NEWS: Long Beach judge recuses himself from medical marijuana case before sentencing

LONG BEACH -- A local judge recused himself from a medical marijuana case at the 11th hour Wednesday, admitting he made a serious error when he sent a complimentary letter to the prosecutor prior to sentencing.

Long Beach Superior Court Judge Charles Sheldon voluntarily removed himself from the case of Joe Grumbine and Joe Byron, the owners and operators of a trio of medical marijuana collectives who were convicted of illegal drug sales last month.

In a stunning revelation that drew exclamations from many in the courtroom, Sheldon admitted he sent a "complimentary letter" to Deputy District Attorney Jodi Castano before the matter was finished.


"I don't know what I was thinking," Sheldon said, adding that he meant what he said in the missive, which was dated Jan. 5, but it was inappropriate to send while the case was still active.

His recusal drew raucous applause, cheers and shouts from a courtroom brimming with about 50 medical marijuana advocates who have rallied inside and outside the Long Beach courthouse throughout Grumbine and Byron's trial.

Defense Attorney Christopher Glew said outside court that the letter congratulated the prosecutor on a job well done and showed the judge's clear bias in case.

"I've never seen anything like it," Glew said. "But it was obvious from the start that Judge Sheldon was biased ... he said from the very beginning there are no legal sales of marijuana of any kind."

Grumbine and Byron were convicted Dec. 21 -- on 13 felony counts including illegal sales of narcotics, grand theft, and filing false tax returns -- following a roughly three week trial.

Supporters of the defendants insist the charges are nothing more than an attack by zealous police and prosecutors in violation of the state's medical marijuana law and have accused authorities of fabricating evidence.

Castano insisted in her opening statements to the jury the case was about two men using the sick and infirm as a shield for illegal drug deals.

"This case is not about whether people have the right to medical marijuana," Castano told the jury at the start of the trial last month. "This case is about two wolves in sheeps' clothing. It's about two men who were out to line their pockets ... with millions of dollars."

Grumbine and Byron were arrested in December of 2009 after police raided the three locations, two in Long Beach and one in Garden Grove.

The legal wrangling began long before the trial, with numerous motions heard as both sides sought to block some witnesses and evidence.

The district attorney and defendants' attorneys disagreed from the start over whether a medical marijuana defense could be presented. Initially, Sheldon ruled no such a defense would be allowed, said supporter Cheri Sicard.

Glew and co-defense Attorney Allison Margolin challenged Sheldon's ruling in a higher court and was awarded a judgement that required the lower court to allow the medical marijuana defense, Sicard said.

Nonetheless, police and prosecutors insisted the defendants used the collectives as profit-driven drug dealing operations run like stores with frequent flier cards, specials and discounts offered inside the businesses.

The defendants, Castano said, tried to hide the businesses by using fictitious business names. She also said the accused stole electricity from neighboring businesses to hide the large amount of power needed to grow the plants.

Bills were paid by money order to eliminate paper trials, the prosecutor noted. The defendants, she said, under-reported their sales tax for two years, pocketing more than $2 million.

Though Sheldon has recused himself from the case, the convictions still stand. However Glew and Margolin said they are preparing motions for a new trial, which will be heard in a new court, by Judge Joan Comparet-Cassani, on April 3.

The motions will include arguments that Sheldon's bias denied their clients a chance at a fair trial and will also cite juror misconduct, Glew said, referring to one jurors revelation post conviction that the group used the Internet to look up the definition of marijuana collectives even though they were instructed by the court that they could not use any outside source of information while deliberating the case.

Even the appointment of the new judge looked as though it was going to be a tough fight Wednesday morning, as Glew and Margolin told Long Beach Superior Court Supervising Judge James Otto they opposed the case being transferred to Comparet-Cassani.

Moments later, however, they withdrew their challenge of the venue.

Outside the courtroom, Glew explained that though he is concerned about Comparet-Cassani's strict ruling record the only other options left at the Long Beach Court would prove even more unfavorable to the defense's case.

