Australian army officer recently convicted for stealing rocket-launchers from a high-security military repository is also implicated by a former Bandidos bikie gang insider in at least one other criminal transaction where rocket-launchers were sold to bikies.His evidence suggests that many more of the armour-penetrating rocket-launchers may be in circulation in the criminal underworld than the nine officially acknowledged. Former Australian Crime Commission informant Stevan Utah, in hiding overseas, says he witnessed a separate weapons sale by then army captain Shane Della-Vedova from the one for which Della-Vedova was convicted earlier this year.
Della-Vedova is serving a 10-year prison sentence, but at his sentencing in May, his theft of 10 66mm M72 rocket-launchers was painted by his counsel as a "single very stupid mistake which has left his career in tatters". References were provided on his behalf by former army colleagues and much was made of his previously distinguished service record. Della-Vedova's job as an ammunition technician meant he was entrusted to dispose of huge amounts of military weaponry, including rocket-launchers, explosives and hand-grenades, often without any supervision. The court heard that he told police his theft of the rocket-launchers was accidental, that he "just panicked" when he realised he had mistakenly taken them off the base.
But Utah, a former informant with the Australian Crime Commission who helped state and federal police agencies investigate the Bandidos and other motorcycle gangs, said he witnessed Della-Vedova sell five more rocket-launchers to a senior member of the Bandidos in February 2005 -- nearly three years after the offences for which Della-Vedova was convicted. Utah trained as an army ammunition technician within a year of Della-Vedova in the late 1980s. They became friends. Utah said it was obvious at the time that there were huge holes in the military's security, and that until Della-Vedova's arrest in April last year, not much had changed. Utah, a convicted criminal, came forward to police with this information during the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation meeting in Sydney last year when he became aware that some of the weapons on which Della-Vedova was facing charges had been sold to alleged terrorists. One of the weapons was recovered, but the court heard that even after extensive raids and searches across western Sydney, nine of the weapons had still not been found. Court records show that Della-Vedova was entrusted with the disposal of as many as 323 rocket-launchers without any witnesses to their demolition. Utah's evidence suggests that at least five more of those weapons may have been sold to criminals. But a year after his approach to police during APEC, Utah has never been formally interviewed by any police agency.
Nothing that Utah alleged implicates Dean Stephen Taylor, Della-Vedova's co-accused, who was acquitted in late July of charges of possessing and receiving the stolen rocket-launchers and other weapons. When Mr Taylor walked free from the NSW District Court just over a month ago, he said he had "nothing to say at all" about a witness code-named Harrington, a former bikie and convicted drug supplier who testified that Mr Taylor had offered to supply him with the stolen military weapons.
Harrington had an undertaking from the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions that he would not be prosecuted under any federal laws in return for his evidence. But he has no such undertaking from NSW and the CDPP said that any prosecution of Harrington was a matter for NSW.

beheadings of twelve people in southern Mexico were probably the work of the powerful Gulf cartel based across the border from Texas, a state governor said on Friday.Eleven beheaded bodies with signs of torture were dumped outside the city of Merida in the Yucatan Peninsula on Thursday. A 12th beheaded body was found 50 miles away in a small town to the east of Merida, also showing signs of torture.
"This seems to be the work of the Gulf cartel," Yucatan Gov. Ivonne Ortega told reporters, adding that she had received several threats from suspected drug gangs over the past three months.Authorities say the cartel controls drug smuggling in seven states along the Gulf of Mexico from southern Mexico into Texas."We will have to see where the heads turn up. I am sure they will try something spectacular to shock society," she said.Three armed men were arrested on Friday after ignoring instructions to stop at a police checkpoint on the road between Merida and the popular Caribbean beach resort of Cancun, federal police said.The men fired shots at the checkpoint and police gave chase and captured and detained them on a dirt track. Inside the vehicle, police said they found three guns, an axe and more than 500 rounds of ammunition.The checkpoint had been set up because of the beheadings, although police did not say if the men arrested were suspected of being involved in the grisly killings.Investigators said the victims were drug dealers and all 12 had their heads cut off while they were still alive, reported the Reforma newspaper.

Two men suffered serious stab wounds Friday in a brawl in Germany involving the motorcycle gang Hell's Angels. Riot police separated the rival gangs after the battle outside a court building in the northern port city of Kiel.
Police said the court had been just about to start the trial of an accused for nearly stabbing a Hell's Angels member to death last year. The accused, who had recovered, and the victim, both with a crowd of supporters, met on a street outside the court Friday. Last year's Hell's Angel victim was stabbed again and rushed into intensive care, along with a second man. There were 20 arrests. Police did not disclose the other gang's name, except to say there had been a history of gang feuding between the two groups. The trial was adjourned.

