Bob's Angry Rants

Ed Rosenthal has been convicted on three felony charges related to growing marijuana for distribution. As it happens, Mr. Rosenthal was acting as an agent of the City of Oakland for their medical marijuana program. All evidence related to medical marijuana or Proposition 215 (the California proposition that legalized medical marijuana in the state) was excluded from the trial. Now that the jurors have become aware of this information, some are recanting their verdict.

Jury foreman Charles Sackett III stated, "For the first time in my life, I find myself questioning the court system." But here's the thing. The system worked exactly the way it was supposed to. There was a reason that the judge had that evidence excluded, and the reactions of these jurors proves that he was right.

One of the other jurors said, "Had we been notified that Ed was deputized by the city of Oakland . . . there's no way we would have convicted him." A juror is supposed to judge a case based on the laws as they exist, not on the laws as they think they should be. Just because they think that medical marijuana should be legal and, in fact, the State of California thinks that medical marijuana should be legal, neither of those things actually makes it legal in a Federal Court.

I happen to think that Federal drug laws are ass backwards. Mandatory minimum sentencing in drug law cases often exceeds the minimum sentences for rape and kidnapping even for relatively minor players, like couriers. I think that the whole concept of the drug war is ridiculous. Just look at the ads during the Superbowl which linked marijuana to teen pregnancy, terrorism and all kinds of horrible consequences, but then portrayed alcohol as having absolutely no consequences. But despite all this, the fact remains that the laws are what they are and it is the court's job to see that they are adjudicated properly. The proper recourse here is not to piss and moan about the court system, which worked properly, but to try and change the laws which resulted in this conviction.