Steve Kubby, 55, the 1998 Libertarian candidate for governor of California, was a leading force behind the passage of that year's referendum which legalized medical marijuana there.
But it was after voters approved Proposition 215 that California police broke into Kubby's Lake Tahoe home, busting him and his wife Michele for growing what they contended was "too much" marijuana.
(Kubby asked them not to frighten his young daughter by breaking into his home with guns drawn - saying he'd gladly show them his marijuana plants at any time. He tells me he sent this message to police by placing a note in his trash can. Police introduced the note at his trial.)
After Kubby explained why he needed to maintain more than 200 plants in various stages of growth at his Lake Tahoe home to successfully breed the strains which keep his adrenalin levels below toxic levels, his California jury in 2001 unanimously acquitted the Kubbys of any wrongdoing for their marijuana cultivation. They did, however, convict Kubby on a minor related charge after police found a dried-up hallucinogenic mushroom stem or cactus button (police were never sure which) in a drawer in a guest bedroom of the house.
Needless to say, rather than instructing the jurors of their irreversible power to decide that this law and its application were wacky, the trial judge told them they had no choice but to enforce the law.
An adrenal cancer survivor who has received medical advice that he could die if incarcerated as long as four days without his quasi-legal medication, Kubby has been living in Canada rather than submit to a court-ordered 120-day California jail sentence on the dried-up vegetable charge.
California Attorney General Bill Lockyer, whom Kubby describes as having been "made to look ridiculous" in a 1998 debate with the Libertarian candidate, seems to have taken on the Kubby case as a personal vendetta, labeling Kubby a "fugitive" and successfully intervening with the court to get Kubby's misdemeanor conviction upgraded to a felony, after the fact.
Canadian sources say it's Kubby's continuing high profile in the pot legalization movement -- founded the American Medical Marijuana Association; he and Michele host Canada's Vancouver-based Internet-based Pot-TV news -- that has led to pressure on Canadian authorities from "south of the border" to crack down on the Kubbys, after they invited press photographers to tour their home last year, resulting in the publication of photos of the medical marijuana they grow there.
On Dec. 20, Michele Kubby wrote me from Sechelt, British Columbia:
"The Kubby family could be forced by Immigration officials to leave Canada as early as Jan. 15.
"Initially we were optimistic that our appeal would be heard (and) we were not at any imminent danger. We even told reporters and friends not to worry about us. However, now that we've had a chance to obtain competent legal advice, we finally realize just how serious and precarious our plight has become.
"Although we have filed an appeal with the federal court of Canada, we've just learned that the judge has the right to refuse to hear the case. We are supposed to have the right to a full hearing before an independent board, but the Immigration Ministry has not yet created an Appeal Board and we are caught in the middle.
"We're very concerned that we will be forced to leave Canada without a fair hearing."
The Kubbys said they have been assured by immigration officials that before forcing them to return to the United States, they will have a risk-assessment evaluation. But Michele Kubby is not optimistic.
"Immigration has done everything they can to have us removed from Canada and we don't expect any favors in the risk-assessment process. Furthermore, (our attorney) John Conroy has advised us that this decision has painted us into a legal corner and there's not much he can do to help us.
"For the past five years, I've watched one judge after another refuse to protect my husband. I don't have much hope that this next judge will be any different. At this point, we can only hope that our plight will shock the conscience of Canadians and that somehow this terrible and unjust decision by the Refugee Board will get an honest and fair review.
"The continued abuse of 'due process' is wearing Steve down. How can these judges and government officials look at themselves in the mirror when my husband is suffering so? Why can't a judge simply say that Steve Kubby is a bona fide cancer patient and that he deserves to be left alone? It's like these officials are saying, 'Merry Christmas; now get out of our country.'
"We believe this recent decision by the Refugee Board is a fraud that cannot stand up to a proper judicial review. The evidence on our side is overwhelming. It was their doctor, not ours, who said Steve would die if deprived of medical marijuana for more than 48 hours. The Refugee Board even heard from a former U.S. prosecutor and sitting judge that it was not safe for Steve to return. And still they refuse to believe what was in front of their own eyes. Truly, none are so blind as those who refuse to see."
Michele Kubby says that those who wish to help can contribute online at: www.kubby.com/00-contribute.html.
Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the Review-Journal and author of the books "Send in the Waco Killers" and "The Ballad of Carl Drega." His Web site is www.privacyalert.us.
CN BC: Cannabis Campaigner May Be Forced To Go
Pubdate: Sun, 21 Dec 2003
Source: Edmonton Sun (CN AB)
Copyright: 2003, Canoe Limited Partnership.
Contact: letters@edm.sunpub.com
Website: http://www.fyiedmonton.com/htdocs/edmsun.shtml
Author: Ajay Bhardwaj
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/kubby.htm (Kubby, Steve)
CANNABIS CAMPAIGNER MAY BE FORCED TO GO
Pot activist Steve Kubby - who says he depends on marijuana to ward off a rare form of cancer - is now fighting to stay in Canada.
Kubby, 56, is under a departure order from Citizenship and Immigration Canada that would force him, wife Michele, and two daughters, out of the country as early as Jan. 15.