Gang members are suspected in several crimes from Prince William County to Baltimore. In Washington's Trinidad neighborhood, where police are battling an increase in violence this year, young people are wearing the Bloods' colors and flashing their hand signs. However, police say they haven't tied the gang to any homicides in the neighborhood. Bloods and the Crips, well-known gangs on the West Coast, are a growing concern for law enforcement in the Washington area.
"We've started seeing more and more signs of the Crips and Bloods -- more Bloods than Crips," D.C. Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier said. "We are seeing a growing presence in the graffiti, the clothing, the symbols." In Montgomery County, authorities have linked a shooting and three stabbings to a Bloods-Crips feud.
In February, a federal grand jury in Baltimore indicted 28 members of a gang called the Tree Top Piru Bloods on charges including murder, robbery, drug trafficking and witness intimidation. Bob Bermingham, gang prevention coordinator in Fairfax County, said in some cases, local crews are adopting the names of the well-known gangs. "They run around saying we are the Ravenswood Boys, and everybody says, 'So what?' " he said. "But if they say they're the Ravenswood Bloods, suddenly they have some credibility." But Capt. Bill Lynn, of the Prince George's County police, said "wannabes" can be just as dangerous because they have something to prove. The ranks of the two gangs are growing in part because men join the gangs for protection when they're in jail. When they get out, they bring other people into the groups.
Authorities said about 25 percent of the 1,300 inmates in the Prince George's jail are affiliated with gangs and that more than 60 percent of the gang members are Bloods. Virginia officials have identified about 2,000 Bloods and 700 Crips in state prisons.

self-taught gunsmith who ran an illegal arms factory converting replica submachine guns into lethal weapons has been sentenced to life imprisonment, with a minimum term of 11 years. At least eight people, including a teenager, Michael Dosunmu, were killed by weapons converted by Grant Wilkinson in a shed in Berkshire…
Wilkinson, 34, of no fixed abode, was convicted yesterday at Reading crown court of buying replica MAC-10 submachine guns and converting them to fire. Police said his operation was one of the largest they had ever discovered. They believe it produced 90 guns used in a fifth of shootings in the capital over two years.The judge, Zoe Smith, passing sentence, said: “The scale of this criminal enterprise is unprecedented in this country. The roll call of deaths and injuries is horrific. Some 30 to 40 of these weapons are still unaccounted for, and regrettably but doubtlessly, the roll call of death and serious injury will continue to rise.”
Wilkinson bought the replica guns claiming to be involved in making a James Bond film.

Roy Arredondo, Jr., a/k/a “West,” 34, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Ed Kinkeade to life in prison, without parole. Arredondo, was the sillon, or chairman of the Dallas TS from 2003 until his arrest in April 2005, although there are some reports that he was the chairman as early as 2001. Arredondo, who pled guilty in March to conspiracy to conduct the affairs of a racketeering enterprise, has TS-related tattoos, including the overlaid letters “T” and “S” on his chest, and had a major role in several violent crimes committed by the Dallas TS, including the murders of Ernesto “Neto” Glavan, Peter Paul Pecina, Miguel “Big Mike” Elizondo, Mitchell “Cisco” Lozano, and Juan Silva Barrera, and the attempted murder of Ruben Rocha. Arredondo also admitted that he was responsible for trafficking drugs including approximately 270 kilograms of cocaine. Members of the TS are bound by a set of strict rules which ensure loyalty and participation in the enterprise’s criminal activities and are subject to strict and harsh discipline, including death, for violating the rules. The rules require that a member continue his participation in the organization even after his release from prison. Membership is for life.
Although TS rules exclude “shady” or “devious” characters, members who commit murders, aggravated assaults, robberies, or traffic in illegal drugs are not classified as being of bad character. Instead, this category is interpreted more narrowly to exclude child molesters and those who fail to follow the rules of the TS . Members and associates of the TS committed crimes to achieve the enterprise’s economic goal of making money as well as to enforce the rules of the organization. Victims of the violent crimes were often those who transgressed TS rules regardless of whether it was done knowingly or unknowingly. The remaining 13 defendants have pled guilty; all but two have pled guilty to the RICO statute. All will be sentenced within the next two months.

Grand jurors have indicted two Whatcom County men, a Seattle police officer and a Hells Angel biker shot during a bar fight earlier this month in Sturgis, South Dakota.

