Michigan Senator Rick Jones' bill passed the Senate on Tuesday that will restrict the use of medical marijuana by proscribing it in all public venues, and allows a property owner to prohibit any otherwise legal use of marijuana on his property.  If the bill passes the House, then Michigan's Medical Marijuana Act, passed via voter initiative back in 2008, will be amended by the restrictions.

A close reading of the original act shows that smoking pot has been prohibited in public places all along. Jones' bill clarifies the term "public" by expanding the definition to include private property that is open to the public, i.e. like a restaurant, store or amusement park.

The more onerous restriction, however, comes in the form of granting landlords the power to prohibit medical marijuana use when the restriction is written into the lease.  In discussing his bill with the media last month, Senator Jones described complaints he received from constituents whose rental properties were ruined by pot-growing tenants.

Seeing the handwriting on the wall of the senate chamber, the pro-pot caucus proposed tie-barring Jones' bill to a bill languishing in the House that would legalize edible marijuana [think pot brownies]; something that was recently outlawed by the Michigan Court of Appeals as being outside the scope of the MMA.

The plenary Senate wasn't having it, and Jones' bill passed with the "super-majority" needed to amend voter-initiated legislation like the MMA.  This bill could get legs in the House and become law by this summer.

So here is a shout-out to all you medical marijuana patients out there: if you are going to medicate, then you may need to own your home.  Otherwise, you may have no where to go to [legally] smoke your pot.

We here at the Law Blogger do not see too many tears being shed over these restrictions.  But we would expect that, should this bill become law, it will sustain marijuana's criminalization enough to keep the criminal defense bar happy for some time to come.

www.clarkstonlegal.com
info@clarkstonlegal.com

Earlier this week, a bill was submitted to the plenary Michigan Senate by the Judiciary Committee that would require a state-wide registry for medical marijuana patients and care providers.  Senator Rick Jones, a sponsor of the proposed legislation and chairman of the judiciary committee said the registry would be a "critical tool" for law enforcement.

 The mechanics of the proposed law would require the DCH to submit a registrant's name and address to the state police within 48-hours of issuing the marijuana registration card.  The police would then be able to call-up the data, for example, during routine traffic stops.

Of course, the compassion care industry is up in arms, viewing the bill as a significant affront to a registrant's privacy.  An earlier version of the bill called for the submission of a wider scope of personal information about a registrant.

Oddly, the ACLU has come around on this bill, opposing the earlier version as overly intrusive, but conceding that a state-wide registry could prevent potentially dangerous raids where lots of feathers get ruffled.  Still, the ACLU's official position is that the bill, even as amended, needs a separate "probable cause" requirement prior accessing the database.  Unworkable, in our humble opinion.

Senator Jones' committee was busy this week, also introducing another medical marijuana related bill; this one to stop those pesky lawsuits filed by high profile lawyers against municipalities over their pot ordinances.

http://www.clarkstonlegal.com/

info@clarkstonlegal.com