Don's Fight

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March 5, 2008

Don went to court today and judge LaVerdier ruled that his doctor had not listed his medical problems on the paper work so it was no good, even though it stated Don had one of the approved medical uses by law, and all other information was correct with the doctors authorization he denied the change of bail to allow for medical use. Never mind what the doctor has authorized and recommended, he just didn't care. This is just one more instance to show that the system is corrupt and has no regard for the patients or doctors, just their authority  and mindset of refer madness.  Their seems to be no doctor patient confidentiality with this medical marijuana law, putting all patients business out in the public for all to see. This is not done with any other prescription medicine whatsoever.

Also it was discussed that Don's status as a provider be reinstated, having met the requirements of the medical marijuana stipulations of 2 prior judges, Studstrunk and Marden to have the proper current medical documentation for each patient, but LaVerdier did not even want to look at it and refused to comply with any prior judges ruling. He did leave the door open to have Justice Marden hear the issue again and rule on it but would not himself do it. He could care less about the sick citizens who need a provider to help them get their medicine, and this is what we have to work with. Some day this will come back to haunt him is usually how this works, karma...  The States  Ass  DA Mitchell was his usual mad dog self, and could care less about the sick people involved in the case, or any other person for that matter. He is a sick individual who definitely doesn't work for the people who pay his wages.

Meanwhile Don is now scheduled for a probation violation hearing on May 9th at the Somerset County Court. If it is ruled that Don is in violation then he will probably end up back in jail for an undetermined time which will be decided by the presiding judge at that time. Remember people this is all stemming from a case that is still on appeal and could be reversed in the end, but hard to give back the time once it is served in jail. We the people voted for medical marijuana, but the powers at large have done everything they can to stop all from being able to use the current law. The current law needs to be changed big time, and if it isn't these types of problems will continue which is just what the authorities want. It is time for every one who cares to speak out and get involved to make the needed changes. Write letters to the editor of the news papers, and talk to everyone you know about this issue, Be Vocal...

Feb. 27, 2008

Don has a hearing on his case for the alleged probation violation on March 5, 2008. The hearing will be at the Skowhegan Somerset County Superior Court House at 8:30 AM, and is before Judge LaVerdier. At this hearing Don has to show that the marijuana at his home on Oct. 4, 2007, was not in violation to the law  and that he acted according to the laws and ruling by a previous justice who stipulated in his probation paper work that Don could provide medical marijuana to legal patients as provided by law. Don has a ruling from Justice Marden, that his paper work was as good as could be expected under the current law that is vague and hard to follow from his bail hearing in Oct. 2007. Don's lawyer has the transcript of this ruling for the hearing, and all previous documentation for the new judge to examine for the case. Don's medical patients will be in court to testify to the facts that Don was indeed growing the marijuana for them, and providing them with their medicine at that time.

Now it is time to see if the Courts will abide by the law the citizens created and want. Don has done all he can to follow the law as is written, and it will now be ruled upon. Don is optomistic and ready to proceed and get this law workable for the citizens of Maine, which the authorities, DAs, Law Enforcement do not want to work for our citizens and have done all they can to fight this and stop it from being used for the people who voted this in.

Other motions are also to be heard, but this one above is one that could decide Don's freedom. The others are to bring forward the medical documentation for the patients and Don's new medical marijuana paperwork for medical need forward to change the bail, so that Don can use the medicine his doctor recommended, medical marijuana, which will change his bail conditions, and allow him to provide for the patients that have appointed him as their provider,  who are all legal patients as they have been since the beginning of the case, with basically the same paper work from their doctors, and the appointment papers that have been notarized to give Don permission to provider them their medicine.

Nov. 28, 2007

Don is brought up from Cumberland County and given his Bail and Stay of Execution of the Sentence Hearing at the Somerset County Court House. Bail is given again with the same conditions. During the trip to the Clerks Office to sign the Bail papers, an altercation between the transport officer and Pam, Don's wife and Bob Don's brother took place in which the transport officer was an arrogant asshole to Pam, and Bob who tried to defend her almost goes to jail. This showed Bob just how arrogant the authorities can be and changed his perspective for sure. A complaint is now being lodged with the county commissioners.