Five of the men, including Scott Lazalde of Bellingham and James Rector of Ferndale, are members of the Iron Pigs Motorcycle Club, which is made up of law enforcement officers and firefighters. Lazalde and Rector both work for the Blaine sector of U.S. Customs and Border Protection.Joseph McGuire, 33, of Imperial Beach, Calif., was shot and injured Aug. 9 at the Loud American Roadhouse by Ronald Smith of Seattle, 43, a vacationing off-duty Seattle police detective, authorities said.
Both men are charged with alternative counts of aggravated and simple assault.
The four other men charged are Lazalde, 38; Rector, 44; Dennis McCoy, 59, a Seattle police sergeant, and Erik Pingel, 35, of Aurora, Colo. All were charged with carrying a concealed pistol without a permit and an alternative count of failure to abide by a permit of a reciprocal state.McGuire and Smith also face those charges, and Smith also is charged with perjury."The grand jury must've decided that Mr. Smith, having taken an oath to testify truly, in a state proceeding, stated intentionally and contrary to the oath, a material matter which he knew to be false," Meade County State's Attorney Jesse Sondreal wrote in an e-mail to the Associated Press.No court dates have been set.Ten people testified Thursday before the grand jury. On Aug. 10, 25 people appeared before the same panel, Sondreal told the AP.In a brief statement Thursday, the Seattle Police Department said only that its officers who were involved remain on paid administrative leave.Smith, who said after the shooting he had been attacked, had clashed with the Hells Angels before. In 2005, he pressed misdemeanor charges against the owner of a Seattle motorcycle shop, Anthony James Magnesi, for threatening him over the telephone.
Smith was twice disciplined in 2005, first for taunting fans at a Seattle Seahawks playoff game and later after he was accused of threatening to shoot a Tacoma restaurant manager. The first incident resulted in a two-day suspension, the second with a letter in Smith's file.He testified last year at a federal racketeering and murder trial involving members of the Washington Nomads chapter of the Hells Angels.

Four men were arrested Monday and charged with capital murder in the case: Alejandros Castaneda, 31, and Juan Francisco Castaneda, 25, brothers who live in Birmingham; Rodriguez Jaime Duenas, 22, of San Antonio; and Christopher Scott Jones, 40, of Birmingham. All are in the Shelby County Jail under no bond. Five men found slain last week in a north Shelby County apartment were beaten and shocked in a brutal murder-for-hire related to drugs and money, authorities said Tuesday. Four men have been charged with capital murder in the slayings, which Shelby County Sheriff Chris Curry described during a news conference as being connected to a drug organization that transports cocaine, methamphetamine and marijuana. All the suspects either received or paid money in connection with the slayings, he said. Curry did not say how much the men were alleged to have been paid to do the killings, but he said the slayings may have been in retaliation for embezzling money from the drug organization. He said there are no books to check, but authorities believe the amount was in the neighborhood or $400,000 to $450,000, based on what they have been told. "It revolves around money, and that money revolves around drugs," Curry said. Curry said others may have been targeted for death and fled before authorities discovered the bodies. The bodies of Angel Horacio Vega-Gonzalez, 23, and his brother Gustavo Vega-Gonzalez, also known as Armando Lopez, 24; Ezequiel Rebollar-Terevan, 23; Jaime Echeverria, 30; and a fifth unidentified victim were discovered last Wednesday at Cahaba Lakes apartments off U.S. 280. Investigators believe that on Aug. 17 - three days before the discovery - the men were beaten and tortured with electric shocks, and their throats were cut, the sheriff said. Shelby County Coroner Diana Hawkins said her office is awaiting dental records to positively identify the fifth victim. Arrangements have been made by families to have the other four shipped to Mexico, Hawkins said.

Two bodies were found Monday morning on a hillside, one with its head placed on its upper back.The gruesome discoveries this week of five bodies, four of them decapitated, have shattered a period of relative calm and revived concerns that organized crime groups are escalating their battle for control of this border city.Three more bodies were discovered Tuesday morning in an illegal dump.
Their heads, charred from gasoline burns, were placed at their feet, according to the Baja California state attorney general's office.Authorities have not identified the victims.The attacks recalled the decapitations two years ago of three Rosarito Beach police officers.Authorities believe the recent victims may have been associates of the reputed leader of the Arellano Felix drug cartel, Fernando Sanchez Arellano, nicknamed El Ingeniero -- The Engineer.
Printed on the shirtless victims' backs was a taunting message: "We are people of the weakened engineer."Violence had declined significantly in recent months, and Alberto Capella Ibarra, Tijuana's secretary of public security, discounted the significance of this week's killings, comparing them to Los Angeles-area gang slayings that are barely noticed."The only difference here is how dramatic the deaths are," Capella said in an interview in his downtown office.
But Capella and others conceded that the savage nature of the crimes could signal a deadlier phase in the drug war as the Arellano Felix drug cartel fights rivals.
The cartel, once among the most powerful in Mexico, has been weakened in recent years by arrests and killings of its top bosses.Sanchez Arellano is said to have assumed control when his uncle, Francisco Javier Arellano Felix, was captured in 2006.In April, a gun battle between groups headed by Sanchez Arellano and a rival faction left 13 dead and appears to have split the cartel into two camps.
The head of the rival group, Teodoro Garcia Simental, moved to the state of Sinaloa, where he may have forged ties with a cartel based there, said Mexican law enforcement sources who spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to talk publicly on the subject.The recent deaths could be a sign that Garcia or one of his underlings may have launched an offensive to push out Sanchez Arellano with the help of powerful allies from Sinaloa.Such a scenario, some fear, could turn Tijuana into a battleground on par with the northern state of Chihuahua, where more than 800 deaths this year have been linked to drugs, the most of any Mexican state, according to a report by the Trans-Border Institute at the University of San Diego.
The Chihuahua death toll grew higher Tuesday when gunmen killed five people at a family gathering at a ranch. Also this month, cartel gunmen killed 13 people at a party in the tourist town of Creel, and eight people during a prayer service at a Ciudad Juarez drug rehabilitation center

