp oil” products infused with cannabidiol (CBD), a versatile, non-psychoactive cannabis component with exciting medical prospects. Around the same time that the Kannaway soldiers were “aspiring higher” in their Google Hangout, a young mother named Brittany Warrior desperately clutched her 21-month old daughter’s tiny body, watching as her baby Jaqie writhed in pain.3 For days Jaqie’s diarrhea and vomiting would not go away, despite a steady regimen of electrolyte-charged victuals and Pedialyte. At her wits end and scared for her daughter’s life, Warrior finally checked Jaqie into the emergency room of a Denver hospital. The culprit for her daughter’s illness, according to Warrior, was something called Real Scientific Hemp Oil (RSHO) Gold, a product sold by a company called HempMedsPX.4 Warrior’s daughter is epileptic, and according to Warrior, representatives of HempMedsPX reached out to her online and gave her free samples of RSHO Gold, a CBD-infused product, to try on her daughter. CBD-rich oil, a remedy of last resort for children with catastrophic seizure disorders, has proven effective in some cases of treatment-resistant epilepsy, and HempMedsPx (since renamed HempMeds) sought to profit from CBD’s growing reputation as a miracle compound. What, if anything, do six guys hustling hemp oil products on Google Hangout have to do with a sick child in Denver? Kannaway enlists independent vendors to peddle products supplied by HempMeds.5 Warrior alleges that Real Scientific Hemp Oil, the flagship product of HempMeds, sickened her girl. Warrior isn’t the only person making such claims. Several people, adults as well as children, say they became ill after ingesting Real Scientific Hemp Oil. Others maintain they’ve gotten positive results with RSHO. And some assert that the hemp oil derivative didn’t do much for them one way or another. The ties between Kannaway and HempMeds run deep. Both companies are controlled by the same circle of businessmen, and both are subsidiaries of a shadowy umbrella corporation known as Medical Marijuana Inc., which has numerous subsidiaries and affiliates. The Kannaway Kraze Launched in January 2014, Kannaway looped in an army of newly-minted CBD zealots with little prior experience in the field of cannabis therapeutics.6 A YouTube search of “Kannaway” yields hundreds of videos of independent distributors frantically pitching their cause to the world. Distributors also pummel Craigslist with invitations to potential recruits, and then barrage any responders with rapid-fire hyperbolic emails. “Time To Join. The Movement,” rhapsodized one Kannaway representative in an email message.7  Another distributor implores recipients to secure a spot within “an industry that is expected to be larger than the steel industry within 5 years.”8 Kannaway claims that its products are legal in all 50 states because oil extracted from industrial hemp contains little to no tetrahydrocannabinol (THC, aka The High Causer).9 However, it is against the law for the company to make therapeutic claims about its products, or advertise them as medicine, and Kannaway treads this line haphazardly. Wary of attracting scrutiny from the FDA or DEA, the company informs distributors that they cannot incorporate Kannaway’s name in the distributor’s personal branding.10 Here’s how it works: When you sign up to be an “independent business owner” for Kannaway, you must purchase a product from HempMeds, which can include a “hemp-based, cannabidiol-rich” salve, a vape pen, or CBD-rich food chew squares.11 Kannaway appears to be a pyramid scheme. The company is structured in such a way that its distributors are more incentivized to recruit other distributors than to actually sell anything. An official company information packet says that once you sign up as a Kannaway distributor, you make a commission from anybody you can convince to become a distributor, and your commissions compound as your recruits also recruit others. The more recruits, the higher a distributor ascends  the eleven ranks of commission earners until they reach the coveted status of a “Royal Diamond” distributor. All distributors also have to pay a $15 monthly fee or risk losing commissions from previous months, according to a Kannaway Compensation Plan obtained by Project CBD.12 The Federal Trade Commission warns that if a multilevel marketing company “sells more products to distributors than they do to the public,” then it is likely a pyramid scheme, a business arrangement that is inherently unsustainable because it is built on an ever-increasing number of distributors.13 Pyramid schemes inevitably go bust, but while they’re around, those at their helm stand to make a lot of money. Sitting at the apex of Kannaway is Stuart Titus, the owner of General Hemp, Kannaway’s parent company.14 Titus previously helped raise capital to launch Medical Marijuana Inc.,15 and he also financed the creation of another company, CannaVest, which for over a year supplied the hemp oil used in Medical Marijuana Inc.’s CBD product line.16 To untangle this complicated network of business entities, let’s start from the beginning when Medical Marijuana Inc. was whipped up into existence by two men hustling on the fringes of a different industry. The company’s original purpose had less to do with healing the sick than cashing in on uniquely placed historical opportunities. Rotten Roots Two former marijuana smugglers, Bruce Perlowin and Don Steinberg, founded Medical Marijuana Inc. in 2009.17 The company actually started as something called the Berkshire Collection, identified by the Security Exchange Commission (SEC) as one of 59 shell companies operating under the umbrella of a fraudulent telecom enterprise called Blackout Media.18 The mastermind of Blackout Media, Sandy Winick, went to prison for the rest of his life after a court found him guilty of swindling investors out of $140 million.19 In 2005, Perlowin and Steinberg issued a 1,000:1 “reverse split” on shares of Berkshire.20 That means the number of all Berkshire shares was suddenly reduced by a ratio of 1,000, and the value of each share correspondingly increased 1,000 per cent. Those who held the most shares—Perlowin and Steinberg—were sitting pretty, while those who had fewer than 1,000 shares were trumped out of the market. A reverse split is a desperate—and rarely used—option of last resort for legitimate firms hoping to shore up the value of their stock, but it can also be a trick to con small-time investors out of their money. After the reverse split, Berkshire became “My Newpedia,” which subsequently merged with a company called Club Vivanet. Another reverse stock split—this time 20:1—took place shortly after the merger.21 Club Vivanet, Inc. was a multilevel marketing arrangement that sold prepaid phone cards.22 Its biggest shareholders were Steinberg, his wife, and a company owned by a woman with intimate ties to supposed nobility in the Dominion of Melchizedek, a fake island used to facilitate international banking fraud.23 * Club Vivanet, Inc. was around for less than a year before CNBC asked Perlowin, an ex-con, to appear on a documentary about his marijuana smuggling days.24 It would be the shot of publicity he ** The company was called New Compendium Corporation, owned by Sadia Barrameda, who holds the majority of New shares. Barrameda has a child with David Korem, former “vice president” of the Dominion of Melchizedek. She defended him in an affidavit at one of his arraignments. (See Fantasy Island: The Strange Tale of Alleged Fraudster Pearlasia Gamboa by Peter Jamison.) and Steinberg needed to reorganize their business yet again. After a forward stock split† of 1:10, they renamed the company Medical Marijuana Inc.25 In early 2009, Perlowin and Steinberg issued themselves millions of shares to become the CEO and President, respectively, of Medical Marijuana Inc.26 Former employees say the two men began rounding up boat captains from their smuggling days and idealistic cannabis do-gooders who were taken in by Perlowin’s stratospheric ambitions for the company. Medical Marijuana Inc. churned out press releases, and Perlowin gave frothy proclamations to business publications. He told Bloomberg Newswire that he intended his company to be “the McDonald’s of marijuana.”27 The CEO’s enthusiasm had a rousing effect on employees. At his encouragement, they sold thousands of “MJNA” shares to relatives and friends. “When Perlowin came to me and said, ‘We have access to billions, we’re going to blow up the business and legitimize it,’ I thought ‘holy cow this is what I was hoping for,’” said Rob Griffin, founder of 420 Magazine, who was recruited to be Medical Marijuana Inc.’s chief operating officer.28 For the first few months, Griffin and others roamed the state to attend seminars and expos and help get the company’s name out. Advertisers and investors began flooding the MJNA phone lines, looking for ways to attach themselves to Medical Marijuana Inc. There was just one problem: Few seemed to know what Medical Marijuana Inc. was really selling. Officially, the company said it offered “education programs” and “turnkey solutions” to government clients and the medical marijuana industry.29 Initially, Medical Marijuana Inc. (listed as MJNA) was little more than a blip presence on the OTC [Over-The-Counter] stock market—the risky, unregulated arena where investors can buy ultra-cheap shares from new, lightly capitalized companies. Since “Pink Sheet” rules require minimal transparency, it was difficult for folks outside the Perlowin-Steinberg inner circle to assess the company’s cash flow. After a while, some grew suspicious, especially when complaints started coming in. “People were calling and wanted answers but I had nothing to tell them,” said Julie Black, who acted as Perlowin’s financial and legal secretary. 30 Black had convinced several friends to buy MJNA shares. “At six months to a year the stock was supposed to grow,” she said, but it never did. She wound up losing friendships—and money—as a result. † According to the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, a forward split is “the division of outstanding shares of a corporation into a larger number of shares,” while a reverse split is “the division of outstanding shares into a smaller number of shares.” Griffin also lost faith in Medical Marijuana Inc. “[It] took me six months to figure out [that the] press releases” were the most important thing the company produced, he recounted. “I came up with half the ideas for these guys, and they’d write the press releases from my ideas.” It was all smoke and mirrors, according to Griffin, who said that MJNA lacked a coherent business plan and staff meetings went nowhere. A year into the business, Griffin and Black had already left Medical Marijuana Inc. By that time the staff was mostly composed of former pot smugglers and boat captains with little experience navigating the bureaucracy of drug law and federalism.31 Nevertheless, they began hawking $100,000 “franchise licenses” to buyers who wanted to vend federally prohibited medicinal pot under the company’s name.32 In return, the company promised to bestow its turnkey wisdom on weed start-ups. “We have a feeding frenzy for people wanting to open up centers. We have a feeding frenzy for people who want this information and knowledge,” enthused Perlowin to Salon in March 2010, in his typically stirring pitch.33 Around this time, the company also launched a proto-Kannaway multilevel marketing effort called “The Hemp Network.” As with Kannaway, The Hemp Network encouraged independent distributors to pay an initial fee to lock in an early place in a multilevel marketing scheme selling hemp products, but it appears that it never reached the distribution stage. As of October 2014, the Hemp Network’s website was still urging viewers to “pre-enroll” and it featured no purchasable products.34 It’s unclear what prompted Perlowin and Steinberg to sell the majority of their MJNA shares in March 2011. Around that time, Perlowin began giving public presentations about his plans to “creat[e] 1,000 millionaire women through quantum economics.”35 Nevertheless, even after they sold Medical Marijuana Inc., Steinberg still held 8.59% of the company’s shares and Perlowin 5.06%.36 Perlowin never returned Project CBD’s request for a comment. The Handoff In 2011, Michael Llamas purchased majority ownership in Medical Marijuana Inc. through another firm he controlled, the Hemp Deposit and Distribution Corporation.37 Stock market analysts would soon raise questions about Medical Marijuana Inc.’s new, young owner, who had a shoddy financial history involving complex mortgage fraud, according to federal investigators. When 26-year-old Michael Llamas became interim president and CEO of Medical Marijuana Inc. in 2011, he was also serving as CEO of North American Companies, a holding company founded by his father.38 One of North American’s subsidiaries, Colbalt One LLC, was implicated in a massive, multi-state ponzi scheme for which Llamas was indicted along with five other defendants in September 2012.39 Court documents describe how Llamas approached new home and condominium builders through Colbalt LLC and offered to buy distressed homes at a 30%-50% discount from their public listing price. After purchasing the properties, he sold them at full price to a group of investors whose retirement funds were ensnared in another co-defendant’s scheme. Investors were never told that the properties were originally purchased at a steep discount. The federal plaintiff alleged that Llamas and his co-defendant split the difference and got rich off the dirty deals. Llamas would plead not guilty to the federal charges.40 Soon after Llamas was indicted for mortgage fraud, Medical Marijuana Inc. announced that he had resigned as interim president and CEO.41 But he continued to be a major shareholder in the company. With Llamas calling the shots from behind the scenes, Medical Marijuana Inc. would morph into a high-profile umbrella corporation with significant holdings in at least seven different subsidiaries, each at varying levels of capitalization.42 By emphasizing non-psychoactive CBD in its product line, MJNA was able to stake out a position at the forefront of a rapidly evolving business terrain. Simply the name “Medical Marijuana” was enough to seduce investors who hoped to profit from the much anticipated pot.com boom. But the public support it seemed to enjoy at the outset may have had less to do with the company itself and more with the movement it symbolized. An umbrella corporation like Medical Marijuana Inc., with a complicated network of portfolio companies, can impress outsiders the same way a frill-necked lizard wards off predators: by making itself seem bigger (and thus more credible) than it actually is. MJNA stitched together a network of subsidiaries and affiliates, which grew to include HempMedsPX, Red Dice Holdings, Dixie Botanicals, PhytoSphere Systems, Kannaway, CanChew BioTechnologies, Canpia Holdings, Ace Hydro, KannaLife Sciences, and Wellness Managed Services. Medical Marijuana Inc. often cited these entities as sources of revenue, but some of them appear to be illusory. For example, MJNA asserted in a press release that its collection of health and wellness facilities operated by Wellness Managed Services experienced “an accumulative 3941% revenue increase”43 throughout 2011, but it’s hard to figure out exactly how that happened.44 The website for Wellness Managed Services contains distorted stock photos and typos on the “About” page, and appears not to have been updated in two years. Phone calls to Wellness Managed Services by Project CBD were routed back to Medical Marijuana Inc.’s line, which never returned our messages.