Medical Marijuana - Just Say Not Guilty

Dear Editor,



Robert Edward Forchion is a US Marine Corp. Veteran, Congressional Candidate, practicing Rastafarian, and a seriously-ill patient suffering from painful bone tumors. Mr. Forchion is originally from Burlington County, New Jersey but relocated to Los Angeles, California in 2008.



In Los Angeles, Mr. Forchion decided to fully dedicate his time to spirtual pursuits and opened a Rastafarian place of worship known as the Liberty Bell Temple with a medical marijuana ministry to aid the sick, that legally provided medical marijuana to patients (per doctor's recommendation) in full compliance with California law.



Everything was going fine for Mr. Forchion until he was back in New Jersey to visit family and was stopped by a trooper for an alleged traffic violation. Mr. Forchion was then found to be in possession of medical marijuana. Mr. Forchion supplied the trooper with proof of his status as a legal medical marijuana patient in California. However the trooper ignored the fact that Mr. Forchion is a seriously-ill, legally recognized medical marijuana patient and arrested him.



New Jersey legalized medical marijuana in Janurary of 2010, but the state government has repeatedly missed deadlines and has failed to move forward with the program. The end result is that while NJ is a medical marijuana state on paper, in actuality nothing has changed.



Mr. Forchion will be going on trial shortly at the Burlington County Court House in Mount Holly. Mr. Forchion is not wrong. The law is wrong. As a juror you cannot be punished for your verdict. If you're on his jury, no matter what the evidence is, do the moral thing and say “NOT GUILTY”.



Eric Hafner

North Hollywood, California