two dozen police officers in seven vehicles were called to deal with a fight between rival gang members at a Dargaville restaurant early on Saturday. Dargaville police Senior Sergeant Sue Leach said eight people were arrested as a result of the incident, which required the assistance of two Whangarei team police units and a dog handler. A member of the public called police to the Lyrik Restaurant in Gladstone St just after midnight on Friday when a karaoke evening erupted into a confrontation between members of the Stormtroopers and a rival gang. Mrs Leach said that, when police arrived, one member from each rival gang had obvious injuries. Up to 30 intoxicated people were drinking outside the restaurant, which is within the town liquor ban area, she said. The pavement was littered with broken bottles and the group refused to leave. Eight people were arrested for charges ranging from disorderly behaviour, assaulting police, breach of the liquor ban and being unlawfully on property. One man is being held in custody in Whangarei because of a previous warrant for arrest. Seven others were bailed to appear in the Dargaville District Court on Wednesday. When Dargaville police returned after dealing with the gang fight, they disturbed a 17-year-old youth in the yard behind the Dargaville Police Station. The youth was arrested and held in custody. Mrs Leach said police searched the youth's Dargaville address and found a substantial amount of property allegedly taken during burglaries in Dargaville and Whangarei over the past month. The youth is appearing in the Dargaville District Court today. In February last year, four people were arrested in connection with a burglary at the Dargaville Police Station when illegal drugs, police batons, cellphones, radios and other police equipment were stolen. The loot may have been carried away in a police patrol car later found torched near Dargaville.

dozen men, some wielding weapons including golf clubs, baseball bats and spiked pieces of wood, were involved in the brawl which stretched over three roads in Easington Colliery.Police have carried out forensic tests in the streets of Cornwall, Cardiff and Corbett, which lie behind Station Road, and blood could still be seen on the pavements and on vehicles later in the day.Four local men, aged in their early 20s to mid-40s, were arrested after the major disturbance at about midnight yesterday on suspicion of violent disorder.It was expected they would be released on bail pending further inquiries once they were questioned by detectives.
Durham Police said a man had been arrested on suspicion of stealing a car and assault prior to the "running battle".The 26-year-old man, who sustained serious head injuries, is in Newcastle General Hospital, where his condition is said to be stable, but not life threatening, and detectives hope to speak to him about the attack at the earliest opportunity.Another four men received hospital treatment for injuries.A 45-year-old was taken to Sunderland Royal Hospital after sustaining wounds to his head and neck.The three others, aged 42, 33 and 21, were taken to the University Hospital of Hartlepool for treatment for minor injuries, mainly to their faces.One 26-year-old, who lives near the scene, said his partner saw a lad being pushed against their Renault Clio, which was left dented by the impact and stained with blood.The man, who lives with his 25-year-old girlfriend and did not want to be named, said: "He was pushed on the car and his father came to his aid and has been attacked himself around the back of the head."I don't know what's provoked the attack and it's been a crime scene ever since."Some residents said they thought the fight could be linked to the arrival of travellers who have been camped in a field on the nearby former pit site.They arrived late last week in the run-up to a horse fair held at the weekend, but it is thought those involved are local to the village and the fair passed without incident.The man added: "At first we thought it might be because of that, but apparently not and there's been no bother with it. It's pretty bad round here sometimes."

Gang shootings are rare in Romania. But there have been several clashes in Craiova between members of the underworld. Romanian police say they have deployed about 600 officers in a southern city where a gang leader was killed in a poker game.
Police spokeswoman Florentina Popescu says the police were sent to Craiova to keep rival gangs apart after 41-year-old Mihai Parvu was shot early Tuesday by another poker player over suspicions of cheating.Another man suffered stab wounds in the altercation and is reported in stable condition.Parvu died in the main hospital of the city, about 158 miles (255 kilometers) west of Bucharest.Dozens of rival gang members gathered outside the building.

