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Jaime Hagel knows drugs can ruin lives. She’s worked in the area of addictions for more than a decade and helped set up harm reduction programs in Saskatoon’s inner city.

She never knew Crohn’s disease would take her down a path that would result in police charging her with trafficking marijuana.

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“I am not a drug trafficker, nor I am a threat to this community,” Hagel said in an interview.

She was one of four people arrested during a police raid on the Saskatchewan Compassion Club last October. Last week, she pleaded not guilty to charges of trafficking.

Police and prosecutors say the medical marijuana dispensary was operating outside the legal framework for dispensing medical pot and the people there were breaking the law.

Because of the pending court case, Hagel would not go into detail about what she was doing at the club on the day of the raid.

She was, however, using medically prescribed marijuana to combat Crohn’s disease. Cannabis oils saved her life, she said.