"We don't have a lot of options for a fair trial in Long Beach," Glew said.

Source: Press-Telegram

NEWS: Joe Byron and Joe Grumbine Trial: It's a Kangaroo Courtroom

There's a reason why the marijuana-selling trial of Joe Byron and Joe Grumbine, the former owners of a pair of Long Beach cannabis collectives, is unfolding in Long Beach Superior Court's Department K. The letter, as Judge Judith Meyer (who last month referred the case to Judge Charles Sheldon) once drew laughs for explaining, stands for that lovable bouncy rodent from Down Under: the kangaroo.

As jokes go, it's not that funny, though: As the first week in Byron and Grumbine's trial in Sheldon's courtroom draws to a close today, it's becoming rapidly clear the robe-wearing octogenarian isn't exactly worried about appearing overwhelmingly biased against the two defendants.

First of all, Sheldon denied the two Joes their right to mention medical marijuana in their defense. This prevented their attorneys from sending subpoenas to witnesses who could testify they were following state law, which, in California, allows patients to smoke marijuana for medical reasons and to establish collectives to grow the plants. But thanks to a ruling last week by the California Court of Appeal, Sheldon was left with no choice but to allow such witnesses to testify.

On Monday, when confronted with this ruling, however, Sheldon refused a follow-up motion by the defense to delay the trial for a week so defense lawyers Alison Margolin and Christopher Glew could get ahold of those previously off-limits witnesses. No dice, ruled Sheldon, who insisted the trial start right away. It's been all downhill from there. According to court observers and the blog of the activist group The Human Solution, Sheldon has ruled against almost every defense objection, including ones in which prosecution witnesses were rambling onstage without answering any pending question, in which cases Sheldon simply instructs prosecutors to pose a question so that the witness can keep going.

Today, Sheldon went so far as to order a screen erected between the jury and the audience to prevent jurors (some of whom observers have already been noticed rolling their eyes at Sheldon) from seeing audience members, most of whom support the two defendants.

Supporters have been protesting the trial for weeks now, gathering every morning at 8 on the courthouse steps. The protests--and the trial itself--are scheduled to resume Monday morning.

Source: OC Weekly

NEWS: Rights of All Medical Marijuana Patients at Risk in Long Beach Case

In what will soon become one of the closest-watched court cases in medical cannabis history, Long Beach Superior Court sets the stage for a series of ongoing protests that highlight an injustice to all medical marijuana patients, providers, and advocates.

As medical marijuana patients poured out of the courtroom, another group pounded the pavement, as protests errupted for a second straight week as The People of the State of California VS. Joe Byron and Joe Grumbine unfolds.

The People vs. Joe, one of whom is a Long Beach business owner, the other an Executive Director of the non-profit group The Human Solution, is Los Angeles County’s DA Steve Cooley’s Flagship Case in his efforts to silence the two community leaders with his premise that “All Sales Are Illegal.”

Unfortunately, it’s working on Judge Charles Sheldon (who has a record of sentencing 3-strikes cases to the fullest, even on non-violent cases), as prosecutors got their way today in their motion to suppress the same rights the will of the people voted awarded people like Byron and Grumbine fifteen years ago.

“The law is clear, but Judge Sheldon, citing no reasons, is not allowing the defendents to exericise their rights to an Affirmative Defense, which the voters have clearly voted on,” reiterates Allison Margolin, one of the attorneys for one of the Joes.

This could be bad news for patients and dispensaries, providers and caregivers, and anyone who believes in the fundamental right to choose from the form of medicine, natural or synthetic, a patient finds to be most effective.

Kamala Harris inched her way to victory over Cooley largely due to the efficacy of the Americans for Safe Access ‘Not Cooley’ campaign in last year’s California Attorney General’s race because of this very issue.

The same population that could’ve turned Prop 19, which would’ve made California the first state to create regulations for marijuana use by adults, from a loss to a victory but did not, are the same group of people that didn’t want Steve Cooley making his “ALL Sales Are Illegal” perspective a state-wide stance.