‡ Pump and Dump? As suspicions grew about MJNA’s machinations, frequenters of Internet investor forums began to warn of potential “pump-and-dump” financial fraud carried out by the company’s management.45 Pump-and-dump schemes, like the one that drives the plot in The Wolf of Wall Street, are mass deceptions that begin when high-level representatives of weak companies buy the majority of their own shares. These shares are inherently worthless because they represent equity in a company that hardly exists—or may not even exist at all. But their value is “pumped up” by a constant stream of ‡ As of October 8, 2014, the most recent update to the Wellness Managed Service website was a press release posted on June 19, 2012. enthusiastic press releases that embellish (or outright lie about) the current and future prospects of the firm. As excitement builds and novice traders buy more shares, their price rises, buttressed by a mirage of contrived optimism. When the company’s representatives bait enough traders to drive the value up as much as possible, they sell the shares at an inflated price, “dumping” them onto ignorant investors. And when the supply of these shares rapidly increases, demand falls, causing their value to plummet. Everybody outside the company’s inner circle is then left with rubbish shares they can’t sell. According to the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, pump and dump schemes rely on scammers who puff up a questionable company via online investing message boards, emails, texts, and a plethora of press releases portending great things about its future. These are the kind of press releases that Medical Marijuana Inc. was spitting out several times a month after Llamas got involved.46 Of course, every MJNA press release includes a “Forward-Looking Disclaimer,” a legal protectant that shields the company from ramifications if “the actual results, performance, or achievements of Medical Marijuana Inc. [are] materially different” from predictions made in its press releases. Such disclaimers are typical in press releases issued by publicly traded companies. MJNA’s financials didn’t seem to jive with the promises touted in the company’s press releases. During the first half of 2011, for example, Medical Marijuana Inc. announced that it was going to transfer shares to Hemp Deposit and Distribution Corporation in exchange for a facility that would “generate in excess of $40 million in revenue annually.”47 Over a year later, however, an audited financial statement for Medical Marijuana Inc. revealed that the company only had $16 million in assets, and of that, less than $15,000 was derived from facilities and real estate.48 Was Medical Marijuana Inc. dissembling about the transfer in order to pump up enthusiasm for its stock? The complex enmeshing of “shell companies”—companies that act as vehicles for business transactions without actually having any assets or operations themselves—is another hallmark of pump and dump schemes, says Seattle-based Canna Law attorney Robert McVay. “Novice investors will see the complicated structures and holding companies that have a bunch of shell companies attached to them, and [then] people put trust in these companies because they seem large and professional,” McVay told Project CBD.49 Corporate start-ups can also bolster their legitimacy—or shroud their stock market schemes—by entering into strategic relationships with affiliate firms whose public image is mutually enhanced by the partnership. Companies reference each other in their press releases, McVay explained, “and they’re able to pump each other up in terms of how they’re doing. You see it a lot when a company is involved in fraudulent action.” CannaVest and PhytoSphere Medical Marijuana Inc. went into damage control mode in September 2012 when its interim CEO Michael Llamas was indicted for mortgage fraud. A MJNA press release quickly announced that he was stepping “down from his position in order to focus his attention on personal business matters that are entirely unrelated to MJNA.”50 A few months later, Michael Mona Jr. left his post as Management Committee Chairman of Red Dice Holdings, a MJNA subsidiary, to launch a new company called CannaVest.51 A corporate brochure published by CannaVest states that “Mr. Mona worked as a consultant to Medical Marijuana Inc. until early 2013 when he was named President and CEO of CannaVest Corp.”52 From January 2013 onward, CannaVest and Medical Marijuana Inc. not only pumped each other up in their press releases, they also formed a production and distribution line for CBD-infused “hemp oil” imports that bound the two together like the intestinal tract of conjoined twins. And they regularly exchanged shares with each other, lending an appearance of growth and productivity to outsiders. The corporate headquarters of CannaVest is located on Rainbow Avenue in Las Vegas, Nevada, in the same Sin City suite that was also home base for a company called Roen Ventures. Co-founded by Mona and Llamas, Roen Ventures was hit with a $17.77 million legal judgment in 2012 for facilitating fraudulent land transactions in California.53 Before January 2013, CannaVest was known as Foreclosure Solutions, where Mona served as President and CEO.54 In order for Foreclosure to transition into CannaVest, some of Mona’s associates in other industries began buying CannaVest shares. Mona also funneled a $3 million loan through Roen Ventures to CannaVest, a maneuver that rankled Far West Industries, the creditor that had won the $17.77 million settlement against Roen Ventures. Far West Industries said that loan “was intended to prejudice creditors like Far West by concealing and wasting assets that would otherwise be available to satisfy the [$17.7 million] judgment.”55 But no matter. It was a new year, and Mona and his partner Llamas, the disgraced majority shareholder of Medical Marijuana Inc., had positioned themselves at the top of a nascent industry where investors were clamoring to get a piece of the action. Voters in Colorado and Washington had recently cast their ballots for legal recreational cannabis and the value of any stock even tenuously connected to ganja went soaring. In a glowing press release dated March 1, 2013, Medical Marijuana Inc. announced that it was selling its subsidiary PhytoSphere (which processed the hemp paste from abroad) to CannaVest for $35 million in “CANV” shares.56 It sounded impressive on paper, but CannaVest scarcely had an operation to justify any meaningful valuation of its shares.57 SEC filings show that CannaVest only had a total of $431 in assets at the time the transaction was announced.58 “The terms of the transaction were the result of arms-length negotiations between the parties, unaffected by any prior relationships,” explained Michael J. Mona, III, VP of Operations for CannaVest (the CEO’s son).59 Throughout 2013, Medical Marijuana Inc. reported that it was handing off incremental parts of its portfolio company PhytoSphere to CannaVest for piecemeal infusions of $35 million in CannaVest shares.60 Each new pronouncement gave a momentary jolt to the price of Medical Marijuana Inc. shares, their value inflated by overblown press releases and a cannabis-crazy zeitgeist. “Medical Marijuana Inc. has never sold a single share of CannaVest, so it’s done no good for the company,” said Alan Brochstein, founder of 420 Investor, in a phone conversation with Project CBD. Brochstein is cautious about labeling the MJNA-CANV collaboration a “fraud,” but he acknowledges that the whole thing is suspect. “They put an arbitrary price of $35 million, and said it was all going to be paid in [CannaVest] stock and not cash. But [CannaVest] was a shell company that had no operation, so the whole thing looks fraudulent,” he said. “How did they come to $35 million?”61 Brochstein isn’t the only investment analyst who has challenged the financials of weed start-ups like Medical Marijuana Inc. “Most of these over-the-counter weed penny stocks are just vehicles for their insiders to sell shares to retail investors caught up in the hype of the legalized marijuana revolution,” wrote Cody Willard in the Wall Street Journal Market Watch blog.62 Insiders at CannaVest and Medical Marijuana Inc. held much of each other’s shares, and some would later sell them to credulous traders at a significant markup. For example, Stuart Titus, the owner of Kannaway’s parent company, General Hemp, and a key financier for Medical Marijuana Inc., sold over $4 million worth of CANV shares in early 2014 as their value reached an astronomical $166.17 each.63 The rise and fall of CANV’s price trajectory looks like the Burj Khalifa skyscraper shooting up from the streets of Dubai.64 One reason why CANV shares spiked so high is that Medical Marijuana Inc. sold PhytoSphere “assets” to CannaVest for $35 million (almost exclusively) in CANV shares, a transaction that bolstered both companies’ profiles at little actual cost. CannaVest also issued 900,000 of its shares to PhytoSphere as part of that deal.65 The whole transaction was somewhat like the episode of Beavis and Butthead in which the two teenagers sell all their chocolate bars to each other for the same pair of dollars. The mega-valuation of CANV shares may have temporarily boosted MJNA’s valuation because of “a weird feedback loop” created by Medical Marijuana Inc., writes a representative of Rolling O Research on the investor website Seeking Alpha. “[Medical Marijuana Inc.] mentions . . . CannaVest in their PR. Some readers then think that CannaVest sold much more product than it likely did, which increases the price of CANV shares. That increases the value of MJNA’s CannaVest holdings on the balance sheet, providing support to a higher [MJNA] stock price.”66 MJNA stock peaked at about 50 cents, but since then its price has hovered below 20 cents per share.67 By October 2014, CANV shares had dropped precipitously to $3.00, a change facilitated by a barrage of bad press. An article in Forbes, “Inside the Pot Stock Bubble” (March 26, 2014), disclosed that CEO Mona was attempting to sell 10 million CANV shares for $1.50 each. These restricted shares couldn’t be traded publicly for another six months. When queried about this deal, Michael Mona III of CannaVest told Project CBD that this offering had been terminated on April 23.68 On May 9, purchasers of CANV stock filed a class action lawsuit against CannaVest. The lawsuit followed a disclosure by CannaVest to the SEC that it had “misreported” its financial position throughout 2013.69 “We believe the claims are without merit and intend to vigorously defend the company and management,” CannaVest VP Michael Mona, III, stated in an email to Project CBD.70 The Hemp Oil Pipeline PhytoSphere, the centerpiece of the questionable MJNA-CannaVest deal, processed imported hemp paste for Medical Marijuana Inc.’s CBD-infused products. Imported from where? That’s a secret. Canada? Germany? Eastern Europe? Yunnan, China? All of the above? Rumors abound. Medical Marijuana Inc. reportedly opened an office in Bucharest in 2012, but the company hasn’t disclosed whether Romania is the source (or one of the source countries) of the industrial hemp that it uses to make its paste. Because the industrial hemp paste is relatively high in CBD and low in psychoactive THC, it’s legal to buy, sell, and possess products made from this paste in all fifty U.S. states, according to Medical Marijuana Inc. Denver-based Dixie Botanicals, a Medical Marijuana Inc. affiliate, was the first company to mass market CBD as a “wellness” product on a nationwide scale. For a year or so, Dixie was MJNA’s showpiece—a real business ostensibly manufacturing and selling real products. Medical Marijuana Inc. supplied the CBD-infused hemp oil for Dixie’s tinctures, capsules, and a topical “pain relief salve.” Dixie also sells THC-dominant offerings to Colorado residents. But quality control has not been Dixie’s strong suit. Independent lab analyses found that the amount of cannabidiol contained in Dixie’s “X Dew Drops” CBD tincture was significantly lower than what the label indicated, as O’Shaughnessy’s disclosed in Spring 2013.71 More than a year later, the Denver Post and other news media would report mislabeling problems that overstated the THC content in Dixie’s edibles.72 Medical Marijuana Inc. and Dixie consummated their relationship in the spring of 2012 with the creation of a co-owned company called Red Dice Holdings. Medical