On October 7, in the Central Penitentiary of San Pedro Sula, Honduras, the prison homeboys of the "MS" gang cranked up the volume of their dormitory's TV set. It was the day of the big Honduras-Jamaica soccer game, and the blasting soccer commentary covered the screams of ex-gang leader Geofredo Cortes Ortiz as two ornately tattooed MS members — both Hispanics from the U.S. — dragged him into the bathroom and hacked him to death with machetes. Their homeboys then joined in the symbolic rite of methodically cutting the dead man's body into little pieces and flushing them down the toilet. Revenge motivated the leaders of the U.S.-based MS, whose initials stand for "Salvatrucha Gang," to order Cortes killed. They blamed him for his failure, while leading the gang inside the penitentiary, to defend his members against an attack by rivals from the 18th Street gang. It had been the worst prison massacre in Honduran history: While the MS slept on the floor of their cramped dormitory, members of the "18" had sneaked in with homemade knives and steel pipes and killed 11 of Cortes's homeboys. The attackers then gutted their victims and triumphantly strung their intestines along the prison barbed-wire like party streamers. They also cut the ears off the corpses and tossed them over the wall for the stray dogs. "It was a grotesque barbarity," says prison psychologist Oscar Suazo. "After it was all over, the 18's were laughing and flashing the gang sign." Cortes had been transferred out of the Central Penitentiary soon after the killings, but after he turned to religion, prison authorities sent him back, hoping he could tame his own gang. And that cost him his life. The murder illustrates how Hispanic gangs in U.S. cities are spreading their terror all over Central America. Deported to El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala, these delinquents not only imported the mystique of U.S. gang culture — its neo-Nazi tattoos, rap music, baggy trousers and "homey" slang — but they also brought crack cocaine, semi-automatic weapons, home-made bombs and a level of calculated aggression not seen in the region since the insurgencies and counterinsurgencies of the '70s and '80s. Coming from the U.S. gives a deportee the edge over the local gang-bangers. "These kids might have been low-level gang members back in the States, but when they come here, they're like the Nike of the gang world," says Magdalena Rose Avila, founder of Homeys Unidos, which helps deported gang members settle into Salvadoran society. "One guy I know recruited 60 or 70 soldiers to his gang in six months." Outgunned and underfunded local police forces are overwhelmed by this lethal American export. Tiny El Salvador has over 55,000 gang members, including some 10,000 deportees. San Pedro Sula, a city of half a million Hondurans, has over 35,000 — and only one police officer who handles gangs. "About all I can do," says Magdalenys Centeno, "is see who shows up at the gang funerals and take their photos." According to Centeno, almost all the leaders of local gangs Control Machete, The Junk, Poison, Crezi Kids, MS and 18 are deportees from the U.S. "They're much more violent than anything we'd seen before," she says.
The wave of returning gang members hit Central America in the mid-'90s, when the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) was given more power to hunt down and prosecute illegal aliens. According to the INS, the number of criminal deportations to Mexico and Central America has doubled since 1995 to 62,359 last year. INS officials concede that many of these "removals" belonged to gangs, either in prisons or in Hispanic neighborhoods back in the U.S. In Florida and New York, aliens in jail for criminal acts are given a choice halfway through their term to either be deported immediately or serve out their stretch and then be deported. Most go quickly, not realizing that violent death may await them in Central America.
Both the 18th Street and MS were originally started by Salvadorans in Los Angeles to fight the Mexican gangs, and then spread to San Francisco, New York and Washington, D.C. They thrive on robberies, extortion and "taxing" the street drug dealers. Says Russ Bergeron, INS media director, "We have a fundamental obligation to protect our American citizens from the threat posed by gang violence." And however ill-equipped Central American countries may be to cope with these criminals bred in U.S. cities, other governments have an obligation to take back their nationals, says the INS. But as San Pedro Sula's regional director of criminal investigations, Pastor Ortiz, complains, "If American police with all their resources can't control the gangs in their cities, what can we do? We have nothing."
Until the homeboy invasion, local gangs got by with knives or primitive steel-pipe guns. They got drunk and maybe smoked a little grass. But that all changed under the deportees' murderous influence. The pipe guns were replaced with AK-47s and Uzis, and the marijuana with crack, which in San Pedro Sula sells for only $4.25 a "rock." Now, gang members aspire to have a teardrop tattooed on their cheek, to signify they've killed a rival. The new-look gangs quickly began shaking down grocery shops, factory girls and bus passengers for "taxes." They hijacked buses for drive-by shootings in rivals' neighborhoods, and began raping local girls, some as young as six, according to San Pedro Sula police. The inability of the police to tackle the gangs has spawned vigilante groups such as El Salvador's Sombra Negra (Black Shadow), which has been gunning down deported youths since 1994. Death squads have caught on in Honduras, too, where human rights workers say they've killed over 180 gang members over the past two years. Suspected of being off-duty cops and soldiers hired by local businessmen, these groups are not particularly discriminating. "Any kid who has a tattoo is fair game," says Human Rights Commission member Hugo Maldonado. Sociologist Ernesto Bordales concurs. "The general feeling here is that the only way to deal with the gangs is to kill them all. "
But many of the vigilantes are simply local men pushed too far by the gang- bangers' reign of terror. Last Spring in Villanueva, a shantytown on the edge of San Pedro Sula, homeboys, high on crack, raped and killed a young teenage girl and her mother, hacking their breasts off. The screams brought neighbors who, according to Villanueva police chief Valentino Sandoval, "more or less lynched the gang". After that, there was no shortage of armed men volunteering for nightly anti-gang patrols.
Just as often, though, San Pedro Sula's gangs do an excellent job of exterminating each other. Seventeen-year-old Cesar was spotted ambling down the street in his liquid, druggy gait by a bunch of 18 members. Once they zeroed in on the MS tattoos on his forehead, Cesar was cornered and shot four times, in the chest, his shoulders and legs. His wounds healed, he and seven other gang members are sitting in a muddy backyard behind an empty house. The homeboy who lives there with his mother is a crackhead who has pawned off everything in the house except for a photograph on the wall of his runaway father.
In the alley, a white jeep with smoky windows rumbles by, and the MS boys leap up. The 18 have been driving around the neighborhood in a similar white jeep, smashing in doors of MS houses and spraying everybody inside, grandmothers and children, with Uzis. Isidra Benegas, the mother of the crackhead, curses, "These deportees from the U.S. are to blame. They've brought the crack and the killing." A flicker of guilt crosses Cesar's face. He belonged to an MS chapter in Eagle Pass, Texas, before he was deported back to Honduras. "It's either live in the gang, or die," he retorts. And Cesar knows his death may be riding in the next passing car.