Now that Cooley has set his sights on a target closer to the Los Angeles DA’s radar, the ‘Cooley’s Not Cool’ hat is back, as Joe and Joe both lost their right to their Affirmative Defense as medical marijuana patients directing a collective.

Most Federal medical marijuana cases do not allow patient’s rights to be shown to the jury, and this form of information censorship and manipulation tactics is being replicated in Cooley’s current case against the two men who had dotted all I’s and crossed all T’s while providing medical marijuana to qualified medical cannabis patients.

Even the rules they were following will not be allowed to be introduced to the Jury, once the trial begins. Long Beach’s current Congressman is even a Co-sponsor of the Truth in Trials Act, to ensure that the truth be a part of a blind Justice System.

While our Congressman, who recently endorsed the “Regulate Marijuana Like Wine” Initiative, to be a Co-sponsor on a bill that ensures transparency in medical cannabis cases, are we to assume that there is a clear need for such transparancy?

We don’t have to assume any longer, now that the lies to build the laws are being dismantled one by one, as right-leaning groups like the RAND Corporation are even publishing studies to prove than medical cannabis dispensaries make areas more safe because crime goes down, not up, like our ‘leaders’ would like us to believe.

Even elected officials in Long Beach, like Councilmembers DeLong, O’Donnell, and Schipske, who were buying the lie and perpetuating it tenfold, throwing the entire permitting process back several steps (as if their process wasn’t already flawed enough).

It’s not that Justice in Blind, however, it’s that for the prosecution to win this case, they need the Jury to be.

Unfortunately for the lead prosecutor in the case, Jodi Castano, who has admitted to not fully understanding the Endogenous Cannabinoid Signaling System (eCBss), which regulates the human body systems that keep us all alive, and doesn’t want the Jury to understand it either.

In fact, she is quoted as saying, “I’ve never even heard of it,” underscoring a larger problem.

Unless local Long Beach residents have been living under a rock these past few years, the jury pool will fully understand that this is a medical marijuana case, and they may follow Montana residents, where Jury Nullification has come up, and where Missoula couldn’t even seat a jury.

If they understand science and have access to a smart-phone or computer, and if they live in Long Beach, they most likely understand marijuana IS a medicine also, even if they know even less than Castano about the eCBss, who is prosecuting a case that is the clearest representation of wasteful spending as California reaches a second recession and resources become more scarce.

Many innocent people every day are victims of violent crimes, and many of those crimes go unsolved. Perhaps our law enforcement and court systems could be less controlled by politics, which is the driving force behind the perpetually-flawed perspective the war-mongering in the War on Drugs provides.

Long Beach is even in the process of providing permits for the same thing Joe Byron and Joe Grumbine are being accused of doing.

Twelve charges of sales occurred by undercover officers and informants who obtained legal medical cannabis recommendation by physicians, and then went into the medical marijuana dispensary to get the medicine their doctors deemed worthy of introduction to their own body’s marijuana system it makes.

Sounds like normal medical cannabis dispensing center (MCDC) protocol: a qualified patient comes in, gets what they were unable to grow for themselves, and pay for it.

As a matter of fact, it sounds like America to me too. Not that a California MCDC can earn a profit, but I do notice that health care delivery in America is for profit.

Health care insurance is for profit, the medicine is for profit, health care delivery is for profit (which is why 50 millions Americans don’t even have it), and even marijuana in a pill, Marinol, is FOR PROFIT!

Joe Byron and Joe Grumbine were operating a MCDC, and for those that found it too difficult to even go to a safe access point like their dispensary, they would set up and teach patients how to grow their own.

The whole plant is also much more effective than a synthetic, isolated, pathetic attempt to replicate the safe and natural substance in the first place. So natural in fact, we make it ourselves naturally.

One such natural body chemical, called Anandamide, Sanskrit for ‘Bliss’, is like Delta-9 THC, which is the psychoactive property. It only becomes psychoactive when THCA is heated up and turns into Delta 9.