Marijuana Inc. agreed to give Dixie hundreds of thousands of MJNA shares in exchange for intellectual claim and licensing rights to Dixie’s brand and its cannabinoid-infused tinctures, drops, candies, soda, etc. Dixie owner and managing director Vincent (“Tripp”) Keber became president and CEO of Red Dice Holdings and a board member of Medical Marijuana Inc. “I make companies to sell companies,” Keber boasted to The Daily Beast. “Make me an offer, and I’ll ride off into the sunlight with saddlebags of gold.”73 Less than a year after forming Red Dice, Medical Marijuana Inc. and Dixie had a falling out. Dixie took Medical Marijuana Inc. to court for allegedly never handing over all the MJNA shares and for breach of contract after Medical Marijuana Inc. allegedly engaged “in a pattern of behavior intended to mislead and defraud investors, affiliates, subsidiaries, and business partners.”74 They would eventually make amends, agreeing on an amicable split,75 but not before Tamar Wise, formerly Dixie’s chief scientist, blew the whistle on both companies. After she left Dixie, Wise posted this message on Facebook (since removed): “I’m tired of so called CBD companies claiming that what they provide is medicine. Anyone using a CBD from hemp product please be aware of what you’re actually getting b/c it is not what you think. These formulations start with a crude and dirty hemp paste contaminated with microbial life! I have seen this and these organisms decompose the paste. The paste perhaps even contains residual solvent and other toxins as the extraction [is] made in a process that actually renders it unfit for human consumption. What these companies are doing is criminal and dangerous . . . . I cannot keep quiet any more. And since I formulated most of these products as head of Dixie science, I feel responsible for spreading the truth. I left Dixie for ethical reasons but it is not enough to just walk away. These frauds need to be exposed for what they are . . . . Let’s keep this industry pure and safe.”76§ Alarmed by what she saw in Medical Marijuana Inc.’s hemp paste, Wise shared her concerns in a phone conversation with Dr. Jeffrey Raber of the Los Angeles-based Werc Shop, which tests medical marijuana products for cannabinoid content, mold, and pesticide residue. Wise suspected that Medical Marijuana Inc. was extracting its CBD paste from retted hemp—industrial hemp that had been specially treated with micro-organisms and moisture to dissolve cellular tissue, thereby expediting the removal of the slippery raw fiber, which is used for producing textiles and other goods. Chris Boucher, director of U.S. Hemp Oil, the CannaVest subsidiary that supplies CBD-infused “hemp oil” to Medical Marijuana Inc., adamantly denies all of Wise’s claims. “She’s insane,” Boucher told Project CBD. “That’s what happens in this business. People shoot arrows at people’s back for no reason.”77 A true believer in the plant’s economic and medicinal potential, hemp industry veteran Boucher served as lead project coordinator for an experimental hemp grow at the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s research center in California’s Imperial Valley in the early 1990s. Boucher is currently VP of business development for CannaVest, which tasked him to run U.S. Hemp Oil when it launched in June 2013. Initially, U.S. Hemp Oil was “a joint venture between MJNA and CannaVest,” Boucher told the Marijuana Business Daily.78 Now CannaVest owns U.S. Hemp Oil outright. CannaVest supplied the hemp oil that Medical Marijuana Inc. turned into something called “Real Scientific Hemp Oil,” a CBD-infused concentrate. (There are two grades of Real Scientific Hemp Oil: “Blue,” said to be around 17 percent CBD, and “Gold” at around 25 percent CBD, though these percentages may vary somewhat from batch to batch.) CannaVest also manufactured and packaged an array of other CBD-infused hemp oil products—chewing gum, tinctures, vape pen cartridges, topical creams—that were sold through Medical Marijuana Inc.’s marketing subsidiary HempMeds. Dixie responded to Wise in a strongly worded defense of their products and manufacturing practices, claiming “Ms. Wise and members of her science team resigned after a dispute with the company” over intellectual property rights, and were motivated to make false allegations by their desire to embark on a new endeavor “that will compete directly with Dixie Botanicals.” Real Scientific Hemp Oil (RSHO) is much more expensive than hempseed oil, a widely available nutritional supplement. An 8-ounce bottle of Nutiva Hempseed Oil retails on Amazon for $9.02, while a 2-ounce bottle of MJNA’s Cibdex Hemp Oil tincture—sold by HempMeds—fetches $160. Real Scientific Hemp Oil with 2,200 mgs of CBD (assuming the label is accurate) sells online for $549. “We have no control over the price,” Boucher maintains. CannaVest says it sells its hemp oil wholesale to “qualified individuals” and businesses for around ten cents per milligram. “And they in turn mark it up,” according to Boucher.79 What’s in RSHO that commands such a high retail price? HempMeds promotional literature states that RSHO is derived from “hemp seed and stalk.” But CBD is not produced or pressed from hemp seeds. Cannabidiol can only be extracted from the flower, leaves, and, to a very minor extent, the stalk of the hemp plant. CBD-rich “hemp oil” is not the same as protein-rich hempseed oil. The obfuscation of nomenclature is problematic to Eric Steenstra, president of Vote Hemp and a founding member of the Hemp Industry Association. “Our biggest concern, from an industry standpoint, is the conflation of hemp oil with cannabidiol,” explained Steenstra. “The reality is that the best source of CBD is high resin strains of cannabis—the drug kind.”** Legal in All 50 States? MJNA’s promotional strategy for its RSHO product line has relied heavily on social media, press release hyperbole, and a relentless email barrage from “The CBD Guy,” whose messages are often comically alarmist: “Right now, know it or not, you are likely CBD deficient…. If you know what is good for you, you will add some. Any amount is better than none.”80 ** On June 26, 2014, the Hemp Industries Association (HIA) issued a press release stating its position on CBD Extracts Misbranded and Marketed as “Hemp Oil.” The press release asserted: “It is important for America farmers and processors of hemp to understand that most CBD in products mislabeled as ‘hemp oil’ is a co-product of large-scale hemp stalk and fiber processing facilities in Europe where the fiber is the primary material produced at a large scale. CBD is not a product or component of hemp seeds, and labeling to that effect is misleading and motivated by the desire to take advantage of the legal grey area under federal law. Hemp seed oil does not contain any significant quantity of CBD.” In order not to mislead consumers, the HIA maintains that “CBD products in the market should not be termed ‘Hemp Oil’ and we are working with vendors of such products to rebrand CBD extracts to remove the market confusion this causes.” Repeated missives from The CBD Guy hyped various MJNA products, including CanChew, a chewing gum infused with cannabidiol. CanChew also contains Kratom, an opiate receptor agonist (activator) that is banned in several Asian countries.81 Another announcement trumpets: “Stronger CBD Vape Oils [are] on the Way!” Apparently vaping hemp oil and whatever else was in there didn’t pack much of a therapeutic punch, but The CBD Guy promised better times ahead: “I am working with a few vape oil manufacturer (sic) seeing if I can get a special ‘batch’ of vape oil that may indeed have enough CBD per ‘puff’ to make it a practical way of adding CBD to your daily diet.”82 And, of course, every email blast featured MJNA’s marketing mantra: “Legal in all 50 states.” Not so fast, says the Food and Drug Administration. When queried in July 2013 regarding the legal status of cannabidiol, Lisa Kubaska, who works for the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation, told Fred Gardner of O’Shaughnessy’s: “CBD meets the definition of schedule I under the Controlled Substance Act. The DEA is the regulatory agency.”83 Thus far, the DEA has not moved against Medical Marijuana Inc. or any of its subsidiaries. Does this mean that CBD products are legal to possess or distribute throughout the United States? Medical marijuana dispensaries are illegal under federal law, but these facilities operate openly in several states. Although it is nontoxic, non-addictive, and non-psychoactive, cannabidiol is still illegal, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration. The DEA categorizes CBD and all other plant cannabinoids under “tetrahydrocannabinols,” which are Schedule I substances. On July 28, 2014, a bipartisan group of Congressmen introduced a bill in the House of Representatives to exclude industrial hemp and CBD from the definition of marijuana under the Controlled Substances Act. Such a bill would not be necessary if CBD extracted from foreign-grown industrial hemp was already legal throughout the USA, as Medical Marijuana Inc. blithely asserts. Meanwhile, draconian legal restrictions make it nearly impossible for American scientists to access plant-derived CBD to conduct medical research. Those who insist that federal policy allows the importation and distribution of hemp-derived CBD rest their case on a 2004 federal appeals court ruling, which protected the domestic sale of hemp- containing foods, not hemp-derived drug compounds. Although U.S. farmers were still not permitted to grow it, industrial hemp remained legal for import and sale in the United States as long as (1) the hemp product is derived from the seed or stalk of the plant, not from the leaves and flowers; and (2) the THC content measures below 0.3 percent.84 But cannabidiol was never mentioned in the appeals court ruling. Nor was CBD mentioned in an October 9, 2001, DEA interpretive memo pertaining to retted fiber hemp products and essential fatty acid-rich (not CBD-rich) hempseed oil. Neither of these rulings explicitly addressed the legality of CBD as a drug compound extracted from industrial hemp. It may be a moot point, anyway, given that several lab reports showed THC levels higher than 0.3% in samples of Medical Marijuana Inc.’s Real Scientific Hemp Oil. A tube of RSHO analyzed by CannLabs in Denver weighed in at 1.01 percent THC.85 The Werc Shop in Los Angeles found THC levels at 1.14 percent when it tested RSHO.86 PhytaLab in Seattle got a 2.56 percent THC reading for RSHO Gold.87 HempMeds promotional literature even included a certificate of analysis of hemp oil paste with THC measuring .79 percent by dry weight, more than double the apparent legal limit (see Appendix A). Many other lab tests of RSHO samples, it should be noted, found less than 0.3 percent THC in accordance with DEA policy. Overall, these inconsistent results undermine Medical Marijuana Inc.’s tortured argument that its products are legal in all 50 states. In terms of federal law, anything above 0.3 percent THC, or anything extracted from the leaves and flowers of hemp, would not be legal in any state. It shouldn’t be this way—the laws banning hemp are absurd—but it is. Patented CBD Troubles were mounting for Medical Marijuana Inc., which reported a paltry $45,000 in total revenue from its CBD-rich hemp oil products for the first quarter of 2014.88 Poor sales, the pending class action suit against its hemp oil supplier CannaVest, and the erratic THC levels found in its hemp oil products were among a series of problems that called into question the company’s long term prospects. In the spring of 2014, during the countdown to the much-ballyhooed Kannaway “buzz launch,” a controversy erupted at another MJNA portfolio company, KannaLife Sciences. Linked to Medical Marijuana Inc. in numerous ways, KannaLife featured a familiar cast of characters on its board of directors, including Stuart Titus, owner of Kannaway’s parent company, General Hemp. KannaLife is also wed to Kannaway in a five year sales and distribution contract that allows KannaLife to certify products sold through the Kannaway Network. 89 KannaLife Sciences, a recipient of $1.5 million in financing from Medical Marijuana Inc. and CannaVest, was purportedly engaged in the research and development of cannabinoid-based medicinal agents. 90 But KannaLife’s executive director Dean Petkanas did not have a background in cannabis science. Instead, he got his professional start in the early 1990’s as the chief financial officer of Stratton Oakmont, the corrupt penny-stock company featured in The Wolf of Wall Street.91 Petkanas left Stratton Oakmont before the FBI and SEC popped the firm for pump-and-dump fraud.92 Petkanas subsequently was hired by Xechem International, a publicly traded company, to commercialize a “phyto-pharmaceutical” compound for treating Sickle Cell Disease. But Xechem, which had acquired rights to an indigenous African plant compound, declared bankruptcy and folded after its Nigerian subsidiary was targeted by multiple lawsuits from creditors, consultants, former officers, and third parties.93 Petkanas was also executive director of a publicly traded energy drink company called Full Motion Beverage (FMBV). That company has not filed with the SEC since 2009, and had zero sources of revenue flow in 2012, yet the website Penny Stock Research discovered that third party companies were paid to heavily promote FMBV shares that were virtually worthless.94 It’s somewhat of a head-scratcher how Petkanas was able to convince the U.S. government to award KannaLife Sciences a patenting license to commercialize CBD. In 2003, the U.S Department of Health and Human Services had secured a patent titled “Cannabinoids as Antioxidants and Neuroprotectants” based on preclinical research involving CBD and THC. Nine years later, the National Institute of Health (NIH) “granted an exclusive license to the patent to KannaLife to develop drugs . . .  