Nov. 26, 2007

No hearing for Don as the Jail administration had failed to notify the clerk of courts that they had shipped Don to Portland for the rest of his tour, shortly after the bail and revocation hearing. Why? Because Don had made complaints in the jail  as to problems at the jail that needed to be taken care of.
1. Phone didn't work properly. Don couldn't contact his lawyer prior to his hearing on the 25th of Oct. from the time of his incarceration, though the phones did work some of the time, they were not on at times when he could get through to his counsel.
2. One of the inmates was a African American (Anderson), who was prejudice, and was "unruly" to the rest of the inmates in the cell block, who were not prejudice and tried to tolerate the situation. Don was warned about the "attitude" they thought he had, but the administration was informed that Don was not prejudice and was not the problem. They found out that the real problem was the other inmate who they could see in their cameras in the cell block that was the real problem.

3. This same individual, Anderson was also a problem while using the telephone. He would Put His Hands down his pants and play with himself while talking on the phone, which of course we all had to use that phone, so we made it known we didn't want him to do that. He didn't care and continued to do it. The guards were informed that someone was doing that and we were given disinfectant to use to clean the phone before we used it. Complaints were made and we were told it was a racist problem, but the administration could see it all happening on their cameras down in the control room and did nothing to stop it. Don filed 3 reports about this problem, 1 a medical one as the Sgt. thought that would be the route to go, but no the administration wanted a grievance form which they got, signed by most of the guys in the cell block.

4. On Sundays the jail has to run a generator to make sure it is in working condition to run the jail should the power go out. The generator is not properly exhausted and during the period that it is in operation, depending on which way the wind is blowing outside, the exhaust fumes are sucked into the ventilation system and fills the D-Block Cells up with the fumes making it quite unpleasant for the inmates who are trapped in there. It gave us headaches, made our eyes red and sick to our stomachs, but the administration says their is no such problem and I am the only one complaining, a trouble maker. With this problem, what would happen if the generator were to have to run for an extended period of time when the exhaust was coming into the vents? Their would be some dead inmates at that rate, and the jail administration just wants to ignore the problem. Don went to the press with this problem and the Dept. of Corrections.

Instead of fixing the outlined problems at the Jail, they decided to ship Don to Cumberland County Jail to fix their problem, but it only added to it. Now the County had to foot the new bill which more than doubled the price of Don's incarceration, at the Cumberland facility as compared to being housed in Somerset, and Don is still going to pursue the issues with the Dept. of Corrections.

On Oct. 4, 2007 the Cops raided Don again, and Don refused to take a piss test which landed him in jail on the spot within 10 minutes of the bust. While one of the lead pigs- Rourke took Don to jail, the new bust took place. The new charges were again trafficking, (changed to furnishing)  cultivation of marijuana, (Aggravated) and violation of probation, which wasn't even in effect till the refusal of the piss test that morning! They also charged Pam Christen with the same charges as Don because they can, but Pam was not a named caregiver and was not involved.

Don was incarcerated at the Somerset County Jail and given a hearing on the new charges within a couple of days, and was given bail of $1000.00, but because they had revoked the Bail and Stay of Execution of the Sentence imposed from the prior charges he would have to sit in jail until a hearing on the revocation was heard, which was scheduled for the Oct. 25, 2007 in front of Justice Marden.

At the revocation hearing the evidence was presented to the judge and Don's medical marijuana paperwork was at that time reviewed and determined to be as good a "good faith effort as could be presented." by Judge Marden. In his order Marden said that Don could continue his efforts when released on bail provided he had his patients update their doctors records to keep a current history which one patient, Carroll Cummings had already done for this hearing. But Judge Marden put Don back in jail for the refusal to take the piss test for another 30 days till Nov. 26, 2007, which was about a 2 month term for his refusal to give up his constitutional rights to not provide any evidence against himself, the 5th amendment to the US Constitution. After all, Don had signed the Bail papers to give up those rights, didn't he, even if it was an Unconstitutional condition of Bail.