The Sons of Silence, one of the country’s biggest outlaw biker gangs. With its headquarters in Colorado, the Sons of Silence (SOS) are known as “one-percenters” — the term given to those that operate on the fringes of an otherwise law-abiding motorcycle community. One-percenters are dedicated to principles of personal freedom and the right to self-expression. Membership is by invitation only and their motto is Donecmors non separat — Latin that is intended to translate as “Until death separates us”. At first sight, an alliance of white supremacists and biker gang members seems an odd one. Edward Winterhalder, former leader of a rival biker gang known as the Bandidos and now an author on gang culture, said: “Most of them are just regular guys who work during the week and have a little too much fun at the weekends. The majority of them are law-abiding, have families. They’re just regular neighbourhood guys. “They love their Harley-Davidson motorcycles and love their brotherhood and the camaraderie of riding their bikes. They are very pro-government, they stand behind the flag. This is something they would never be involved in. Working with white supremacists would be an extremely unusual partnership.”
But Steve Cook, president of the Mid-West Outlaw Motorcycle Gang Investigations Association, said that the gangs were known to have a sub-culture — and a bad element — that could sit comfortably with racist extremism.
“I have personally seen SOS members wearing hats that say ‘Dirty White Boy’, T-shirts with swastikas and other Nazi regalia. “I don’t believe that even a group like the SOS would knowingly, as an organisation, get themselves involved in something like this because nothing good can come of it for them. “But would it be out of the realms for some of their associates or a member to do something like this on his own? No. Anything is in play.”

Louis Vuitton, Luella Bartley, Marc Jacobs, Anya Hindmarch and Sonia Rykiel are just a few of the shops targeted by "scooter gangs" - criminals on mopeds who drive through the windows and take what they want. Oddly, they don't clear out the shop; rather, they pick and choose very specific handbags. This suggests they are taking orders, possibly for collectors who don't want to wait. It's all speculative at this point, as tracking of the stolen goods has proved unsuccessful. Bold smash-and-grab thefts of handbags in London's upscale designer shops are increasing, reports British Vogue in the September issue. Metropolitan Police say the gangs work in groups of six or more young men, and there are currently about six gangs operating in London. They work for a middleman who shifts the goods which are thought to be transported overseas, "likely Russia and the United Arab Emirates where you can still get a high price for a designer bag."Designers aren't only hit at the retail level. In August 2007, a shipment of shoes that Alice Temperley had co-designed with Christian Louboutin for her S/S 2008 collection in New York was stolen during transport in Italy during what appears to be a planned hijacking. Oddly, they've never turned up anywhere. More devastating is that some thefts could potentially ruin careers. Christopher Kane, one of London's brightest new talents, was burglarised eight days before the start of last September's London fashion week. Ignoring the neighbouring photography studios filled with expensive equipment, the thieves entered Kane's and carefully hand-picked items, says Kane "as if they were in a shop". Fortunately, he was able to remake the missing pieces in time to show his third collection, which was a hit. Had the entire collection been stolen, Kane acknowledges that in "such an unforgiving industry" he would have been "ruined".