for the treatment of hepatic encephalopathy [brain damage caused by a diseased liver],” Renate Myles of NIH confirmed in an email to Project CBD.95 Myles noted that other companies and investigators could still apply for licenses for the same patent to develop a CBD-based pharmaceutical for treating neurological diseases that are not liver-related. Thus far, however, no other company has done so during the patent’s eleven-year existence.†† Thanks to the U.S. government, Petkanas and his Medical Marijuana Inc. cohorts had another tool to hustle their stocks and products while donning the cloak of official credence. A “Kannaway Executive Summary” lists the NIH patent among several bulleted highlights for potential salesmen and women who are seeking “a ground-floor opportunity with an explosive-growth and breakthrough nutraceutical network marketing company.” In addition to dubiously claiming that “MJNA controls the seed supply of CBD rich hemp” and “CBD-rich hemp oil products are already legal in all 50 states,” the Kannaway Executive Summary hypes the “exclusive rights to NIH patent #6630507 on therapeutic use of cannabinoids.” Myles from the NIH told Project CBD that Kannaway’s “use of the patent for marketing purposes does not fall within the scope of [the NIH’s] patent.” However, a U.S. Patent Office representative conceded that Kannaway’s use of the patent for marketing is technically not a violation of the law.96 But KannaLife Sciences may have overstepped when it entered into a five-year sales and distribution contract with Kannaway. Partnering with what appeared to be a tawdry pyramid-scheme seemed opportunistic and in poor taste to some. It sparked a mutiny among members of KannaLife’s scientific advisory board. Two science advisors, Dr. Michelle Sexton and Jason Cranford, quit in protest. †† In 2003, the U.S Department of Health and Human Services secured a patent titled “Cannabinoids as Antioxidants and Neuroprotectants” based on preclinical research, which revealed that cannabinoids, specifically CBD and THC, “have antioxidant properties [and] are found to have particular application as neuroprotectants, for example in limiting neurological damage following ischemic insults, such as stroke and trauma, or in the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and HIV dementia.” “We had a big scientific advisory board, but we never had one advisory meeting,” said Cranford, who also served on KannaLife’s corporate board. “We never had a board of directors meeting. When KannaLife started merging with Kannaway, I demanded a board meeting to bring it to a vote, but they refused. So I resigned.”97 Hard to Stomach Jason Cranford, a horticulturist, CBD-rich strain breeder, and proprietor of a medical marijuana dispensary in Colorado, would become a major thorn in the side of Medical Marijuana Inc. In addition to growing cannabis for patients and giving away CBD-rich clones to needy families, Cranford ran a non-profit charity, the Flowering Hope Foundation. He gained notoriety in 2013 when he developed a strain of CBD-rich cannabis called Haleigh’s Hope, which later became the name of a bill (Haleigh’s Hope Act) that legalized CBD-dominant marijuana for research purposes in Georgia, one of several states that have passed so-called “CBD-only” bills this year. The KannaLife fiasco prompted Cranford to take a closer look at the machinations of Medical Marijuana Inc. Concerned about the quality of its aggressively marketed products, he put out feelers on Facebook, asking whether anyone had problems with Real Scientific Hemp Oil. The first person to respond to Cranford’s inquiry was Brittany Warrior, whose epileptic daughter Jaqie suffered severe gastro-intestinal distress and was hospitalized in Denver after she ingested RSHO. After conferring with Cranford, Warrior contacted the FDA and filed a complaint against HempMeds. She sent the FDA the hemp oil that allegedly made her daughter sick. This prompted the FDA to open an investigation into Medical Marijuana Inc. Warrior also sent Cranford some of the RSHO she’d given Jaqie. He had it tested at CannLab in Denver. The results indicated a THC level higher than 0.3 percent, but that wasn’t the only thing Cranford suspected was wrong with the hemp oil. After hearing serious complaints about RSHO from more than a dozen families, he decided to have a RSHO sample tested for heavy metals and other toxins. Most cannabis testing labs do not test for heavy metals, so Cranford submitted the RSHO sample to Stewart Environmental Consultants in Fort Collins. The initial results appeared to confirm what Cranford and Warrior had suspected: The RSHO contained high levels of several heavy metals, including nickel, selenium, molybdenum, arsenic, and silver. A few days later, Stewart Environmental Consultants issued a second report that contradicted its earlier findings: Five numbers, all pertaining to heavy metal toxins, were changed from unsafe to safe levels (see Appendix B). Stewart maintained that its lab technician had erred in his haste to get results for Cranford. But Stewart did not comply with Project CBD’s request for a copy of the corrective action report that a lab is supposed to generate for internal quality control when test results are modified. A corrective action report would explain why the RSHO sample was retested and what accounts for the discrepancies between the first results and the second set of findings. Nor did Stewart explain why the same lab technician who supposedly botched the first test also conducted the second test when there were two other lab technicians who could have retested the RSHO sample. Several more red flags suggested lab-testing improprieties, which Project CBD noted in a detailed memo to Stewart (see Appendix B). Stewart did not respond to our questions. Be that as it may, Medical Marijuana Inc. proceeded to post the second set of innocuous test results online along with an upbeat press release claiming that a “top laboratory” gave the company’s flagship product a clean bill of health.98 Subsequent testing by other analytical labs, including a DEA and FDA registered facility, would not give Real Scientific Hemp Oil a clean bill of health. Brave Mykayla In the fall of 2013, Brandon Krenzler was contacted via email by Charles Vest, vice president of HempMeds, then the marketing arm of both Medical Marijuana Inc. and CannaVest. He offered to send samples of Real Scientific Hemp Oil to Krenzler to give to his 8-year-old daughter, Brave Mykayla, who was undergoing chemotherapy for leukemia. Krenzler was already administering cannabis oil to help his daughter. He told Vest that Brave Mykayla responded better to high-THC oil than high-CBD concentrates. But Vest persisted, even offering to travel to Oregon to meet Krenzler and his family at their home. Krenzler finally relented—what did he have to lose? Before long, Vest and a man who identified himself as Michael Mona of CannaVest were sitting in Krenzler’s living room, speaking with him and his wife about their hemp oil products. It turns out it wasn’t Michael Mona; it was Michael Llamas, former CEO of Medical Marijuana Inc., pretending to be Mona for reasons unclear.99 Vest explained to the Krenzlers that HempMeds would loan them a certain amount of RSHO if they agreed to spread the word and sell it to their friends. There was little talk of medicine or helping sick children—the meat of the conversation was about marketing and making money, according to Krenzler. Then Vest said something that stunned Krenzler. Vest wanted to know if the family was interested in branding RSHO “Brave Mykayla Oil.” “I wasn’t comfortable with that,” Krenzler told Project CBD. “[CBD oil] wasn’t the oil that worked for Mykayla, so why would they even consider asking that?”100 Despite harboring some doubts, Krenzler agreed to share a few samples of RSHO with others in Oregon’s medical marijuana community. Vest and “Mona” encouraged him to tell his friends that RSHO was safe for use. Krenzler gave some RSHO to Mykayla. Almost immediately, she complained of severe stomach cramps. When he tried it himself, Krenzler’s guts started cramping soon after ingestion. Other people he’d sent samples reported similar gut-wrenching reactions. Krenzler complained to HempMeds, but Vest denied there was a problem. Interviewed by Project CBD, Krenzler recounted what he told Vest over the phone: “I said, ‘Please Charles, as a human being, stop selling this oil. Please stop…. I don’t care if you give it to adults. I don’t care if it’s marketed as a supplement. Stop specifically giving it to children. You’re going to poison them.’”101 Krenzler subsequently provided two samples of RSHO oil—one Gold, the other Blue—to Project CBD. Dr. Noel Palmer of PhytaTech, an analytical lab in Denver, Colorado, was enlisted to scrutinize this material. Project CBD also sent PhytaTech a RSHO Gold sample from a Crohn’s patient who said that she and a friend both became “violently ill” after they ingested the oil. In addition, PhytaTech analyzed two other random samples of RSHO Blue that Project CBD submitted. The three RSHO Blue samples tested clean. But Dr. Noel Palmer found significant levels of hexane, a highly toxic industrial solvent, in both RSHO Gold vials.102 Symptoms of hexane poisoning include nausea, vomiting, headaches, dizziness, and mental confusion. Concentrations of hexane in excess of 50 grams can be fatal.103 Chromatographs of the RSHO Gold samples also showed a second major peak, presumably another chlorinated solvent, which PhytaTech was unable to identify due to equipment limitations (see Appendix C). In an effort to verify PhytaTech’s findings and identify the mystery peak, Project CBD contacted Flora Research Laboratories, a DEA and FDA registered facility in Grants Pass, Oregon, which agreed to examine the two RSHO Gold samples strictly because of public health and safety concerns, not for commercial purposes. James Neal-Kababick, director of Flora Research Laboratories, confirmed the presence of significant levels of hexane and other solvent residues in the RSHO Gold sample from Krenzler (see Appendix D). 104 A smorgasbord of contaminants were found in this item, including variants of pentane, butane, and ethyl acetate (as in nail polish remover). These are all “class one solvents, the most dangerous and toxic class of solvents,” explained Dr. Jahan Marcu, a Project CBD science consultant.105 In his lab analysis, Neal-Kababick noted that the first sample he tested ended up clogging his equipment: “Major residue left on needle and found on vented caps of used vials…. Ran multiple vials of water to clean system of carryover. . . . Carryover dissolved after triplicate runs of water vials.” Neal-Kababick had never encountered such a problem before: “Carryover issues not observed in historical samples of other matrices tested.”106 These carryover issues may have been a factor as Neal-Kababick was unable to conduct a satisfactory analysis of the second RSHO Gold sample from the Crohn’s patient. That sample showed no peaks at all, underscoring the need for another battery of tests, which are pending. Buying Legitimacy On April 1, 2014, a Medical Marijuana Inc. press release announced the launch of new PR campaign aimed specifically at families with disabled children.107 The “Don’t Move” campaign, as it was called, urged families not to move to states with legal medical marijuana to access CBD-rich cannabis strains, some of which are known to work wonders for children suffering from catastrophic seizure disorders. “We are launching the new ‘DON’T MOVE’ advertising campaign to further increase awareness of the CBD-rich hemp oil products we represent,” Vest stated in the press release. “Rather than move to another state, consumers need only to move to the nearest computer or smart phone to order online.” In an effort to burnish its public image and increase its market opportunities, Medical Marijuana Inc. has spread lots of cash around. A “featured member” of the National Cannabis Industry Association (NCIA), it has foot the bill for some of the association’s meetings. “As the sponsor of the NCIA’s Educational Series conference during the historic ‘420 week,’ HempMeds is showing support for all cannabis businesses in this rapidly growing and changing industry,” HempMeds VP Charles Vest crowed in another press release.108 The show of support for all cannabis businesses included a HempMeds web banner ad, which implored (without a hint of irony): “Invest in medical marijuana penny stocks and weed out scams.”109 On Memorial Day weekend 2014, AutismOne, an organization that promotes alternative therapies for autistic children, held a conference at the Intercontinental Hotel near the O’Hare Airport in Chicago. The “exclusive gold sponsor” for this event was HempMedsPX, which occupied a spacious lounge area where well-meaning parents purchased Real Scientific Hemp Oil and other Medical Marijuana Inc. products for their ailing offspring. Medical Marijuana Inc. has also sponsored events hosted by the American Herbal Products Association, Americans for Safe Access, and other groups allied with Project CBD.