Aug. 25, 2007

Sentencing in Don's case
At the sentencing procedure, the judge gave Don 14 months, and suspended 8 months with 2 years probation. That meant that the sentence was 6 months with 8 months hanging over his head with 2 years of probation, which any violations could give him the entire 14 months. The case was appealed and the bail was continued with a stay of execution of the sentence till the case was heard at the supreme court. This will take some time to get to the courts with the case as the transcript has to be ordered and written up by the court recorder, then go to the lawyer to lay the case out and then go to the Law Court for review and then a hearing on it if the Court deems necessary. Will keep all posted.

APRIL 24, 2007

Don's trial ends up with a dismissal on count 2, trafficking in marijuana by sales to someone after the state failed to provide anyone that allegedly was sold to. Count 1 Don was found not guilty of by the jury, and the least of the charges of cultivation the jury found Don guilty and didn't find that he met the requirement of authenticity of either his care giver status or of the patients doctors papers authenticity to prove they were qualified patients. The DA never said that the paper work was not signed by the doctors, or patients, only that they had forgot to dot an I, or cross a t.
Sentencing is pending, and nothing can be done till then, but if judge is not sympathetic Don will be forced to appeal.
                                          (more to come on case)

APRIL 4, 2007

Jury pick Thursday April 5 for Don's trial at Somerset County Courthouse.

Trial date is set for April 17 for Don's trial at Somerset County Courthouse..

APRIL 2, 2007

Went to court today for another motion to dismiss. Reason for Dismissal?
 Reason for dismissal was that over 900 days has passed since the indictment has been issued,
and Federal Law allows for 90 days from indictment to trial for its speedy trial laws. Over 10 times the allotted time as you can see. I did have a couple of continuances, but were still talking over 10 times what the law requires at the federal level. The State of Maine has ruled that is reasonable. At one point about 1 1/2 years or more from the start of the case, the DAs Office admits that it had further discovery to give to me. This caused the whole case to have to be started again, giving me another 21 days to file motions. I had filed 2 or 3 motions to compel the DAs Office to give me full discovery which I still know they are withholding or they would not have not had any evidence to get a warrant to enter our home. To this date the authorities have brought no one forward that has given any information about this case that would give reason to
issue a search warrant. Now they intend to go to court and bring in the marijuana they found here and not justify how they got reason to search our home in the first place.

It is quite obvious that I had reason to have the marijuana in our home, and it was for medical purposes, not what the authorities planned on when they came to the house. Their so called info was seriously flawed, and it was obvious to the cops who were their to bust me that they were either duped or their perception of me was mistaken. I was not the threat they alleged I was and now they have a different case on their hands. Now it is almost time to get to the bottom of all this before a jury who are not quite like the system and can use some common sense to see through their BUSHIT. The people of a jury will see through their smokescreen and react to the facts and truth just as they did when they voted for medical marijuana in 1998 much to the dismay of the legislators courts and police who are milking this prohibition for all its worth.

Dec. 15, 2006

All motions were denied in Oct. and now I am waiting for a trial date.

Today the lawyer, Lynn Williams, that was going to help with the case, was relieved of her duties, and was granted my ok to withdraw from the case. Lynn is to busy to be of assistance at this time as she probably never thought the case would drag on this long and has other cases that need her attention. Thanks Lynn and keep on with the fight.

I will be going forward pro se and will put any upcoming dates up here on this page as soon as
here from the clerk of courts about the trial. If you are interested in supporting this effort by showing up at the trial check in each week and I will keep this updated.

Sept. 12, 2006

Call to the Docket. Went to court the 11th and the courts postponed the case once again as my lawyer was not available on the 11th to pick a jury. Although my case is the oldest case on the docket, they could not bring in the jury for picks any other day when they had 2 dates to have trials this month. The jury could been asked to come in at any time and in order to take care of this case including the week of the 24th which was when they planned to have more trials. This was not even considered though I suggested it for that week and we were ready for trial. Now the case will be set aside for till probably after the new year.

