It is legal to use medical marihuana, yet government actors continue to persecute those who have their meds in their car. Responding to the medical marihuana act (“MMMA”), government actors in Michigan enacted MCL §750.474(1) which states you can only transport your medical marihuana if it is in a case in your trunk. If your vehicle does not have a trunk, it must be in a case that is not readily accessible from the interior of your vehicle.
MCL §750.474(1) makes it a crime to have your meds inside your car and allows judges to punish you with up to 93 days in jail and a $500.00 fine. Also, you can be charged with one or more felonies, if you have prior drug convictions. This law not only violates your constitutional right to equal protection under the law, but it also leads to some very contradictory, and quite frankly, insane outcomes.
First, according to MCL §333.7214(e), marihuana used for treating medical conditions listed in the MMMA is a schedule 2 drug. MCL §750.474 treats differently patients who are prescribed medical marihuana from all other medical patients who are prescribed schedule 2 drugs. Other schedule 2 drugs include OxyContin, Hydrocodone-Acetaminophen, and a great many other opiates and medications. A person can safely drive around town with their opiates in their shirt pocket without fear of arrest and jail. The law treats you differently, simply because you are a medical patient who uses marihuana, rather than OxyContin and other schedule 2 drugs.
Second, according to the MMMA, §333.26423(d)(1) & (2), a person who is a caregiver can transport medical marihuana plants in their vehicle. This does not restrict the plants to a trunk. Your vehicle is considered an enclosed locked facility under the MMMA, when you are temporarily transporting medical marihuana plants, and no other person is in your vehicle with the plants. If you are a caregiver for 5 patients, plus yourself, and you are allowed 12 plants under the MMMA for each patient, and yourself, you can legally transport 72 medical marihuana plants in plain sight on the front seat of your vehicle.
Now you understand that you are able to legally drive down the road with your 72 marihuana plants in plain view, while having an OxyContin pill in your pocket. Yet, if you have a roach in your ashtray the law makes you a criminal. Worse, you could be convicted of a felony if you have a prior drug conviction.
The use of reason and logic dictates that if you can drive around town with 72 marihuana plants on your front seat while having an OxyContin in your possession and “medical use” allows you to transport your medical marihuana buds (see MCL §333.26423(f)), then a roach in the ashtray, or your 2.5 ounces in your car should not be crime.
Again, in general, government actors seek to violate your right to self-determination and to control your behavior to suit their own bigotry. In this case, it is bigotry against medical marihuana users. When the people of the State of Michigan asserted their right to self-determination as it pertains to medical marihuana, government actors quickly began a concerted effort to violate that right and destroy the voting process, by enacting and enforcing piecemeal legislation that contradicts the MMMA and violates your right to equal protection under the law. And in the words of one prosecuting attorney in Michigan, that’s ok, because medical marihuana patients choose to be singled out. Are you kidding me?!
This suggests that these efforts may be the result of these government actors using opiates themselves when they think up these laws. But it also suggests that it may be the result of a lust for power over the lives of others. And to paraphrase one of my favorite authors, power lust is a weed that grows in the barren wastelands of empty minds.
You must fight for your rights against those who lust to control you and violate your right to be free.
Next month I’ll address some of the legal issues of growing medical marihuana. Until then, keep rolling on.
Disclaimer: This is an informational article only. It is not to provide individual legal advice. If you need legal services, feel free to contact me at liberty13legaldefense.com, or any attorney of your choosing.