‡‡ But some cannabis advocacy organizations were less receptive to MJNA’s blandishments. When a Kannaway rep tried to set up a vending booth at the Patients Out of Time conference in Portland, Oregon, in May 2014, he was promptly told to leave. Apparently the Kannaway salesman had signed up for a booth under a different company name. HempMeds also approached Project CBD about “forming a strategic alliance.” An email dated June 3, 2014, from Jennifer Yarbrough, an independent account manager working with HempMeds, indicated that “we may be interested in an investment” in Project CBD.110 Project CBD did not respond to this overture. ‡‡ HempMeds provided funds for the national conference of Americans for Safe Access in April 2014. This conference included a panel discussion on CBD with critics and representatives of Medical Marijuana Inc. The American Herbal Products Association has hosted several meetings involving critics of Medical Marijuana Inc. in an effort to sort out proper nomenclature for marketing hemp products. “HempMeds is trying to buy legitimacy within the medical marijuana community and beyond,” says Project CBD director Martin A. Lee. “But legitimacy can only be earned by offering high quality products at reasonable prices. It appears that Medical Marijuana Inc. falls short in this regard.” Lee is concerned that the activities of Medical Marijuana Inc. could discredit the entire grassroots cannabis community and the industry it has spawned—from mom-and-pop organic growers and cannabis oil artisans to well-heeled start-ups. Drug war defenders doubtless will revel in any fact or rumor suggesting that an ethically challenged cabal has been swindling stockholders and peddling poisonous, THC-laden products in all 50 states. This will be grist for the mill of diehard prohibitionists who are looking for any excuse to roll back the gains made by medical marijuana and industrial hemp advocates. But the problem, in this case, is not cannabis or CBD or THC. The problem is greed and commercialization. “The questionable nature of Medical Marijuana Inc.’s business dealings and its overpriced products suggest that they are trying to make a fast buck by preying upon people who are desperate for miracles,” says Lee. Site Visit In July 2014, a Project CBD delegation visited the laboratory facilities of CannaVest in San Diego, where the imported hemp paste is refined into oil. We were greeted by lab director Joshua Hartsel and CannaVest executives Chris Boucher and Michael Mona III. Hartsel, the lead scientist at CannaVest, specializes in medicinal organic chemistry. He earned a PhD at Virginia Tech and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of California. He subsequently founded Delta-9 Technologies, an analytical testing lab that serviced California’s medical marijuana industry. Hartsel’s clients included CannaVest, which sent the first of several batches of its CBD-infused extract to Delta-9 Technologies for evaluation in March 2013. A half year later, Hartsel was hired by CannaVest to establish an in-house laboratory and oversee research and development for the company. Hartsel got the job after being interviewed by CannaVest CEO Michael Mona Jr. and Michael Llamas, the former CEO of Medical Marijuana Inc.111 Prior to September 2013, CannaVest did not have a science department, according to Hartsel.112 But CannaVest, through its subsidiary PhytoSphere, had been providing CBD-infused hemp oil to Medical Marijuana Inc. for several months before Hartsel came on board. The exact role of PhytoSphere in the hemp oil pipeline remains somewhat of an enigma. Originally a wholly owned subsidiary of Medical Marijuana Inc., PhytoSphere was supposedly sold to CannaVest in exchange for $35 million in CANV shares. But CannaVest insiders told Project CBD that Medical Marijuana Inc. never fully dissolved its portion of PhytoSphere.113 “At one point, we had a PhytoSphere and they had a PhytoSphere,” said Michael Mona III.114 To allay confusion as to the status of Phytosphere—and perhaps also to distance itself from any problems that may have arisen prior to forming an in-house science team—CannaVest changed the name of Phytosphere to CannaVest Laboratories, LLC. Project CBD was invited to tour the lab by the CannaVest management team, which sought to make a good impression by showing their “full portfolio of scientific instrumentation.” The lab was equipped with gas chromatography, liquid chromatography, and mass spectrometry machines. We saw a binder filled with chromatographs and charts indicating CBD content and other data, but we did not have a chance to examine these reports. The CannaVest lab was also equipped with distillation tools for processing crude hemp paste and refining it into a CBD-rich oil concentrate. We saw dozens of 25-kilogram drums filled with thick, black, tarry paste that lacked the compelling aroma of cannabis. We were told that the raw CBD paste was extracted from hemp strains certified by the European Union. “It’s a mix between Italian and Czech cultivars,” said Boucher. “We use super-critical CO2 technology to extract the oil.”115 The initial extraction is done in Europe and the paste is shipped to the United States. “Our oil is cleared through Customs, Homeland Security, and the FDA on a regular basis,” according to Boucher.116 After it arrives at the lab, the paste is heated and decarboxylated in large stainless steel pans. The hemp paste is further refined through what seemed to be a two-stage vacuum distillation process, resulting in a CBD oil concentrate. Hartsel utilizes additional separation equipment to brew “CBD Simple,” a super-refined oil, which reportedly measures close to 100 percent pure cannabidiol. This oil has won awards for highest CBD concentrate at several High Times cannabis cup competitions that were sponsored by HempMeds, Medical Marijuana Inc.’s marketing arm. Each High Times award was followed by self- congratulatory PR from HempMeds, incorrectly implying that the prize-winning CBD concentrate is the same as the RSHO products sold over the Internet.§§ When Project CBD visited CannaVest, the lab did not have equipment to test for heavy metals or fungi-derived mycotoxins. But Hartsel said they would soon be installing state of the art, rapid screening technology to identify the DNA of pathogens. “We’re trying to do this the right way,” he assured us.117 * §“Our High CBD awards are given to whatever flower, concentrate, and edible score the highest in CBD content based on the results we get from the labs who test our entries,” says High Times senior editor Bobby Black. “Unlike the majority of our awards, these are given out based solely on the lab results without any subjective input from judges.” Project CBD does not doubt Hartsel’s sincerity, but somewhere along the line it appears that a bad mistake was made, resulting in a poisonous batch of RSHO. Project CBD does not maintain that this batch is typical of all the oil marketed by HempMeds. We do not know the extent of the problem. Nor do we purport to know who is ultimately responsible for the tainted RSHO Gold, when it was made or what may have happened to the oil after CannaVest supplied it to HempMeds. A Phyto-Remedial Plant Irrespective of what the lab tests show, there are inherent problems with extracting cannabidiol from industrial hemp stalk, which contains meager amounts of CBD and a trace of THC. *** The notion that CannaVest only extracts CBD from hemp stalk strains credulity. But theoretically it might be possible. Let’s assume for the sake of argument that CannaVest is actually abiding by federal regulations and forgoing the leaves and flowers. Given how little CBD can be drawn from hemp stalk, a huge amount of plant material would be required for sufficient oil extraction. Moreover, hemp is a bioaccumulator—it sucks up contaminants from the soil. Once in the soil, heavy metal pollutants are very difficult to remove. Fungi-derived mycotoxins that resist decomposition are another concern. “The more plant material you have to concentrate, the greater the chance of dragging contaminants into it,” explained Dr. John McPartland, coauthor of Hemp Diseases and Pests.118 CannaVest says it processes 700,000 tons of industrial hemp annually and turns it into 150,000 kilos of concentrated CBD-rich oil.119 Hemp’s phyto-remedial properties increase the probability that heavy metals, mycotoxins or other poisons will be extracted and concentrated along with the CBD. This problem will vex any business purporting to extract CBD from industrial hemp stalk. When Project CBD visited CannaVest, we heard complaints about the Kannaway campaign and Michael Llamas’s mercurial, behind-the-scenes management style. “We’re separate, but everyone thinks we’re one,” CannaVest CEO Michael Mona Jr. insisted. “HempMeds is not CannaVest, and CannaVest is not HempMeds.”120 But even as it tried to distance itself from Medical Marijuana Inc., CannaVest was burdened by its own corporate history. In June 2014, CannaVest, a MJNA offshoot, announced that it had disposed of several million shares of KannaLife Sciences, a MJNA subsidiary, in exchange for a half million shares of CANV, which had previously been issued to Phytosphere.121 Shades of Beavis and Butthead again. *** Hemp stalk is dotted with tiny sessile trichomes, which are shaped like inverted commas, unlike the mushroom- shaped trichomes on cannabis buds and leaves that are densely packed with cannabinoids and other medicinal compounds. Chris Boucher acknowledges that CannaVest would prefer to extract cannabidiol from CBD-rich cannabis rather than industrial hemp and they hope to do so when the legal environment improves. Divesting from KannaLife Sciences foreshadowed the split with Medical Marijuana Inc. that CannaVest disclosed in its Second Quarter 10-Q report on August 18, 2014. The text of the 10-Q filing indicates that CannaVest terminated its agreement with HempMeds, its main distributer, because the latter allegedly reneged on several commitments: “[CannaVest] had previously notified HempMeds that it was in breach of various provisions of the HempMeds Agreement including provisions regarding HempMeds distribution of competing products, the requirement that HempMeds obtain prior approval of marketing and promotional materials, [CannaVest’s] ability to access HempMeds sales data, and HempMeds payment of amounts due under the HempMeds Agreement, amongst others.” 122 In September 2014, CannaVest filed a lawsuit against Kannaway, General Hemp, and the Hemp Deposit and Distribution Corporation, alleging trademark infringement and fraud.123 This falling-out could mean that Medical Marijuana Inc. will need to find a different source of cannabidiol to remain a viable enterprise, while CannaVest repositions itself to sell cheap, bulk CBD oil directly to nutraceutical producers and third-party distributors. Medical Marijuana Inc. ultimately is an artifact of prohibition, an opportunistic creature rooted in the cracks and contradictions of a government policy built on lies. Give these hemp oil hustlers their due for realizing early on that there was a large, untapped market for non-psychoactive cannabis concentrates. They shamelessly played the CBD card and pushed the envelope willy-nilly into grey areas of the law. Several independent hemp oil entrepreneurs are poised to rush through the “CBD-only” door that Medical Marijuana Inc. has opened. All are banking on the presumption that the U.S. government won’t risk a public relations fiasco by targeting a CBD-related enterprise.††† And those who say they’re extracting CBD only from the stalk of industrial hemp are almost certainly being disingenuous. Either they are bluffing to make it appear as though they are operating legally—or  they are extracting the oil in a way that makes a dangerous product more likely. Extracting cannabidiol from hemp stalk ups the risk of concentrated, bio-accumulated contaminants because so much plant matter has to be processed to get any CBD. ††† On July 7, 2014, the FDA issued this tepid statement in an email to Project CBD: “FDA is aware that there are products that are sold on the Internet, marketed as available in all 50 states, and labeled as ‘hemp oil’ and as containing cannabidiol (CBD). The Agency is also aware that there is a growing public interest in CBD oils to treat childhood epilepsy, among other diseases. It is important, however, for patients and their caregivers to understand that these products have not been approved by the FDA, and those who choose to purchase these cannabidiol products cannot be assured by the FDA that they are safe or effective. We encourage patients and their caregivers interested in experimental treatments [to] gain access to these drugs through a clinical trial or through an expanded access IND that has been submitted to FDA and has been allowed to proceed.” At the very least, the sketchy saga of Medical Marijuana Inc. underscores the importance of implementing sensible regulations for therapeutic cannabis—let’s ditch the hemp pretense—in accordance with standards that apply to other medicinal herbs. All cannabis oil products should be lab tested for contaminants and labeled accurately for content. If tainted products are discovered, they should be recalled without delay. And should it come to pass that regulations are implemented to protect against corporate abuse while encouraging grassroots innovators who make high quality CBD-rich products, then perhaps something positive might emerge from this sordid affair. Author: Aaron Miguel Cantú Published & Copyright: October 14, 2014 Martin Lee of Project CBD Please visit Project CBD for more information Hemp Hustlers Article at Project CBD Endnotes 1 Kannaway Buzz Launch Event Hangout with Kannaway Leaders Billy Funk, Ray Dietrich, CTO   Christopher Hussey, CEO Jeff Rogers, Troy Nihart, and Eric Ventling. YouTube. Published on March 4, 2014. Accessed on October 10, 2014. 2 Kannaway to Unveil New CBD-Rich Hemp Oil Product. Kannaway website. Published on May 21, 2014. Accessed on October 10, 2014. 3 Interview with Brittany Warrior by Aaron Cantú. May 15, 2014. 4 Real Scientific Hemp Oil. HempMeds website. Accessed on October 10, 2014. 5 CannaVest Corp. Clarifies Relationships With General Hemp and Kannaway. Press release. Globe Newswire. March 6, 2014. 6 KannaLife Sciences, Inc. and Kannaway, LLC Sign Long Term Sales, Marketing and Product Development Agreement. Press release. KannaLife website. Published on March 31, 2014. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 7 Email from Kannaway distributor to Fred Gardner. Received on April 2, 2014. 8 Email from Kannaway distributor, [email protected], to Aaron Cantú. Received on April 1, 2014. 9 Bacca, Angela. Kannaway Prepares to Launch High-CBD Hemp Products MLM Marketing Campaign. Cannabis Now website. Published on March 4, 2014. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 10 May I use Kannaway, KWay, or Kanna as part of my own personal branding? Kannaway website FAQ. Published on April 18, 2014. Accessed on October 10, 2014. 11 Kannaway Compensation Plan. Kannaway website. Accessed on October 10, 2014. 