Medical marijuana seen at risk after Sessions’ move Prosecutors in pot-friendly states will decide on crackdown
SALEM, Ore. — When U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions green-lighted federal prosecutions of marijuana lawbreakers, the vast majority of U.S. states that allow some form of medical marijuana were unexpectedly placed at risk of a crackdown and are warily watching developments.
Forty-six states — including Sessions’ home state of Alabama — have legalized some form of medical marijuana in recent years, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Eight of those states also allow recreational marijuana.
Among the guidance that Sessions rescinded was the so-called Ogden Memorandum of 2009 that instructed federal prosecutors not to pursue cases against medical marijuana patients and distributors who complied with state laws.
“Previous nationwide guidance specific to marijuana enforcement is unnecessary and is rescinded, effective immediately,” Sessions told the U.S. attorneys based in all 50 states in a letter Thursday.
Georgia state Rep. Allen Peake, a Republican who sponsored a bill in his state’s legislature that legalized possession of medical marijuana in 2015, denounced the move.
“I’m very disappointed in Jeff Session’s actions,” Peake said Friday in a telephone interview. “He will be hurting the grandfather with Alzheimer’s, the soccer mom with breast cancer, the college student with Crohn’s disease, the young child with seizures — these are the people that will be impacted by this action by the attorney general.”
The only legal protection now for medical marijuana growers, processors, sellers and users is a temporary measure sponsored by Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.) and Rep. Earl Blumenauer ( D- Ore.) prohibiting the U.S. Department of Justice from using government funds to target them.
Rohrabacher, in a conference call with reporters and four other members of Congress, said Sessions’ move should galvanize national support for marijuana legalization.
“This is a wakeup call for American people who believe in freedom,” Rohrabacher said. “It will mobilize people throughout the country.”
Many politicians, including Republicans, have cast Session’s move as an infringement on states’ rights.
Only Idaho, South Dakota, Nebraska and Kansas do not allow any access to marijuana, said Karmen Hanson, a cannabis policy analyst with the National Conference of State Legislatures. Twentynine states — plus Washington, D.C. and the U.S. territories of Guam and Puerto Rico — allow for comprehensive public medical marijuana programs. An additional 17 states allow use of marijuana products for medical reasons in limited situations or as a legal defense, she said.
DENVER — Whether to crack down on marijuana in states where it is legal is a decision that will now rest with those states’ top federal prosecutors, many of whom are deeply rooted in their communities and may be reluctant to pursue cannabis businesses or their customers.
When he rescinded the Justice Department’s previous guidance on marijuana, Attorney General Jeff Sessions left the issue to a mix of prosecutors who were appointed by President Donald Trump’s administration and others who are holdovers from the Barack Obama years.
Legal experts do not expect a flood of new cases, and people familiar with the job of U.S. attorney say prosecutors could decide against using already limited resources to seek criminal charges against cannabis companies that abide by state regulations or their customers.
“There are higher priorities: terrorism and opiates to start with,” said Rory Little, a former prosecutor and a professor at the University of California Hastings College of Law. “You also have to draw the jury pool from the local people, who appear to generally support the state policy. You’re not going to waste your resources on cases you can’t win or cases your community is against.”
Until Sessions’ announcement on Thursday, federal prosecutors followed guidelines laid out in the socalled Cole memo, which was issued by the Justice Department during the Obama administration. The memo discouraged prosecutors from going after people participating in the marijuana trade in states where recreational marijuana is legal, except in cases with aggravating factors.
Sessions revoked that document and others, citing the fact that pot remains illegal under federal law.
Federal prosecutors are not elected, but they often have long histories working in their districts. They are surrounded by attorneys who have spent their careers arguing federal cases before judges who can make their displeasure with a U.S. attorney known in sentencing decisions and in the scheduling of cases. That environment will not change because of a memo from the attorney general, Little said.
But the change will undoubtedly create some confusion and an uneven landscape, said John Walsh, the former U.S. attorney for Colorado appointed by Obama who left the office in 2016.
SANDY SPRINGS — An FBI agent trying to arrest a man wanted in a gang investigation shot and wounded him after being dragged by the suspect’s vehicle, authorities said Friday.
The agent spotted a man at a hotel in the Atlanta suburb of Sandy Springs and attempted to take him into custody, said FBI spokesman Kevin Rowson.
Rowson said the man fled to a vehicle, and the agent went after him.
“The agent tried to stop the suspect from fleeing in the vehicle and somehow got caught up in the vehicle and got dragged by the suspect,” Rowson said. “At that point, the agent felt that his life was in danger so he shot the suspect and was dragged for another couple of blocks.”
Finally free from the vehicle, the agent called 911. Sandy Springs police arrested the man in the lobby of a hotel where the pursuit began, authorities said.
The suspect was taken to a hospital for surgery, and the agent suffered injuries including fractures that were not lifethreatening, Rowson said.
Authorities didn’t immediately release the name of the suspect or the FBI employee.
Officials said the man was the only person who hadn’t been arrested after an indictment in October that named dozens of alleged gang members and associates.