The Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office Drug Enforcement Unit had a record-breaking year in 2007 for marijuana seizures, according to an HCSO news release.
More than 355,000 marijuana plants were seized from both indoor and outdoor marijuana grow sites. This is the highest number in the county’s history, according to the release, and is up from the 2006 total of 104,606.
Of the total, 317,703 marijuana plants were seized from 238 outdoor marijuana grow sites. The street value of this marijuana at harvest would have been approximately $1 billion.
A total of 37,419 marijuana plants, with a street value of approximately $28 million dollars at harvest, were seized from 119 indoor marijuana grow sites.
Approximately 900 pounds of dried processed marijuana bud with a street value of about $2.7 million was seized. About 1,200 pounds of dry marijuana leaves were also seized. The street value would have been about $600,000.
Sixty-six arrests were made for charges relating to the cultivation and possession for sale of marijuana. An additional 67 arrest warrants were requested through the Humboldt County District Attorney’s Office.
The Drug Enforcement Unit served or was involved in the execution of 64 search warrants for the cultivation and possession for sale of marijuana.
Pursuant to the execution of the search warrants, approximately $280,000 was seized, as well as 73 firearms. More than $500,000 in assets was seized — including vehicles, generators and marijuana grow equipment.
In August, a 132,000-plant marijuana garden was located in northeastern Humboldt County. This was the largest outdoor marijuana garden ever found in the county, the release stated.
In December, Fortuna resident Cody Dobbs was convicted in federal court of cultivation and possession for sale of marijuana. He will not be sentenced until February, but is currently in custody and faces a minimum of 10 years in federal prison.
According to the release, these achievements would not have been possible without the assistance of allied law enforcement agencies — including the Humboldt County Drug Task Force, the United State Forest Service, the Federal Drug Enforcement Administration and many other local, state and federal agencies.
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LEGALIZE MARIJUANA NOW.
ALL ADULT USE ANS SALES OF MARIJUANA SHOULD BE LEGAL.
STOP THE FALL OF OUR COUNTRY INTO FASCISM.
JAIL BUSH,CHENEY,RUMSFELD,AND RICE AS WAR CRIMINALS.
THERE IS NO JUSTIFICATION FOR THE SEIZURE OF PROPERTY, OR THE ARREST AND JAILING OF MARIJUANA PRODUCERS OR USERS.
TIME TO TAKE BACK OUR COUNTRY FROM THE FASCIST DICTATORS THAT HAVE TAKEN IT OVER.IT MAY BE TIME FOR THE NEXT "BOSTON TEA PARTY". MAYBE ITS TIME FOR CALIFORNIA TO WITHDRAW FROM THE UNITED STATES AND BECOME THE "REPUBLIC OF CALIFORNIA"
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There'll be some "tightening the belt" this next year with the family cash crop gone.
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All CAMP is is a price support activity for the big-time organized crime growers. Come on folks. A deputy sheriff makes what, $50,000 a year tops? How much to look the other way? The war on drugs is a joke. The plant should be legal for personal cultivation and use. Don't tax it as that will just generate another government bureaucracy and more corruption. Just don't get caught driving high or be in a public safety job and smoke pot. Otherwise THC is far less a health hazard that the controlled drugs tobacco and alcohol. Government and defense attorneys have been living off the sins of these drugs for years. And they don't want that to change.
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Ah, another issue the Humboldt County Chamber of Commerce can advertise and can be proud of! Bring the family! Come one, come all! Fresh mountain air and plenty of pot!
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Ex stoner here.
The modern version of cannibisis is ten times more potent and ADDICTIVE than the stuff I was smoking 30 years ago. It rightfully should be classified as a narcotic, and you who defend it have capitulated to your addictions.
Keep it illegal and/or strictly regulated as a narcotic. You addicts who can't seem to function without (Eureka has the worst drivers in the state - I wonder why?)can keep getting your prescriptions filled, and businesses can keep drug testing you as they please.
Why should the govt. tax and justify the use of cannibis? It doesn't make sense to drag the level of American awareness down any further than it already is for a few drug dollars.
Feel free to disprove the negative aspects of the drug. While you're at it, be sure to note all the positive benefits. If you're honest and realisitc, guess which list will be much longer?
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cough cough propaganda cough cough
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Ex stoner here. I totally agree with you.
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All one has to do is look at one of the pot advocates. Would you hire one, even if they actually were looking for a real job?
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A record year for CAMP, yet it's never been easier for someone to score some pot, illicitly or through a legal 215 clinic.
Something that is grown so easily can never be controlled. Imagine if rose petals got one high? Law enforcement could have "record" years but would never come close to stopping it...just as with pot.
And for the record, alcohol and nicotine are FAR more addictive than pot will ever be. I'm guessing that "Ex Stoner" probably has had addiction problems with other substances, too.
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Ex stoner here.