12 Ibid. 13 The Bottom Line About Multilevel Marketing Plans and Pyramid Schemes. Federal Trade Commission, Bureau of Consumer Protection and Division of Consumer and Business Education. October 2009. 14 CannaVest Corp. Clarifies Relationships With General Hemp and Kannaway. Press release. Globe Newswire. March 6, 2014. 15 Vardi, Nathan. Inside the Penny Stock Bubble. Forbes magazine. March 26, 2014. 16 CannaVest Corp. Clarifies Relationships With General Hemp and Kannaway. Press release. Globe Newswire. March 6, 2014. 17 Douglas, Brett. The Golden Gate Smuggling Company: A San Francisco Marijuana Empire. eBook. October 20, 2011. 18 Securities and Exchange Commission v. Blackout Media Corporation and Sandy Winick. United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, Civil Action No. 09 CV 5454 (GBD). June 12, 2009. 19 Yew, Madhavi Acharya-Tom. Penny stock fraud: Alleged mastermind Sandy Winick once lived the high life in Toronto. The Star. August 15, 2013. 20 OTC filing for Berkshire. OTC Bulletin Board. Accessed on October 10, 2014. 21 Club Vivanet, Inc. Information and Disclosure Statement. United States Securities and Exchange Commission. December 31, 2008. See also Medical Marijuana Inc. Information and Disclosure Statement. United States Securities and Exchange Commission. June 30, 2009. 22 Medical Marijuana, Inc., Formerly Club Vivanet (PINKSHEETS: CVIV), Today Announced That It Is the First Public Company. Reuters. March 31, 2009. 23 Club Vivanet, Inc. Information and Disclosure Statement. United States Securities and Exchange Commission. June 30, 2008. 24 Smuggler Bruce Perlowin / Marijuana Inc. CNBC. January 12, 2009. 25 Medical Marijuana Inc. Information and Disclosure Statement. United States Securities and Exchange Commission. June 30, 2014. 26 Ibid. 27 Medical Marijuana Inc. Appoints New President and Reduces. Bloomberg. February 3, 2010. 28 Interview with Robert Griffin. March 26, 2014. 29 Medical Marijuana Inc. Information and Disclosure Statement. United States Securities and Exchange Commission. June 30, 2009. 30 Interview with Julia Black. April 1, 2014. 31 Campbell, Greg. Will the King of Pot Go Up in Smoke? Salon. March 8, 2010. 32 Ibid. 33 Ibid. 34 The Hemp Network website. Accessed June 30, 2014. 35 Wheeler, Matt. Bruce Perlowin—Creating 1000 millionaire women with quantum economics. Examiner. February 7, 2011. 36 Medical Marijuana Inc. Information and Disclosure Statement. United States Securities and Exchange Commission. June 30, 2011. 37 Medical Marijuana Inc. Information and Disclosure Statement. United States Securities and Exchange Commission. June 30, 2011. 38 North American Companies, Michael Llamas.wmv. You Tube. Published December 9, 2009. Accessed October 10, 2014. 39 Roseville Wealth Adviser Lee Loomis Arrested for Fraud Schemes; Six Others Charged in the 50-Count Indictment Unsealed Today. Press release. US Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of California. September 14, 2012. 40 US vs. Lee Loomis Indictment, case no. 2:12-CR-315 41 Medical Marijuana Inc. Announces that Interim President and CEO, Michael Llamas, is Taking a Leave of Absence from the Company. Press release. Medical Marijuana Inc. website. Published September 17, 2012. Accessed October 11, 2014. 42 Long, Josh. Hemp, Marijuana Execs’ Pasts Raise Concerns in Investor Community. Natural Products Insider. July 23, 2014. 43 Medical Marijuana Inc. announces its wholly owned subsidiary wellness managed services signs an additional management contract increases annual-revenue. Press release. Medical Marijuana Inc. website. Published April 24, 2012. Accessed October 10, 2014. 44 Medical Marijuana Inc. Announces 4th Quarter 2011 Results. Press release. Medical Marijuana Inc. website. Published February 2, 2012. Accessed October 10, 2014. 45 Eassa, Ashraf. Medical Marijuana: It’s Just a Pump and Dump. Seeking Alpha. Accessed on February 18, 2013. 46 Major Worldwide Announcement to Create Waves Throughout Europe. Press release. Medical Marijuana Inc. website. Published on June 10, 2013. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 47 CannaBANK Transfers First Asset to Medical Marijuana, Inc. Press release. Medical Marijuana Inc. website. March 29, 2014. 48 Brochstein, Alan. How Management Misled Investors When It Gained Control Of Medical Marijuana, Inc. Seeking Alpha. April 29, 2013. 49 Interview with Robert McVay by Aaron Cantú. May 2014. 50 Medical Marijuana Inc. Announces that Interim President and CEO, Michael Llamas, is Taking a Leave of Absence from the Company. Press release. Medical Marijuana Inc. website. September 17, 2012. 51 Dixie Holdings LLC vs Medical Marijuana, Inc. Case no. 37-2013-000513302-CU-BC-CTL. July 18, 2013. Medical Marijuana Inc. owned 60% of Red Dice. 52 SupplySide West 2014 expo list of speakers. Supply Side West website. Accessed October 11, 2014. 53 CannaVest 2013 Annual Report. United States Securities and Exchange Commission. 54 CannaVest Corp profile. OTC Markets website. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 55 Ibid. 56 Medical Marijuana, Inc. Announces Sale of PhytoSPHERE Assets and Acquisition of CannaVEST Corp. Stock. Press release. Medical Marijuana Inc. website. Published March 1, 2013. Accessed on October 10, 2014.  57 Eassa, Ashraf. Medical Marijuana’s Journey To $0: CannaVEST Payment Was Worthless. Seeking Alpha. May 8, 2014. 58 CannaVest 2013 Annual Report. United States Securities and Exchange Commission. 59 Email from Michael J. Mona, III to Aaron Cantú. Received on June 30, 2014. 60 Vardi, Natha. Inside the Penny Stock Bubble. Forbes magazine. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 61 Interview with Alan Brochstein by Aaron Cantú. 62 Willard, Cody. Growlife still halted; marijuana penny stocks still doomed. Marketwatch. April 4, 2014. 63 CannaVest Schedule 13D, Amendment No. 2 to SC 13D, United States Securities and Exchange Commission. November 20, 2013. 64 CannaVest 5 year stock price chart. OTC Markets website. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 65 Medical Marijuana, Inc. Announces Sale of PhytoSPHERE Assets and Acquisition of CannaVEST Corp. Stock. Press release. Medical Marijuana Inc. website. Published March 1. 2013. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 66 Medical Marijuana Inc.’s Fourth Quarter Update: Less than It Appears. Seeking Alpha. January 27, 2014.   67 Medical Marijuana Inc. 5 year stock price chart. OTC Markets website. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 68 Email from Michael J. Mona, III to Aaron Cantú. Received on June 30, 2014. 69 INVESTOR ALERT: Class Action Lawsuit Against CannaVEST Corp. Announced by Law Offices of Howard G. Smith. Bloomberg. May 6, 2014. 70 Email from Michael J. Mona, III to Aaron Cantú. Received on June 30, 2014. 71 Lee, Martin A. A Review of Dixie Elixir’s CBD Products. O’Shaughnessy’s. Spring 2013. 72 Baca, Richard. Edibles’ THC claims versus lab tests reveal big discrepancies. Denver Post, March 9, 2014. 73 Dokoupil, Tony. Will Pot Barons Cash In on Legalization? The Daily Beast. October 22, 2012. 74 Dixie Holdings LLC vs Medical Marijuana, Inc. Case no. 37-2013-000513302-CU-BC-CTL. July 18, 2013. 75 Dixie Holdings and Medical Marijuana Inc., Agree to Amicable Resolution of Red Dice Holdings Partnership. Press release. Medical Marijuana Inc. April 30, 2014. 76 Posted by Tamar Wise on Facebook. November 20, 2013. Since removed. 77 Interview with Chris Boucher by Aaron Cantú. April 1, 2014. 78 Harnessing the Hemp Industry: Q&A With Chris Boucher of CannaVest. Marijuana Business Daily. August 4, 2014. 79 Email from Chris Boucher to Aaron Cantú. Received on May 29, 2014. 80 Email blast from “The CBD Guy.” Received on February 3, 2014. 81 CBD + Kratom Capsules. CBD Gum. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 82 Email blast from “The CBD Guy.” Received on June 1, 2014. 83 Email from Lisa Kabuska to Fred Gardner. Received on July 29, 2013. 84 Hemp Industries Association; All-One-God-Faith, Inc., dba Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soaps; Atlas Corporation; Nature’s Path Food USA Inc.; Hemp Oil Canada, Inc.; Hempzels, Inc.; Kenex LTD.; Tierra Madre, LLC; Ruth’s Hemp Foods, Inc.; Organic Consumers Association v. Drug Enforcement Administration. United   States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. No. 03-71366. February 6, 2004. 85 CannLabs test results for Brittany Warrior. April 29, 2014. (See appendix.) 86 Lab report from Werc Shop. March 25, 2014. (See appendix.) 87 PhytaLab test results, RSHO Gold, August 8, 2014. (See appendix.) 88 Medical Marijuana Inc. Announces First Quarter 2014 Shareholders Report: Product Sales Increase More Than 100% Quarter Over Quarter; Company Posts Significant Increase in Revenues From HempMedsPX; Recaps Company Growth for the First Quarter of 2014. Press release. Medical Marijuana Inc. website. Published July 8, 2014. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 89 KannaLife Sciences, Inc. and Kannaway, LLC Sign Long Term Sales, Marketing and Product Development Agreement. Press release. KannaLife website. Published on March 31. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 90 KannaLife Sciences Announces $1.5M Series A Financing From Medical Marijuana Inc. (OTC:MJNA) And CannaVest Corp. (OTC:FCLS). Press release. Medical Marijuana Inc. website. Published on March 7, 2013. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 91 Maier, Thomas. Businesses bring in lobbyists in push for legalization—and big profits. Newsday. August 27, 2014. 92 Khalaf, Roula. Boca Raton, here we come (investigation into penny stock firm Stratton Oakmont Inc.) Forbes. June 7, 1993. 93 Xechem International, Inc. and Xechem, Inc. Files Chapter 11. Bloomberg. November 10, 2008. 94 Walker, Brian. PHOT, FMBV – Pump And Dump Alerts – 6/27/12. Penny Stock Research. June 27, 2012. 95 Email from Renate Miles to Aaron Cantú. Received on April 11, 2014. 96 Email from Renate Miles to Aaron Cantú. Received on June 4, 2014.  97 Interview with Jason Cranford by Martin A. Lee. June 1, 2014. 98 Medical Marijuana Inc.’s HempMeds Makes Global News Headlines and Report Issued by Top Laboratory. Press release. Medical Marijuana Inc. website. Published on June 12, 2014. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 99 Email from Brandon Krenzler to Martin A. Lee. Received August 5, 2014. 100 Interview with Brandon Krenzler by Martin A. Lee. June 9, 2014. 101 Ibid. 102 Emails from Dr. Noel Palmer to Martin A. Lee. Received on August 25, 2014 and August 29, 2014. See Appendix C for PhytaTech results. 103 Laboratory Safety Fact Sheet #15 Chlorinated Solvents. EH&S Laboratory Safety Specialist. See also Apple pledges to cut down on use of toxic chemicals (Manning, Craig). Daily Digest News. August 15, 2014. 104 CBD Product Headspace Study: R&D Analysis for potential contamination responsible for AERs. Flora Research Laboratories. October 2, 2014. 105 Interview with Jahan Marcu by Martin A. Lee. October 4, 2014. 106 CBD Product Headspace Study: R&D Analysis for potential contamination responsible for AERs. Flora Research Laboratories. October 2, 2014. 107 Photo Release—Medical Marijuana Inc.’s HempMedsPX Launches DON’T MOVE Awareness Campaign; Campaign Focuses on Cannabidiol (CBD)-Rich Hemp Oil and Its Availability Nationwide, Eliminating the Need to Relocate to Colorado or Legalized Medical Marijuana States for Access. Press release. Medical Marijuana Inc. website. Published April 1, 2014. Accessed October 11, 2014. 108 Medical Marijuana Inc.’s HempMeds Title Sponsor of National Cannabis Industry Association Denver Conference; Organization Advocates on Behalf of Fair Policy and Treatment of Cannabis Businesses Nationwide. Press release. Medical Marijuana Inc. website. Published on April 15, 2014. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 109 Invest in medical marijuana penny pot stocks and weed out scams. HempMeds website. Accessed on October 11, 2014. 110 Email from Jennifer Yarbrough to Project CBD. Received on June 3, 2014. 111 Interview with Joshua Hartsel by Martin A. Lee. July 1, 2014. 112 Ibid. 113 Email from Chris Boucher to Aaron Cantú. Received on June 25, 2014. 114 Michael Mona III. Remarks during CannaVest Laboratories site visit. July 15, 2014. 115 Chris Boucher. Remarks during CannaVest Laboratories site visit. July 15, 2014. 116 Ibid. 117 Joshua Hartsel. Remarks during CannaVest Laboratories site visit. July 15, 2014. 118 Email from John McPartland to Martin A. Lee. Received on August 9, 2014. 119 Chris Boucher. Remarks during CannaVest Laboratories site visit. July 15, 2014.  120 Michael Mona Jr. Remarks during CannaVest Laboratories site visit. July 15, 2014. 121 House, Douglas W. CannaVEST sells KannaLife. Seeking Alpha. June 20, 2014. 122 CannaVest Makes Big Non-Cash Profit and Terminates HempMedsPX. Seeking Alpha, August 18, 2014.   123 CannaVest Corporation v. Kannaway LLC, General Hemp LLC, HDDC Holdings LLC. California Southern District Court. September 9, 2014. 420 Magazine would like to thank Martin Lee, Aaron Cantu and Project CBD for bringing attention to this matter, we are truly grateful. http://goo.gl/mdvLVq

According to the Tucson Weekly, Arizona Rep. Ethan Orr is looking at Colorado’s recent marijuana venture and the taxes, licenses, and fees that have brought the state more than $7 million so far. As reported by the Arizona Republic, the Arizona revenue projections released last Tuesday to the legislature’s Finance Advisory Committee predict that the state will end this budget year with a $520 million deficit and possibly up to a $1 billion deficit in the coming fiscal year of 2016. Ethan Orr “Given the massive budget shortfall we’re facing, we need to look at revenue and I think this is a logical place we need to look,” Orr said. “I think it’s time to have an intelligent conversation about it (legalization).” Orr also said that lawmakers should consider his proposal before supporters in the effort to make marijuana legal take their measure before voters in 2016. Mason Tvert, director of communications at the Marijuana Policy Project, commends Rep. Orr for demonstrating leadership on the issue. “While we are not yet familiar with the details of Rep. Orr’s bill, we would likely support any well-written proposal to regulate and tax marijuana similarly to alcohol,” Tvert stated. http://goo.gl/Akgcal

