What Is ‘Usable’ Medical Marijuana?

The Associated Press released an article that talked about the case of Josh Brewer from Rogue River, Oregon. Josh Brewer was arrested after cops searched his house and found fully dried and drying medical marijuana. Josh Brewer is an Oregon medical marijuana patient who had a garden with his cousin who is also a medical marijuana patient. In total, the cops found 42 ounces of dried marijuana, 12 plants, and 43 ounces of drying marijuana. According to Oregon law, two patients can posses up to 48 ounces at a property, but the law refers to usable marijuana.

One thing that I’d like to address is the comment in the AP article talking about ‘After all, even 1.5 pounds by one measure would equal 1,200 joints.’ You can always tell when an article is written by someone who has little to no clue about marijuana. Why would they put it into joints other than to try to alarm readers by the magnitude of the amount. However, what size of joints are we talking about? Pinners, pregos, jumbos? That’s a very subjective claim that quite frankly is meaningless. I really wish the AP would stop doing things like that but I won’t hold my breath.

Originally Brewer filed a motion to dismiss the case, however, the motion was denied. Josh Brewer served 60 days in jail in addition to probation. Last week, upon reviewing the appeal, the Oregon Attorney General’s Office decided to not pursue the case because Oregon case law states that drying marijuana is not ‘usable’ and and therefore can’t be counted in the final tally. “Without the hanging marijuana, there is no evidence that defendant possessed more than the lawful amount of ‘usable marijuana,'” said the state brief on Brewer’s appeal.

Another issue that I have with the AP article is the excerpt, “Research done for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency found that marijuana plants can yield 1 to 5 pounds dry weight, with the prized buds making up 18 percent and leaves 16 percent.” So a huge number range is thrown out, then percentages specify how much of the plant is usable, without stating what that actually works out to. Does that bother anyone else? Wouldn’t it have been easier, and more accurate, to say that plants yield between 2.88 ounces and 14.4 ounces?

I really hope that Josh Brewer gets restitution for his days in jail and all of this harassment. A cops’ job is to uphold the law, including case law. To say that they didn’t know about the relevant case law would prove incompetence if not negligence. It sounds like Josh Brewer is ready to stick it to the man though. “I hope these cops realize after this they can come and try and get me as much as they want, but the more they come, the more I’m going to fight,” Josh Brewer said.

A little fact – Ninjasmoker was actually arrested once upon a time for possessing over 25 pounds of marijuana. Some of it was usable, but most of it was just trimmings being transported for hash making. It brings up two points: 1) when is marijuana usable, and who decides that? Dried is such a subjective term, how could that ever possibly be measured 2) If a cop said that the non-dried marijuana was still going to be used for something other than smoking it, would that change the outcome? I’m just curious how many people out there are going to try to say the marijuana isn’t usable, just to get f’d in the end because the officer changes the ‘usable’ argument on it’s head…I guess only time will tell!