federal grand jury in Erie has indicted 13 people on charges they trafficked in cocaine. Though some of the 13 defendants are accused of working together, they are not accused of being part of the same overall conspiracy.The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Erie announced the indictments today. The indictments grew out of investigations by the FBI-led task Erie Area Gang Law Enforcement force, which focuses on large-scale drug operations.Most of the defendants are from Erie, and two are from Detroit. According to the indictments, the defendants are:
Rashad L. Williams, 22, of the 2400 block of McKinley Avenue, and Lamar A. Owens, 30, formerly of Las Vegas. They are accused of conspiracy to traffic in powder cocaine and crack cocaine, and Owens is accused of two counts of possessing powder cocaine and crack cocaine with the intent to distribute.Williams was also indicted in another case with Shawn T. Howard, 25, of the 800 block of West 19th Street. They are each accused of conspiracy to traffic in crack cocaine and possessing crack cocaine with the intent to distribute.Marvin T. Jones, 40, of the 300 block of East 14th Street, is accused of possessing crack cocaine with the intent to distribute.
Marcus D. Knight, 40, of the 1800 block of Buffalo Road, is accused of one count each of possessing crack cocaine with the intent to distribute and possessing cocaine base with the intent to distribute.Gilbert Jordan Sr., 50, of the 700 block of East 25th Street, is accused of one count each of possessing crack cocaine with the intent to distribute and possessing cocaine base with the intent to distribute.
Devoe D. Pickering, 27, of the 1600 block of German Street, is accused of possessing cocaine base with the intent to distribute.Samuel Tirado, 28, formerly of Erie, is accused of possessing cocaine base with the intent to distribute.
Robert J. Carver, 28, of Erie, but with no address listed, is accused of three counts of possessing cocaine with the intent to distribute and one count of carrying a firearm during a drug-trafficking crime.
Christopher G. Bowersox, 36, of the 2800 block of Atlantic Avenue, Millcreek Township, is accused of possessing cocaine base with the intent to distribute.
John C. Bisbee, 27, of the 100 block of Parade Street, is accused of possessing cocaine base with the intent to deliver.
Carl D. Smith, 35, and Ronald W. Thomas, 58, are accused of one count each of conspiracy to traffic in powder cocaine. Smith is also accused of one count of manufacturing cocaine base and possessing it with the intent to distribute.
The FBI previously charged Smith, with the indictment replacing those charges.

The purported leader of a gang that stole loads of cocaine and methamphetamine in home robberies and carjackings was sentenced to life in prison Monday.Five others sentenced Monday on drug and weapons charges included Robert Ortega-Martinez, 28, sentenced to 34 years; Ricardo Villegas, 28, sentenced to 26 years; Eduardo Ontiveros-Trevino, 37, sentenced to 17 years; Jaime Alberto Saavedra, 29, sentenced to 10 years, and Victor Marquez, 28, sentenced to 10 years.Jesus Espinosa, 30, of the Hermanos Pistoleros Latinos gang was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Randy Crane for conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute cocaine.Espinoza and 14 others, some from his gang and others from another group, were earlier convicted on various charges stemming from drug robberies in McAllen in 2006, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.
Espinoza's gang typically stole the drugs at gunpoint after receiving tips from the other group.

Peter Mitchell was sitting with a number of associates drinking in the El Jardin bar which is a hundred yards away from his own premises when the hitman struck on Thursday night.The gun man thought by locals to be a Moroccan hired by a drug gang – jumped out of a car and ran towards Mitchell.As Mitchell ran to the back of the bar to make his escape it is understood that the gun man fired at least four shots hitting him twice in the shoulder.According to eyewitnesses, the potential killer slipped and fell as he ran and as a result two innocent Irish people were hit by stray bullets.The hitman ran to a waiting car which was found burned-out some time later.
Yesterday, Mitchell was described by the Costa del Sol Hospital as not being in any danger. He was surrounded by his cronies and wife Sonia Walsh in a private room at the hospital.His cousin Christy Mitchell, who acts as his relation’s bodyguard, answered the phone in the gangster’s hospital room. The convicted drug dealer who is also from the inner city told a reporter: “Peter’s not around, he’s gone out for a jog but he wouldn’t speak anyway. We don’t speak to journalists.”Two other men one of whom is believed to be Irish were shot in a separate incident in the early hours of yesterday morning.The men got into a row at the trendy Nikki Beach, a venue popular with Irish and UK expats and holiday makers, in the resort of Elviria 10 minutes from Marbella town centre.Although some of those involved in the shooting are associates of Mitchell’s, it is understood the shooting was the result of a drunken and cocaine-fuelled row that got out of control.As a result of the shooting incidents, which have claimed five casualties in just over 24 hours in Marbella, the Spanish police are expected to launch a major offensive against the crime gangs who are destroying one of the wealthiest holiday hot spots in Spain.