Mean while I have pending motions that have yet to be heard or a written decision handed down from the clerks office. One of which is to have a hearing on the search warrant which is referred to as a Franks Hearing, which would show that the warrant was obtained without probable cause The prosecution does not want to happen as the case would fall apart at that point. They would then have to bring in their witnesses that they allegedly have in order to get the warrant, which they don't have, just an easy warrant that should not have been issued.

This was also in a motion that they produce all the discovery which includes any statements and recordings whether video or audio. They have sworn they have none. That's not the way they do things. In order to maintain an actual record of the case, any statements or recordings that are made  by undercover or informants and they always do, in order to prove what was actually said or done in the future and that statements match in testimony. They also swore they didn't have any more, but sent tapes two weeks later, that extended the case in order to give me 21 more days to file motions which have not been decided or heard before the court.

I will be filing another motion with the court to see about this and one in support of my current motions seeing as they are still pending. Will also be preparing for trial as I don't have much faith in the court to even grant the Franks motion though it is pretty blatant how they have not been at all truthful in their statements.

July 31, 2006

Have finally been given a hearing date on my motion to dismiss. Should that motion fail, I have a couple of more motions that will also be heard at that time as the DA has given me more discovery after he swore he didn't have any more. More lies from Mr. Mitchell which will be argued this time to see if we can get to the truth and I should be granted another 21 days to get my motions in. I have already actually done this, but they refused because the judge said the filing time had run out so I couldn't get the right to attack the warrant which is bogus and is one big lie from front to rear. If there was one ounce of investigation in this case it would startle me. They didn't have a clue as to what was going on as the "franks hearing" I have requested would prove. It's no wonder they don't want to allow me to have a hearing on the warrant as it would show that they have sanitized the affidavit, which allowed them to get a warrant in the first place. Without it they have no reason to be at my our home. They do this all the time with warrants, and get away with it, only a few fight it and are granted the franks hearings to be able to fight against sanitized warrants.

Motion date is Aug. 9, 2006 at 8:30 AM, but will probably be heard later as all who are familiar with the court system know. All support is welcome.

April 24, 2006

It has been some time since the Court Ruled against me for the motion on granting full discovery, which the Ass. DA said full discovery had been given in Aug. of 2005, and my time for motions had expired 21 days there after.  Now comes the Ass. DA with more discovery which he assured the court their was none to come forward with at the last hearing, so my question is, where is the discovery that I am requesting, which is, the tapes, recordings and written statements used to get the search warrant which are always taken at the time to assure that the story can't change. Again this is done all the time, but not this time the Ass. DA says. Oh Really. I don't believe him as he also has tape of my statements to officers at the station when I was arrested which have yet to be presented.

I have filed new motions for dismissal, compel the rest of discovery, and requested a Franks hearing to show the deception and discrepancies leading to the search warrant being issued. I have already testified in court as to some of the reasons, that are right in black and white on the oath of affirmation where officers lied and now the Ass. DA has been untruthful also, and is still with holding evidence/discovery from me.

I am now waiting on a hearing date for the above mentioned motions.

Later,
Don

Feb. 10, 2006

To: Clerk of Superior Court Somerset County

Motion to Compel District Attorney’s Office For Complete Discovery (3rd Request)

On March 4, 2005, the District Attorney was Ordered to give me full discovery. I am still waiting for the rest of the discovery, which included chemical reports on the substances taken from my home on Nov 10, 2004. I was given a chemical report on the substances which says they were all marijuana. This report never tested the amount of THC in the substance to distinguish what was marijuana, and what was the waste of the plant matter. (Part of the Processing of the Plant to obtain the Usable Marijuana) The waste of the plant which is the stalk and leaf of the plant matter, and doesn’t contain enough THC to be included with the weight of the alleged marijuana plant matter. There has been no such test done or at least it was not in with the test results paperwork I received in the mail from the DA’s office. Over half of the substance taken were the stalks and leaf of the plant matter which would bring down the amount of alleged Marijuana taken from our home, considerably.

I am also waiting for the written statements and recordings from the CI to the Affiant, which are only hearsay or lies by the Affiant unless substantiate by the signed written statements and recordings that the police always document and save so the CI can’t retract of change their statements. I cannot start my defense without all of the discovery.