Commenting that alcohol and nicotine are far more addictive than cannibus is not only untrue, it's a red herring. I am guessing you were probably stoned as you typed that.
No, I haven't had addiction problems, but I was lucky to quit smoking dope when I did. I could see my productivity dropping, my awareness of the world around me being dulled. Cannibus makes a user think they are experiencing something they are not, and in that is the danger for recreational users, IMHO. Smokers think they are functioning at a higher level than they actually are. If you want to get high, that's your problem, but I don't care to be working or even be around stoners any more. You're boring and unfocused, and I regret the years I wasted thinking I was someone I wasn't.
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Thats all well and good, but nothing will ever convince me that someone that grows smokes or sells marijuana should be in prison.
Nothing
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"Feel free to disprove the negative aspects of the drug. While you're at it, be sure to note all the positive benefits. If you're honest and realisitc, guess which list will be much longer?"
Learn to read big guy, every single study says that cannabis is virtually harmless. The list of benefits is so long i couldn't type it here.But all you need to do is google it and the READ.
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Hmmm... "every single study says that cannabis is virtually harmless". I find that very hard to believe. Just a simple google search finds numerous pro and con studies.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2005-06-07-pot-studies-side_x.htm
I'd point more at the serious lack of hard results from the "pro" studies. The major common denominator among the "pro" studies seems to be excuses to legalize it. Does it help or is it really a placebo? There has been a synthetic THC released called marinol but where are the "legalize pot" people about it? If it's just the THC effect then this should do the trick. If it's not the THC that people are after then why aren't they smoking hemp? Or is it really that people want the right to grow their own to smoke or the much more likely sell?
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http://www.medicalmarijuanaprocon.org/pop/studychart.htm
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Ex stoner here.
"Feel free to disprove the negative aspects of the drug. While you're at it, be sure to note all the positive benefits. If you're honest and realisitc, guess which list will be much longer?"
"Learn to read big guy, every single study says that cannabis is virtually harmless. The list of benefits is so long i couldn't type it here.But all you need to do is google it and the READ."
This is stonertalk. "Every single study"? Please. Try reading something other than "High Times" as your educational material.
Users have real issues with accountability. As long as it feels good and no one is dying, it must be cool, right? No problems, dude. Some of us, however, can see a bit more clearly, now that the smoke haze is gone.
Good luck with your life.
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Just so we are clear...science say that you can not prove a negative.....
"Feel free to disprove the negative aspects of the drug. While you're at it, be sure to note all the positive benefits. If you're honest and realisitc, guess which list will be much longer?"-Jan 8 2008, 12:13 AM
"The evidence is overwhelming that marijuana can relieve certain types of pain, nausea, vomiting and other symptoms caused by such illnesses as multiple sclerosis, cancer and AIDS -- or by the harsh drugs sometimes used to treat them. And it can do so with remarkable safety. Indeed, marijuana is less toxic than many of the drugs that physicians prescribe every day."
-- Joycelyn Elders, M.D.
Former U.S. Surgeon General
Editorial, Providence Journal
March 26, 2004
"The American Public Health Association:
1. Encourages research of the therapeutic properties of various cannabinoids and combinations of cannabinoids
2. Encourages research on alternative methods of administration to decrease the harmful effects related to smoking; and
3. Urges the Administration and Congress to move expeditiously to make cannabis available as a legal medicine where shown to be safe and effective and to immediately allow access to therapeutic cannabis through the Investigational New Drug Program."
-- American Public Health Association
Medical Marijuana Policy Statement
January, 1995
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cont.
"The evidence in this record [9-6-88 ruling] clearly shows that marijuana has been accepted as capable of relieving the distress of great numbers of very ill people, and doing so with safety under medical supervision. It would be unreasonable, arbitrary and capricious for DEA to continue to stand between those sufferers and the benefits of this substance in light of the evidence in this record."
-- Judge Francis L. Young
DEA Administrative Law Judge
Administrative ruling on Petition to Reschedule Marijuana
September, 1988
"[T]here is very little evidence that smoking marijuana as a means of taking it represents a significant health risk.
Although cannabis has been smoked widely in Western countries for more than four decades, there have been no reported cases of lung cancer or emphysema attributed to marijuana.
I suspect that a day's breathing in any city with poor air quality poses more of a threat than inhaling a day's dose -- which for many ailments is just a portion of a joint -- of marijuana."
-- Lester Grinspoon, M.D.
Emeritus Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School
"Puffing is the Best Medicine," Los Angeles Times
May 5, 2006
"Patients receiving cannabinoids [smoked marijuana and marijuana pills] had improved immune function compared with those receiving placebo. They also gained about 4 pounds more on average than those patients receiving placebo."
--Donald Abrams, M.D. , et al.
Article and Summary: "Short-Term Effects of Cannabinoids in Patients with HIV-1 Infection,"
Annals of Internal Medicine, Vol. 139
August 19, 2003
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cont.