The Immigration and Refugee Board denied his application for refugee status.
Michele has filed an appeal, but there is no requirement for Federal Court to hear it.
"We're not going to pack up and leave voluntarily," a defiant Steve Kubby said yesterday from his home in Sechelt, B.C.
"We love Canada, we love our new Canadian friends. Please let us stay and let us become tax-paying Canadian citizens."
Kubby, who suffers from adrenal cancer, was in Edmonton last year for radiation treatment at the Cross Cancer Institute. But the treatment wasn't effective.
Kubby said cannabis is the only medication that helps his condition. He has a Health Canada medical exemption to grow and smoke pot.
"I'm going to do what I have to do to save my husband's life," said Michele.
If he's forced to set foot on American soil, Kubby said he'll be thrown in jail.
"They will not give me marijuana while I'm in jail," he said.
"It means in all probability I will suffer heart attacks, seizures and strokes until it kills me."
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Drug fugitive wins right to grow pot here
Jane Seyd
Special to The Province
Sunday, September 01, 2002
Kubby at home with wife, Michelle, and their two children, ages 6 and 2.
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Steve Kubby with Canadian permit allowing him to grow 59 marijuana plants at a time
A high-profile American fugitive facing drug charges in B.C. has been granted the right to smoke and grow huge quantities of marijuana -- for medical purposes.
The case is being described as a direct attack on America's anti-drug policy and a move that will trigger a flow of "pot refugees" from south of the border.
Steve Kubby, who fled with his family to the Sunshine Coast to avoid a jail term in California, is believed the first American to be granted a Health Canada exemption to the nation's drug laws.
"We're cleaning out our garage to start growing," said Kubby, 56, who lives on the Sunshine Coast, home to several U.S pot activists who have sought refuge there.
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"The Americans would do well to come up to Canada and see how the Canadians are doing this," Kubby said after receiving his exemption Thursday.
His lawyer, John Conroy, who has represented many high-profile pot activists in court, says he believes that Kubby is the first U.S. citizen to be granted one of the approximately 800 exemptions that have been issued by Health Canada since 1999.
"He's certainly the first one of the high-profile pot refugees," said Conroy.
Kubby's permit allows him to travel with up to 360 grams of pot within Canada and grow 59 plants at a time for medical use. It also allows him to store up to 2,655 grams of marijuana.
Both Kubby and his lawyer agree that's a lot of pot.
Kubby says he smokes up to 12 grams of marijuana a day to control symptoms of a rare form of adrenal-gland cancer.
Kubby, who is a host of Pot TV, a website with breaking news about marijuana issues, once ran for governor of California as a Libertarian candidate. He and his wife, Michelle, are well-known in North America as advocates for legalizing medicinal marijuana.
Kubby was flagrant about his pot use and eventually was charged with 11 counts of possession and trafficking in California. He was acquitted on all but two possession charges, for which he was sentenced to four months.
Kubby, Michelle and their two chidren -- aged six and two -- fled to Sechelt last year after the sentence was handed down.
Kubby was arrested on an immigration warrant last April after coming to the attention of Sechelt RCMP in media reports about medicinal marijuana.
Since then, he has applied for political refugee status -- a move similar to one made by fellow U.S. pot refugee Renee Boje, who also lives on the Sunshine Coast.
The U.S. has asked Immigration Canada to deport both Kubby and Boje.
Kubby and his wife also face criminal charges of production of a controlled substance and possession for the purpose of trafficking in connection with 160 plants police seized from their home in Sechelt in April.
Kubby said one of his biggest problems in B.C. has been that police just don't believe he needs to smoke as much pot as he says he does for medical purposes.
He said the documents from Health Canada now bear out his claims.
Kubby won support for his marijuana use from Dr. Joseph Connor, a clinical professor of medicine at the University of British Columbia and medical oncologist at the B.C. Cancer Agency.
Connor said Kubby's heavy pot smoking controls the blood-pressure spikes, rapid heart beats, severe headaches and chest pains that can result when his adrenal cancer cells produce too much adrenaline or other hormones, and that it cuts down on the risk of stroke and heart attack.
Marijuana appears to be unique in that it controls Kubby's symptoms "better than any currently available combination of standard medicines," wrote Connor in a letter to Health Canada.
"I have firmly recommended to him that he continue to use the cannabis in the current dose and using the specific strains of plants that he is now using."
Kubby's lawyer is now asking for the criminal charges in B.C. against Kubby to be dropped.
He is also asking the RCMP to return the Kubbys' pot-growing equipment so they can get started on a legal crop of marijuana.
But his MP, John Reynolds of the Canadian Alliance Party, is of a different view.
"This is going to open the doors to more Americans coming in and applying for exemptions . . . It concerns all Canadians," said Reynolds, MP for West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast.
"The law is here for Canadians. Now people everywhere in the world are going to say, 'Hey, Canada is a place to go and get your pot.'"
Richard Kurland, a Vancouver-based immigration lawyer, said Kubby's case "flings the doors open to similarly situated Americans."
Kurland also said Canada can expect an angry reaction from the Americans to this development.
"I think they are going to go ballistic . . . This is a direct attack on their anti-drug policy."
Copyright 2002 The Province
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