The court further ordered that I be given 21 days to file motions after I have been complete discovery, which I will file for a Franks hearing for the second time.

The state has had plenty of time to get their case together, yet they are still dragging their feet, and have stalled my defense. I ask for a dismissal if they further refuse to cooperate and provide the needed information timely just as they would want from me.

I have been waiting for a response to my motion from either the DA’S Office or the Court since Oct. 25, 2005,and enough is enough. I realize the dilemma of getting a non-bias judge, but the above problem must be taken care of and any judge can order this. In fact it has already been ordered by the court and the DA’s Office doesn’t seem to care about complying to the order.

Thank you,

Don Christen

________________________________________________________________________

Motion Denied on Oct. 25, 2006

Judge Studstruck
_________________________________________________________________________

FEB. 2006

I FILED MOTIONS TO TRY TO HAVE A HEARING ON THE WARRANT, FOR DISCOVERY WHICH THEY WITH HELD FOR OVER 1 1/2 YEARS, DISMISSALS UP TO NOW, BUT THE COURTS DID NOTHING...
_________________________________________________________________________

November 10, 2004

How Much is Enough???

5:45 AM. I had just got home from work, and gotten to bed and asleep, when I woke to voices outside our home. I got up and went to the door, and my wife was standing there with the cops all around her apologizing for busting us as they all knew she had cancer. When I appeared things changed and they turned their attention to me. I secured the dogs and in they came. You all know how it goes from there. Although the authorities treated us with respect, they violated our home and property which is not a nice thing and it leaves its mark on your mind forever about your government and system.

Posted at my door was/is a sign for all of law enforcement, and a packet of a medical file of people I have been appointed to help procure their medical marijuana that is also signed by a notary to make it a legal document. With that, is a statement from the patient's doctor or records of the patient to verify that they are a medical patient. This was presented to the Officers upon entrance. I have done this to try to make this as legal as possible, verifying every patients appointment of the provider status, because the law is ambiguous and vague in several areas. (The question here is, being a legal medical marijuana patient, can one buy marijuana, and is it a crime for someone to provide that marijuana to the patient, at cost, with no profit for providing the medicine, only for what it costs?)

In late October I harvested and started to cure the plants I had grown for my wife and 5+ patients who had appointed me Medial Marijuana Provider, to grow marijuana for their therapy, and to procure their marijuana for them in times when no Homegrown marijuana was available were waiting on some commercial medicine. I had started to process the plants I had grown, and had put some of it away, but some was still being processed by the time the Public Servants showed up. Everything was upstairs in the storage room and was not hidden at all. Some of the processed in jars in my kitchen cabinets that we used daily, so it was handy. Most processed marijuana was in the grow room in a few jars, but estimated all total their was about 10-12 ounces of usable marijuana. Their was also some leaf that was trimmed off the marijuana, that was to be thrown in the wood stove or on the compost but the Public Servants want to add that weight to the “Processed Marijuana,” to make the weight up over a pound of marijuana. I didn’t even have enough marijuana to fill the patients needs, that at the time asked me to get them some, but I did have enough for an oz each for the four patients of some commercial I had located.

Define-Processed Marijuana-- The patients don’t want to smoke leaf , seeds or the stalks and sticks, as they have no medicinal qualities and don’t work. PLUS, Leaf is also more carcinogenic then tobacco products. Also, the Gov. says when they bust someone who is growing, that each plant that they have = at least 1/4 lb of processed marijuana when mature. So. maturity is when the plant flowers/buds. The leaf and all other before mentioned parts of the plant are not usable marijuana, only the flowers/buds are and that is what marijuana is. Not unlike many other plant that grow, only the fruit or vegetables that
come off the plants are what is usable. If each plant, when mature, according to Gov. standards on how much a plant produces, at 1/4 lb each, six plants at maturity is 1 1/2 lbs., than how is it possible to harvest the plants when you can only have 2 1/2 ounces of marijuana at a time? The law is flawed and must be found that it is impossible for a patient or care giver/provider, to follow once they have grown there six plants. If they wait till they need more the flowers/buds will mold/rot
on the plants in the weather, or go by losing much potency after it ripens, making it undesirable to use.