"Consumer Reports believes that, for patients with advanced AIDS and terminal cancer, the apparent benefits some derive from smoking marijuana outweigh any substantiated or even suspected risks.
In the same spirit the FDA uses to hasten the approval of cancer drugs, federal laws should be relaxed in favor of states' rights to allow physicians to administer marijuana to their patients on a caring and compassionate basis."
-- Consumer Reports
Editorial
May, 1997
7. Marijuana vs. Marinol
"There are really no other medications that have the same mechanisms of action as marijuana. Dronabinol (Marinol) is available by prescription in capsules, but has the distinct disadvantage of containing only synthetic delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) which is only one of many therapeutically beneficial cannabinoids in the natural plant."
-- Gregory T. Carter, M.D.
Co-director, MDA/ALS Center,
University of Washington Medical Center
Muscular Dystrophy Association website article
October, 2003
"For some users, perhaps as many as 10 per cent, cannabis leads to psychological dependence, but there is scant evidence that it carries a risk of true addiction. Unlike cigarette smokers, most users do not take the drug on a daily basis, and usually abandon it in their twenties or thirties.
Unlike for nicotine, alcohol and hard drugs, there is no clearly defined withdrawal syndrome, the hallmark of true addiction, when use is stopped."
-- Colin Blakemore, Ph.D.
Chair, Dept. of Physiology, University of Oxford (U.K.), and
Leslie Iversen, Ph.D.
Professor of Pharmacology, Oxford University
editorial, The Times (U.K.)
August 6, 2001
"We've shown that the marijuana gateway effect is not the best explanation for the link between marijuana use and the use of harder drugs.
An alternative, simpler and more compelling explanation accounts for the pattern of drug use you see in this country, without resort to any gateway effects. While the gateway theory has enjoyed popular acceptance, scientists have always had their doubts. Our study shows that these doubts are justified.[...]
The people who are predisposed to use drugs and have the opportunity to use drugs are more likely than others to use both marijuana and harder drugs. Marijuana typically comes first because it is more available."
-- Andrew Morral, Ph.D.
Researcher, Rand Corporation
Press release discussing study
U.K. journal Addiction
December 2, 2002
"While it is not possible with existing data to determine conclusively that state medical marijuana laws caused the documented declines in adolescent marijuana use, the overwhelming downward trend strongly suggests that the effect of state medical marijuana laws on teen marijuana use has been either neutral or positive, discouraging youthful experimentation with the drug."
-- Mitch Earleywine, Ph.D. & Karen O’Keefe, Esq.
Report, "Marijuana Use by Young People:
The Impact of State Medical Marijuana Laws"
September, 2005
should i list more or is that enough for you....
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http://www.balancedpolitics.org/marijuana_legalization.htm
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Alcohol is legal. Cigarettes are legal. Over-the-counter and prescription drugs with many more side effects are legal.
How many deaths are caused by using marijuana?
How much money do we tax payers want to spend to erradicate the problem? Does anyone recall how useless Prohibition was?
Let's legalize it. Let's tax it like alcohol and cigarettes. Let's use that money to make local improvements (education, roads, etc.).
Let's face it. Too many folks have 215 cards, yet somehow they manage to sell the stuff, and make lots of money (undeclared). Do you know someone who doesn't seem to have a steady job, but seems to have a better lifestyle than you do (the person who works 40+ hours per week and pays taxes)?
Let's stop the insanity. Let's ask the question of "why are there so many more seizures?" Is it because the reward is greater than the risk?
P.S. Agree whole heartedly that local law enforcement turns a "blind eye" to the "problem," otherwise I am sure that there would be many more arrests. I am also sure that if they went after the "smaller" enterprises" now, they would deter the "larger" enterprises later.
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Ex stoner here
"should i list more or is that enough for you...."
I have no problem with people who are ill using cannibis instead of manufactured, synthesized drugs, if that is what would help their afflicition. That being said, I don't care to be around, especially in working conditions, the habitual users who inhabit much of society. I'm sure you believe you are functioning at 100%, but speaking for those of us who have to correct your errors and dodge your poorly-driven vehicles, you're not right. Sorry pard, but I'm not going to agree with you on this one, for I know better now. You see, I've actually grown up and past the need to get high. Life is great without being tuned up.
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Still not a fact to support what you are saying...kind of like Christianity.
"Let's face it. Too many folks have 215 cards, yet somehow they manage to sell the stuff, and make lots of money (undeclared). "
Until you pass medical school, do a resdency and an internship please do not try to act like physician.....leave that to teh well educated DOCTORS.
Thank you.
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http://www.peak.sfu.ca/the-peak/2005-3/issue9/ne-mj.html
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science: Study shows marijuana increases brain cell growth
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i agree the american people should have the right to grow any plant i have a garden of hot peppers in my back yard come and arrest me because these hot peppers can kill you if you eat to many
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