In California, an initiative designed to increase the caps on medical malpractice awards is catching the attention not only of powerful legal and medical interests, but also drug reformers. That's because, in what opponents call a cynical ploy, the malpractice initiative leads with a provision to impose drug testing on doctors. [image:1 align:left caption:true]Proposition 46, whose controversial ballot title is "Drug and Alcohol Testing of Doctors, Medical Negligence Lawsuits. Initiative Statute," would, if passed, make California the first state in the nation to impose drug testing on doctors. According to a Ballotpedia summary, it would: * Increase the state's cap on non-economic damages that can be assessed in medical negligence lawsuits to over $1 million, from the current cap of $250,000. * Require drug and alcohol testing of doctors and reporting of positive tests to the California Medical Board. * Require the California Medical Board to suspend doctors pending investigation of positive tests and take disciplinary action if the doctor was found impaired while on duty. * Require health care practitioners to report any doctor suspected of drug or alcohol impairment or medical negligence. * Require health care practitioners to consult the state prescription drug history database before prescribing certain controlled substances. The fight over Prop 46 is shaping up to be the most expensive initiative campaign ever, with rival groups having already raised nearly $70 million. The vast majority of that funding is coming from opponents of the initiative, primarily the very well-heeled state medical community. The No on 46 campaign committee alone has raised nearly $57 million to kill it. The stakes are huge. Portrayed by supporters -- mainly trial lawyers -- as a boon to patients harmed by medical misconduct and hamstrung by state laws limiting malpractice awards, state analysts estimate that it could cost state health care programs "tens of millions to several hundred million dollars annually," while a legion of hospitals, health clinics, medical practices, and other health care professionals warn that Prop 46 would drive up health care costs across the board while primarily benefiting the bottom line of malpractice lawyers. Law firms and attorneys' groups are the biggest backers of Prop 46, but they aren't the only ones. The advocacy group Consumer Watchdog is also backing it to the tune of more than $2 million, and has laid out some arguments in favor of it. "According to a study published in the Journal of Patient Safety, medical negligence is the third leading cause of death in the country behind only heart disease and cancer. As many as 440,000 people die each year from preventable medical negligence. That's like a 747 crashing every 10 hours," the group said in a March flyer. "The California Medical Board estimates that almost one-in-five doctors (18%) suffer from drug and/or alcohol abuse at some point during their careers -- and leading medical safety experts have called for random drug testing to curb substance abuse and ensure patient safety." In that same flyer, Consumer Watchdog also warned that "doctors are the biggest suppliers for chronic prescription drug abusers" and that "drug prescribed by doctors caused or contributed to nearly half of recent prescription drug overdose deaths in California." But such scary claims beg the question of who else would be expected to supply prescription drugs. [image:2 align:right]While lawyers and some consumer advocates are lining up to support Prop 46, it is also generating a huge and powerful group of opponents, including hundreds of medical groups, health care providers, hospitals, insurance companies, and clinics and private practices worried about rising malpractice insurance costs. It is also opposed by dozens of county medical associations, the state Chamber of Commerce and many local affiliates, along with more than a dozen labor unions. The strange bedfellow opposition extends even further, with the state Republican Party, the state American Civil Liberties Union (and its local affiliates), and the California NAACP all among groups coming out against Prop 46. Also among its foes are most of the major newspapers in the state, which have thoroughly condemned it. "If doctors are drug-addled, other doctors and nurses have a duty to report them," the Sacramento Bee editorialized. "If doctors make horrible mistakes during surgery, there might be cause for testing. But Proposition 46 would impose the insulting requirement of random testing on all doctors who have hospital privileges, and require that the Medical Board of California discipline any doctors whose tests are dirty. In its propaganda, Consumer Watchdog jokes about privacy concerns in a lowest-common-denominator video showing that other professionals must provide urine samples. Simply because laws allow for testing of some workers doesn't mean physicians' privacy should be trampled." The conservative San Diego Tribune was similarly irked by the use of doctor drug testing as a come-on designed to induce voters to favor the initiative, calling it "a pathetic scam" in the title of its editorial. "Plainly, the doctor drug-testing provision is 'the ultimate sweetener' designed to make this foul brew go down better. It wasn't a critic who used that term," the newspaper noted. "It was Jamie Court, president of Consumer Watchdog, in an interview with The Los Angeles Times. Such an openly cynical attempt to manipulate voters shouldn't be rewarded. Vote no on Proposition 46." The drug testing provision has also provoked opposition from the state's largest marijuana consumer organization, CA NORML, and the Drug Policy Forum of California, which urged supporters to vote no on Prop 46 in its 2014 Election Guide. [image:3 align:left caption:true]"Drug testing is about marijuana," explained CA NORML head Dale Gieringer. "More than half the drug test positives out there are marijuana. This initiative deceitfully claims to be about alcohol and prescription drug abuse by doctors, but drug testing is almost useless with alcohol -- unless you're actually drunk at the time, I suppose -- and if you closely read the text of the initiative, you see that prescription drugs are perfectly excusable as long as the doctor has a prescription. So, there's a medical excuse for the prescription drugs mentioned in the ads, but not for medical marijuana, since the initiative only allows exemptions for prescribed controlled substances." The drug testing regime proposed by the initiative is antiquated, too, Gieringer said. "This thing is using urinalysis drug testing standards promulgated by the feds a generation ago," he pointed out. "The list of illegal drugs includes PCP -- yeah, that's a major problem, all those docs on PCP -- but doesn't include the new synthetics. And the list specifically includes marijuana metabolites, but not THC. That's because they're relying on urinalysis, which can't detect active THC, so only the inactive metabolite is being considered under this insidious proposition." In other words, the drug tests wouldn't catch doctors with alcohol problems unless they were literally drinking on the job, would excuse the presence of prescription drugs if the doctor had a prescription, and wouldn't find doctors who were actually high on pot, but would find those who had used the substance days or weeks earlier. But it sounded good in focus groups. "As we know, the drug testing provision was an afterthought," Gieringer said. "This is being done by trial lawyers, and the basic purpose is to heighten the limits on malpractice liability. But those focus groups showed everybody liked the idea of drug testing doctors." The drug testing provision may indeed have been a sweetener designed to improve Prop 46's chances at the polls next month. But the well-funded and broad-based opposition campaign is taking its toll. Although it polled well in a June Field poll, coming in with 58% support, support has declined since then. An August Field poll saw support plummet, with only 34% in favor, 37% opposed, and 29% undecided. But it isn't over until it's over. The number of undecideds less than a month out is big enough to swing the results either way. The airwaves across California are already filled with Prop 46 campaign ads. We can only expect them to increase in the next few weeks as the deep-pocketed contenders throw everything they've got at the voters in the final days of campaigning. http://goo.gl/QHDVnF

Missouri marijuana activists are keeping things hopping, Connecticut patients want actual buds, the Washington Post continues its asset forfeiture series, the Labor Department issues proposed rules for unemployment compensation drug testing, and more. [image:1 align:right caption:true]Marijuana Policy Show-Me Cannabis Activist Sues Missouri Narcs for Violating Sunshine Law. Aaron Malin, a member of the Missouri marijuana reform group Show-Me Cannabis, has filed suit against the Missouri Narcotics Officers Association for failing to hand over documents and information about budgets and training the group provides to narcotics officers. The lawsuit could clarify the question of whether the association is subject to the state’s Sunshine Law. Malin argues that because much of the group’s funding comes from dues and training paid for by members of taxpayer-funded drug task forces, making it a quasi-governmental entity and subject to the law. Columbia, Maryland, Cultivation Decriminalization Advances. The city’s Disabilities Commission voted unanimously last week to endorse an ordinance that would decriminalize the cultivation of up to two pot plants. People caught growing two plants would face only a $250 fine; seriously ill people would face no fine. The city council had asked various commissions to weigh in; the Board of Health and the Substance Abuse Advisory Commission came down against the proposal. The council will take it up at a meeting next Monday. Medical Marijuana Connecticut Patients Want Whole Buds, Not Ground-Up Whole Plant. State medical marijuana regulations require that the plant be ground up, and that’s not sitting well with some patients and activists. Homogenizing the plant results in "the degradation of the cannabinoids, the actual essential oils that are in the floor," explained Peter Mould, executive director of Connecticut NORML, who has posted a petition at change.org (search for "medical marijuana CT") asking state regulators to allow the sale of whole buds. Asset Forfeiture Seized Cash Fuels Law Enforcement Spending. The Washington Post continues to hammer away at asset forfeiture. This latest in an on-going series of articles examines what law enforcement agencies are buying with the hundreds of millions of dollars they have seized under federal asset forfeiture laws. The Post examined 43,000 annual reports from police agencies under the Justice Department's Equitable Sharing program. While some of the spending is justifiable, the Post also found seized funds paying for luxury vehicles, travel expenses, and even a clown named Sparkles. It's a long and worthwhile read. Drug Testing Labor Department Issues Proposed Rule for Unemployment Compensation Drug Testing; Limits It to Job Categories Where Drug Testing is Required. The department is responding to the Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act of 2012, which has a provision allowing states to drug test people seeking unemployment compensation. "We propose that an applicant may be drug tested by the State in order to be eligible to receive State UC if the applicant's only suitable work, as defined under the State UC law, is in a position or class of positions, i.e., an 'occupation,' for which Federal law or that State's law requires employee drug testing in that occupation," the department proposed. Harm Reduction Michigan Governor Signs Overdose Prevention Law. Gov. Rick Snyder (R) today signed into law a bill that requires emergency medical responders to be trained to administer the opioid overdose reversal drug naloxone (Narcan). The legislation, House Bill 5407, is part of a package of bills dealing with the issue. Snyder signed them all.   Pregnancy Two More Alabama Counties Start Charging Pregnant Women Who Test Positive for Illegal Drugs.  Calhoun and Cleburne counties now join Etowah County in seeking to prosecute pregnant women who use drugs, saying the move is designed to deter them from using drugs. That's even though there is a strong consensus among the medical community that criminalizing pregnant women hooked on drugs is not good for either mother or child, because the threat of arrest may deter them from seeking adequate prenatal health care International Medical Marijuana Momentum in Australia. The government of the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) announced today that it will join in a national clinical trial on medical marijuana. It will join in trials being conducted by the New South Wales government. Nearly two-thirds of Australians support medical marijuana, according to a July poll, and both the national and various state governments are becoming more receptive.  http://goo.gl/vKGbE4

According to 9news.com, marijuana product manufacturers in Colorado are making an effort to accommodate inexperienced adult marijuana consumers. Several companies have begun offering edible products with very small dosages of THC in order to allow people who have low tolerance or little experience with the substance to be able to use it without the potential for becoming overly impaired. This move comes following the launch of MPP’s “Consume Responsibly” campaign, which urges caution when consuming marijuana edibles and other products in order to avoid an unpleasant experience. The paradigm shift in the marijuana industry is comparable to the alcohol industry’s selling of beer and wine alongside higher content alcoholic options like spirits or liqueurs. The new low potency edible options include a low-dose marijuana-infused soda — Dixie One — that is 15 times weaker than the Dixie Elixirs company’s best-known soda. There are also light-dose “Rookie Cookies” for people who are not experienced in eating medical-grade marijuana. “For a long time, the medical market was a race to the strongest edibles. Now it’s a new market, and people want something that won’t get them so inebriated they’re not functional,” said Holden Sproul of the Growing Kitchen, which makes the “Rookie Cookie” and is phasing out some if its stronger offerings. http://goo.gl/akDRUc