Along with Patients Marijuana I had 13 plants that I had started for the patients for the winter crop. With these 13 I had hoped to be able to clone enough off of them to supply my patients with some fresh marijuana in 3 to 4 months. They were about 1 ½ to 2 ft. tall and ready to transplant. With 5 Patients I am legally allowed to grow 6 plants per patient. I only had 13, well within the law, as I was just getting the garden going, with hopes to get enough for all. I also was/am in the process of signing up as many people as who confide in me for help and in need of medical marijuana.

I also am a Medical Marijuana Patient although not yet recognized under the Maine Law as my condition is not documented yet. I have a back injury W/acute muscle spasms and I use marijuana faithfully with no other pain medicine since Sept.1982. At the time the only option was surgery and when they bring me in on a stretcher, I may allow them to do it. Until that time I will take care of myself, except for the few visits over the years to my good neighbor who happens to be a Physicians Assistant at the area Health Center. I thank God that I have not had to do any more than my current therapy with marijuana and my back has held out thus far. I don’t need anyone to tell me what to use for medicine when mine works just fine for the last 22 years or so thank you but at this point I will have to pursue a doctor that will endorse my form of therapy for my condition. I have spoken with the doc I see now at the Bingham Health Center and he is aware of my medical use for  my back but I need to  pursue it as my PA friend next door is retired now. He was a fine public servant, and I hope he has time for himself now...
(It should be noted that the National Institute of Medicines recent report, lists Chronic Pain as the #1 use for medicinal marijuana, yet it is not recognized as an issue on its own merits in our law, only in conjunction with muscle related problems.)

My wife told them that the home grown marijuana in the house was hers, but they didn't care and charged me for the medicine  we grew for her, and her six plants that were legally growing at the time. I admit to having other "commercial" marijuana about 1/4 lb for the patients that I was helping get their medicine. This medicine was pd for in advance as I could not afford to purchase it due to being short of funds, and was to be picked up by the patients that weekend. Picking up the product is much cheaper if all can get it at one time pooling the funds to by at least a 1/4 lb at a time. (Approx. $500) It also helps to be using cash as most know that fronting as they call it may be more money to the patients.

Shortly there after, the patients including my wife filed with the court to have their marijuana returned. This was denied. Other supplies had to be obtained at cost to all for the needless intrusion into several lives that are already over taxed to deal with their conditions to have to dig deeper into their pockets to provide what they need. What kind of people are we supporting that treat patients like this? They didn't look into the medical aspects of this case, even after they had been made aware of the facts, they didn't care about the law that the people had voted on and passed by over 63% which is a good majority of the voters. The intent of the voters was to have a medical marijuana bill that citizens would get some marijuana or grow their own.
What they got was a big hassle from every form of government that is supposed to work for us the citizenry not against US. Know other law has had the lack of cooperation of all Gov. agencies and in fact many have done what they can to keep this law from actually working especially the courts and law enforcement. They can't stand it that the people have over ruled them!

All patients are ready for court and will testify. I was busted Nov. 10, 2004. It has taken them over two and a half years to get me to trial. The Federal Gov. allows 90 days from indictment to trial for a "speedy trial", but the State of Maine has no problem with over 900 + days. They have not brought anyone forward that I have allegedly sold anything to so that I could confront them at court though I have tried to compel them to have a hearing on it 3 or 4 times up till now. They have some marijuana that they confiscated from our home and a tale that I was a salesman, but no buyers. Well, I have a different tale, and it is far from what they have for a story. The question is, who is telling the truth and what are the facts. That will be up to the Jury to decide here in the near future. Is this the case that the authorities say it is, or is this action according to the will of the people, when they voted for medical marijuana in 1998. Come on out and hear for yourself...

Soon to be at your Somerset County Superior Courthouse in Skowhegan, on April 17, 2007.

Donald Christen
Maine Vocals Founder