Our body also has receptors that link with the cannabis plant’s properties that bind to each other like a key in a lock, many keys and many locks really, as our body’s cannabis system is responsible for maintaining homeostasis and regulating every other body system we have.

So it’s rather important that elected officials and appointed persons understand what they are trying to regulate, let alone restrict, which is what will happen if Cooley’s case is made by manipulation, omission, and censorship.

If Castano is forced to finish fighting Cooley’s War, more than one Braggart Soldier will ride away, taking marijuana prohibition with them, going quietly into their watermark, swept away by mandate.

Source: MedicalMarijuana411.com

NEWS: Citizens Outraged Over Wasteful Long Beach Trial

LONG BEACH, CA – Hundreds of medical marijuana advocates and activists from throughout Southern California will be holding a rally outside Long Beach Superior Courthouse on September 15th to protest the city’s wasting millions of tax payer dollars investigating, raiding, and prosecuting legal medical marijuana collectives while vital public services are being cut.

That is the day when Judge Charles Sheldon will decide which witnesses, if any, will be eligible to testify for the defense in the trial of Joe Grumbine and Joe Byron, the former operators of two legal medical cannabis collectives in Long Beach and Garden Grove. The city claims the collectives were operating outside of the law, yet ironically a Riverside County judge found Grumbine in complete compliance with California’s medical marijuana laws just 5 weeks before the city of Long Beach sent 120 armed SWAT officers, drug sniffing dogs, and helicopters to raid 17 locations. The December 2009 raid started the men on an entire new prosecution ordeal that’s been dragging on nearly 2 years.

Citizens have presented the Long Beach City Council with numerous FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) requests on the exact amount spent on what they consider to be a frivolous and unnecessary investigation and prosecution at a time when the city is cutting services and California has been ordered to reduce its prison population due to overcrowding. The requests have gone ignored and no actual figures have come from Long Beach officials, but activists estimate the amount to be upwards of 5 million dollars.

“I recently attended a town hall meeting with Long Beach council woman Rae Gabelich where citizens were complaining about their local police station annex being understaffed,” says Long Beach resident Madeleine Johnson. “Yet the city found it wise to send helicopters, dogs, and 120 SWAT officers after a man who had already been found to be following the law? It just doesn’t make any sense.”

Johnson was one of about 80 concerned citizens who filled the courtroom and hallways of Long Beach Superior Court during Byron and Grumbine’s August 16’th pre-trial hearing. At least 3 times that number is expected for their September 15th Jury Selection. Supporters from as far south as San Diego and as far north as San Luis Obispo have pledged to attend the rally.

“People all over the state are fed up with law enforcement and our elected officials ignoring the medical marijuana laws meant to protect patients and wasting enormous tax dollars in the process,” says Grumbine.

Local chapters of numerous organizations including The Human Solution (a non profit organization founded by Grumbine), Americans for Safe Access (ASA), the National Organization for Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML), Marijuana Anti Prohibition Project (MAPP), the Landa Prison Outreach Program (LPOP), and Long Beach’s Committee of Patients (COP) are currently planning how to best show their outrage at the system and support for the two men caught in the crosshairs of California’s deeply flawed justice system concerning medical marijuana.

Those wishing to join the rallies, participate in court support, or donate to Joe Grumbine and Joe Byron’s legal defense funds can do so at The Human Solution’s website (www.the-human-solution.org) or phone 951-436-6312 for additional details.

NEWS: Joe Grumbine Talks About a Natural Stress Reliever Through Cannabis

Joe Grumbine, founder of The Human Solution, lives with his family at Willow Creek Springs where he has a rather large garden of healing herbs, including cannabis.

Joe has been helping others heal with plant-based medicines far longer than the general public has understood the healing benefits of one of his most popular plants: cannabis.

A natural stress reliever, cannabis was used in his tinctures years ago when he first discovered an ancient recipe and saw how the liquid was a unique delivery method for those who needed the plant but didn’t know any other way to get it other than by smoking it.

Source: MedicalMarijuana411.com