The legalization initiatives in DC and Oregon pick up endorsements, Colorado legal pot sales keep on increasing, a Vermont poll has a plurality for legalization, drug use among pregnant women is in the news, Mexico busts another cartel leader, and more. Let's get to it: [image:1 align:left caption:true]Marijuana Policy Gary Johnson Group Endorses DC Legalization Initiative. The Our America Initiative, a non-partisan group headed by former Republican New Mexico and Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson, has endorsed the Measure 71 marijuana possession and cultivation legalization initiative. The Our America Initiative includes ending marijuana prohibition in its list of national projects, along with ending warrantless NSA spying, abolishing the IRS, and requiring presidential debates to include all viable candidates. Oregon Social Workers Endorse Legalization Initiative. The Oregon chapter of the National Association of Social Workers (NASW) has endorsed the Measure 91 legalization initiative. "We conclude that the measure's approach to marijuana use as a public health issue is more consistent with the social work profession's mandate, than Oregon's current treatment of non-medical marijuana use," the group said in a statement. Click on the title link for more. Vermont Poll Finds Narrow Plurality of Voters Favoring Legalization. A WCAX TV poll found that 49% of respondents support marijuana legalization, with 43% opposed. The issue has polled better in previous polls, but those were polls of the general population—not voters. Support is strongest among youthful respondents at 59%, but that is the age group least likely to vote. Colorado Legal Pot Sales Up 10% in August. The state Department of Revenue reported Thursday that marijuana retailers sold $33 million in recreational weed last month, up 10% over the previous month. So far this year, marijuana sales (recreational and medical) have generated $45.2 in tax revenues. Drug Testing Ohio Bill Would Make College Athletes Take Mandatory Drug Tests. A bill filed Wednesday, House Bill 633, would make Ohio the first state in the nation to require mandatory, suspicionless drug testing of student athletes at public colleges and universities. The bill would require all athletes to be drug tested during an annual physical and before any championship games. Colleges and universities would also have to adopt policies to punish athletes caught using substances banned by the NCAA, including marijuana, but not alcohol. Rep. Peter Beck (R-Macon) said he doesn't believe there is a drug problem among college athletes, but he wants any using drugs to be found and placed in drug treatment. The state legislative session ends in December. Pregnancy Call for Justice Department to Renounce the Criminalization of Pregnancy. Some 48 reproductive justice, drug reform, women's rights, and civil liberties groups led by National Advocates for Pregnant Women have sent a letter to the Justice Department calling on Attorney General Holder to move away from policies that enhance criminal sentences for crimes committed while pregnant. The letter was inspired by the case of Tennessee woman Lucy Weld, who pleaded guilty to conspiracy to manufacture meth and was hit with an additional six years in prison because she was pregnant when she committed the offense. The federal prosecutor in the case, US Attorney William Killian, used the case to "send a message" that he would seek sentencing enhancements in similar cases. Growing Calls for Drug Testing of Pregnant Women. Faced with a growing number of infants born exposed to drugs while still in the womb, medical and other groups are increasingly calling for universal drug screening and/or drug testing of pregnant women. The American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials are calling for verbal drug screening followed by a drug test if necessary and agreed upon. The American Medical Association also endorses universal screening. But pregnant rights advocates argue that screening for drug use is more likely to lead to punishment or loss of custody rather than drug treatment. "Instead, what we see over and over again is that screening is used as a tool for reporting mothers to child welfare services and police enforcement," said Kylee Sunderlin of National Advocates for Pregnant Women. "So even if the screening is universal, the reporting is not, which means that low-income women and women of color will continue to be vastly overrepresented in punitive child welfare interventions and, in some states, arrests." Click the link for more details. International Mexico Nabs Another Cartel Capo. Mexican federal police Thursday arrested Vicente Carrillo Fuentes, reputed head of the Juarez cartel, in a "routine traffic stop" in Torreon. Carillo Fuentes is the brother of Amado Carillo Fuentes, who picked up the sobriquet "Lord of the Skies" for using jet liners to fly drug loads from South America to Mexico before his death in a botched cosmetic surgery operation in 1997. Vicente Carillo Fuentes is just the latest cartel leader busted or killed during the Pena Nieto presidency. Hector Beltran Leyva was captured just last week; Sinaloa cartel head Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman was captured in February, Zetas leader Miguel Angel Trevino was captured in July 2013, and Gulf cartel head Jorge Eduardo Costilla was caught in September 2012.  http://goo.gl/k19ErC

According to a University of North Florida press release, a new statewide poll reveals that 67 percent of likely voters responded that they would vote “yes” for Amendment 2, which would allow the medical use of marijuana for individuals with debilitating illnesses or diseases, if recommended by a licensed physician. However, as reported by the Jacksonville Business Journal, Floridians are not yet ready to fully end marijuana prohibition. Although they are more open to allowing the use of medical marijuana, they are more or less opposed to allowing the recreational use of the substance. The poll demonstrates that the percentage of likely voters who are against allowing adults in Florida to legally possess small amounts of marijuana for recreational use is at 53 percent. Below are the full results: Amendment 2 on the statewide ballot in November is called “Use of Marijuana for Certain Medical Conditions.” This amendment allows the medical use of marijuana for individuals with debilitating diseases as determined by a licensed Florida physician. If the election were held today, would you vote yes or no for this proposition? Likely Voters N=  427 Yes 67% No 28% DK 5%   Do you support or oppose allowing adults in Florida to legally possess small amounts of marijuana for recreational use? Likely Voters N=  423 Support 44% Oppose 53% DK 3% http://goo.gl/p9ZnCU

Polls continue to split on the Alaska initiative, Illinoisans are lining up for medical marijuana, four Northeastern states unite to fight heroin, Canada's largest addiction center calls for marijuana legalization, and more. Let's get to it: [image:1 align:right caption:true]Marijuana Policy Polls Split on Alaska Initiative. The fate of Alaska's Measure 2 legalization initiative remains up in the air. Polls this week commissioned by the opposing sides had differing results. A Dittman Research poll sponsored by the "Big Marijuana, Big Mistake, Vote No on 2" campaign has the measure losing 44% to 53%. But the Alaska Survey poll, in which the Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol paid for a marijuana policy question to be asked, had the initiative winning 57% to 39%. Both polls claimed a +/- 4% margin of error, but even so, both of them can't be right. The split in polls has been evident throughout the campaign. Stay tuned Medical Marijuana More Than 6,000 Illinoisans Have Applied for Medical Marijuana Cards. The Department of Health reported Wednesday that some 6,300 state residents have applied for permission to use medical marijuana, with cancer, fibromyalgia, multiple sclerosis, and spinal cord injuries being the most common health conditions mentioned. But the department also noted that the vast majority of applications were incomplete; only 800 have submitted complete applications, which include a doctor certification form and background check information. People whose applications are incomplete will be notified and then will have 21 days to complete them. Guam Election Commission Seeks to End Legal Challenge to Medical Marijuana Initiative Vote. The commission has asked the US District Court on the island territory to dismiss the petition for a writ blocking the vote filed by local attorney Howard Trapp. Trapp has argued that the legislature cannot send an initiative to the voters, but the Election Commission and the Guam Supreme Court have already rejected his claim. Drug Policy Drug Czar Claims Pot Legalization Undermines Fight Against Opiates. In a speech yesterday in Maine, acting head of the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP—the drug czar's office) Michael Botticelli argued that the trend toward marijuana legalization is making the fight against more serious drug problems, such as the abuse of prescription opioids, more difficult. He said that early use of marijuana increases the likelihood that users will develop dependency on other drugs. "It’s hard to say at one level that we want to think about prescription drug abuse and heroin abuse without looking at how to prevent kids from starting to use other substances from an early age," he said. Heroin Four Northeastern States Create Anti-Heroin Task Force. Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania officials Wednesday announced the formation of the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic Heroin Task Force (NEMA-HTF) in "an unprecedented law-enforcement collaboration to combat the growing problem of heroin distribution and abuse in communities throughout the region." Attorneys General from the four states will work together to try to repress the heroin trade. "For too long, drug organizations have tried to outmaneuver law-enforcement agencies by crossing state lines. This task force will ensure that our borders do not become our boundaries," said New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman. "By joining together, we can prevent defendants from using state borders as a shield from law-enforcement and allow us to shut down the pipelines and cut off the heroin supply." Why Are We Freaking Out About Heroin? Wonkblog Asks. The Washington Post's Wonkblog has an insightful piece about the level of heroin use in the country and the public policy response it has engendered. The piece notes that "hardly anyone uses heroin" and is full of crunchy numbers and thoughtful commentary. "Overall, it's important for the public - and particularly the media - to keep some perspective when it comes to the numbers on heroin," the piece concludes. "It doesn't make a lot of sense to speak of 'epidemics' when use rates continue to hover somewhere between 0.1 and 0.5% of the total population. And kneejerk legislating will only make the problem worse." Click on the link for the full piece. Psychedelics New York City Conference on Psychedelics This Weekend. The eighth annual Horizons: Perspectives on Psychedelics conference will be held at Judson Memorial Church and The New School in Greenwich Village on October 11 and 12. Horizons focuses on contemporary research into the applications of psychedelics, providing an invaluable forum for experts to share ideas, insights, and to rethink the future of these drugs in science, medicine, culture, and history. This year, professors, researchers, writers and practitioners from the United States, England and Switzerland will be presenting findings and insights in the fields of neuroscience, terminal anxiety disorder, depression, hard drugs addiction, sexual orientation and identity, and more. Click on the links for more information. International Canada's Largest Addiction Center Calls for Marijuana Legalization. In a report issued today, Canada's largest addiction center calls for marijuana legalization with a strict regulatory approach. The recommendation is based in harm reduction principles. The Center for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) in Toronto made the call for legalization in its report CAMH's Cannabis Policy Framework. It comes after an in-depth analysis of the health, social, and legal implications of marijuana use, as well as an examination of comparative marijuana policy, by CAMH scientists and policy experts. "Canada's current system of cannabis control is failing to prevent or reduce the harms associated with cannabis use," said Dr. Jürgen Rehm, Director of the Social and Epidemiological Research Department at CAMH. "Based on a thorough review of the evidence, we believe that legalization combined with strict regulation of cannabis is the most effective means of reducing the harms associated with its use." Myanmar Moving Toward Reducing Drug Penalties. Deputy Minister for Home Affairs Brigadier General Kyaw Kyaw Tun has told members of parliament that the government is preparing to review sentences for drug use, which currently range from five to 15 years in prison. "Officials from the Central Committee for Drug Abuse Control, the Union Attorney-General’s Office and the Union Supreme Court are drawing up an amendment law," the deputy minister said. Since 2012, the Myanmar government has been moving to shift  http://goo.gl/0sTZoD