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Rick Reimer was a prominent criminal lawyer in Pembroke. Then he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. Mr. Reimer uses marijuana daily to cope with the effects of his illness and intends to use an impaired driving charge to scrutinize the law’s approach toward marijuana and its impacts on life. As Canada inches closer to softer marijuana laws, a retired Killaloe lawyer is asking the courts to rule on the murky issue of driving while under the influence of cannabis. Rick Reimer intends to use an impaired driving charge to scrutinize the wobbly approach of legislators toward the use of marijuana and its impacts on daily life. In a case that begins in a tiny courtroom tomorrow, he is both the… Read More

Since he was a teenager, David Hughes had his heart set on becoming a Chicago paramedic and was within days of graduating from the Fire Department’s academy when his long-held dream was blown apart by what he contends was a bagel. Make that a poppy-seed bagel, along with a Fire Department drug testing policy that Hughes and his lawyers contend are outmoded and unfair. Hughes has filed suit against the city in federal court seeking punitive and compensatory damages and reinstatement as a paramedic candidate. But he said he would be willing to forgo the money. “I don’t care about any of that stuff,” said Hughes, 30, who has wanted to work on a city ambulance since he was 18.… Read More

The jolly man in the red suit is a popular fixture at local shopping malls this time of the year. And chances are good that before Santa Claus hears one Christmas wish, he’s undergone a criminal background check and drug testing. “It’s just a sign of the times for all businesses that provide services to families and children,” said Barbara Sacco, vice president of marketing for Faison & Associates, which manages The Shops of Grand Avenue mall in downtown Milwaukee. Nancy Conley, marketing director at Mayfair Mall in Wauwatosa, said background checks and drug screening have become common place when hiring Santas. “Even the elves are finger-printed and drug-tested,” Conley said. Pre-employ.com specializes in background checks for job applicants. It… Read More

Colombia’s president proposed a new front in the global war on drugs: mass drug testing for Americans and Europeans. Reviving the traditional conflict between drug-producing and drug-consuming nations, President Alvaro Uribe said Friday the tests would dry up demand for drugs that Colombian insurgents sell to finance their decades-old civil war. “We need more serious commitments from the consumer countries,” Uribe said at a conference of Spanish and Latin American attorney generals. He called on “the people in the United States and Europe to submit to a drug test to help us conquer drugs.” Uribe singled out American and European executives to start the process. Colombia produces 90 percent of the world’s cocaine. Drug trafficking supports both the leftist rebels… Read More

Parents Who suspect their teenager is dabbling in drugs now have an alternative to snooping through drawers and closets looking for a hidden stash of dope. They can hire a drug-sniffing dog to do it for them. Hiring a drug-sniffing dog is a sign of desperate parenting, said Helen Jones, a spokeswoman for The Association of Parent Support Groups in Ontario. “In the long term it does nothing for the parent/child relationship and that’s really the only thing we have going for us,” she said. This entry was posted on Sunday, November 17th, 2002 at 12:00 am. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own… Read More

National shyster-in-chief (aka “drug czar”) John Walters has done it again. Walters’ “drugged driving” initiative calls for “zero tolerance” for driving under the influence. “It’s about public safety,” Walters claims. Not only is the initiative not about public safety. It’s not even about driving while drugged. Smoke marijuana on a Saturday night, for example. Drive on that Sunday. Guilty. For that matter, smoke a week before. Guilty. Neither situation has anything to do with driving under the influence—marijuana’s components simply remain in the bloodstream for awhile after it is used, days or weeks after the high disappears. But head drug propagandist Walters isn’t interested in that. He wants zero tolerance, for its own sake. Not only will Walters’ so-called “drugged… Read More

Although Americans expect that their employer’s health insurance will cover alcohol or drug addiction treatment, more than one in five insured employees believe that if they sought coverage for that treatment, they would face negative consequences at work. Fears range from being fired outright to losing a license or failing to get a promotion, according to the results of the September 2002 “Workplace Recovery Benefits Survey” released today by Minnesota-based Hazelden Foundation. Hazelden’s new survey also reveals that more than half of this country’s 74 million workers with job-sponsored health insurance would prefer to ask a boss about their company’s insurance coverage for treatment of a disease like diabetes, rather than face retribution or punishment for merely asking what kind… Read More

A three-judge panel of the Cincinnati-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit held unanimously that a Michigan law that would subject welfare recipients to random drug testing as a condition of receiving benefits is justified by the state’s interest in preventing drug-related child abuse and other crimes. “This decision opens doors that I don’t think the full 6th Circuit would be comfortable with,” said Graham Boyd, an American Civil Liberties Union lawyer who represents welfare recipients. “Its reasoning could be applied to all parents, welfare or not.” An appeal to the full membership of the 6th Circuit is likely. The 1996 federal welfare reform law authorized random drug testing by the states, but only Michigan adopted it, in… Read More

A federal appeals court Friday cleared the way for Michigan to test welfare recipients for drug use. U.S. District Court Judge Victoria Roberts halted a pilot drug-testing program in 1999 after a group of welfare recipients and the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan argued that the testing is unconstitutional. A three-judge panel of the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reversed Roberts’ decision Friday, saying the testing program is based on a legitimate need to ensure that public money is not used for illegal purposes. Robert Sedler, the attorney who sued the state Family Independence Agency on behalf of several welfare recipients, said he will appeal to the full court. “We are dealing here … with the suspicionless testing… Read More

Snacks can make people obese and high-wired. But get them fired? A U.S. Border Patrol agent dismissed from his job earlier this year after testing positive for drugs is blaming a San Diego-based manufacturer of hemp bars for his downfall. Michael Baranic, a San Diego attorney representing the fired agent, said his client’s troubles started last year after he ate Govinda’s Fitness Foods hemp bars just before a random drug test. The Border Patrol fired the agent in May based on the results of the test, which indicated the presence of psychoactive chemicals in his blood. “My client has never used (illegal) drugs,” said Baranic, adding that he would seek reinstatement, back pay and attorney’s fees for the former agent… Read More