outlaw motorcycle gang, the Rebels, will be closely monitored by police during their overnight stay on the Sunshine Coast this weekend.The notorious Queensland bikie gang, also reportedly the world's largest Big Twin Harley-Davidson club, is expected to roll into the Sunshine Coast today wearing full club colours - red, blue and white.The Australian Crime Commission has said the Rebels are a major player in the drug trade and are heavily involved in organised crime.Yet Queensland police media virtually sanctioned the outlaw gang yesterday, warning drivers to expect delays as the club wound its way through the city before heading to the Sunshine Coast and Brisbane.Police are expecting close to 600 Rebels members to attend a function at the Kunda Park clubhouse tonight as part of the gang's compulsory national run.
Superintendent Ben Hanbidge said the outlaw motorcycle gang would be watched closely during its stay."It's no secret that we have adopted a very strong approach to (outlaw motorcycle gangs), not only on the Sunshine Coast but right throughout the North Coast Region, and we will continue to target their unlawful activities," Superintendent Hanbidge said."I don't want them here, and I am sure that the majority of the Sunshine Coast community probably don't want them here, and whilst we can't prevent them from coming, we will do everything we can to make it uncomfortable for them and will be watching their activities very closely.
"Action will be taken where there is any evidence of traffic violations or anti-social behaviour."It is believed the bikies will return to Brisbane on Sunday.

off-duty Seattle police detective who shot and seriously wounded a Hells Angel in a bar fight at a South Dakota motorcycle rally earlier this month has clashed with a member of the outlaw motorcycle club before, according to court records, police reports and interviews.Detective Ron Smith filed charges against a Seattle Hells Angel in 2005, alleging that Anthony James Magnesi, a member of the Washington Nomads chapter of the Hells Angels, had threatened him over the phone.Magnesi, in turn, recorded one of their phone conversations and gave it to the police department's Office of Professional Accountability (OPA), claiming it was Smith who had threatened him.An internal investigation was opened, and the incident was referred to Smith's supervisor as a training issue, according to OPA officials.The misdemeanor criminal charges filed by Smith against the biker were dismissed after Magnesi's lawyers played the tape for city prosecutors, according to Magnesi's attorney, Paul Bernstein, and court records.On a copy of the tape given to The Seattle Times by Bernstein, Smith calls Magnesi a "dirtbag," taunts him about suspected criminal activity — although Magnesi was not under investigation by Smith and has never been convicted of a serious crime — and tells him "you better watch your back."Smith tells Magnesi that simply "being a member of the Hells Angels outlaw motorcycle gang is a ... crime."The detective also boasts that he's a member of the biggest "gang" of all: "It's called law enforcement. You got it?"The recording contains only Smith's side of the conversation — what Magnesi is saying can't be heard. Bernstein said the recording device was set up that way.Magnesi declined to be interviewed for this story, but gave Bernstein permission to discuss the incident.Officer an avid biker, tooSmith, an avid biker himself and a member of the Iron Pigs Motorcycle Club, which draws its riders from police and firefighters, frequently opines about the scourge of "outlaw bikers" in a regular column he writes as editor of The Guardian, the Seattle Police Officer Guild's newspaper.
It is not known whether Smith's apparent contempt for the Hells Angels played a role in the incident in Sturgis, S.D. What is known is that, among an estimated 500 revelers at the Loud American Roadhouse early on the morning of Aug. 9, it was Smith who wound up in a confrontation with members of the gang.
Smith won't talk about it or his earlier run-in with Magnesi, and the Seattle Police Department is withholding comment pending a criminal investigation by a grand jury in Meade County, S.D., said spokesman Sgt. Sean Whitcomb. The grand jury reconvenes on Wednesday.Authorities in South Dakota have also declined to comment on the investigation.The Seattle Police Department is conducting an internal investigation into the incident, and the command staff will review the use of deadly force in a separate inquiry.Smith says that he was "cold-cocked" by a Hells Angel and then jumped by others. He has said the assault was unprovoked and that he was fighting for his life with as many as three Hells Angels when he pulled a handgun and shot one of them.Joseph McGuire, a Hells Angel from Imperial Beach, Calif., was seriously wounded in the shooting.Smith, 43, was working as a theft detective in Seattle's Southwest Precinct in May 2005 when Magnesi called him from Lucky's Choppers, his custom motorcycle business on Airport Way South. Magnesi had "heard I had been talking about him" and wanted to know why, Smith wrote in a police report on the incident.Magnesi, Bernstein said, learned of Smith's inquiries through a friend, who had given him the detective's telephone number.Smith acknowledges in his report, and on the tape, that he "has no business" with Magnesi. Nor does he ever explain why he was asking around about him.Magnesi called from a blocked number, but Smith was able to determine where the call was coming from and told him so.
"Suspect Magnesi informed in a sarcastic tone that he knew where I worked as well," Smith wrote.
"Based on the fact that he is known to me as an armed and dangerous person ... and associated with the Hells Angels I took his assertion that he knew where I worked as a veiled threat."Bernstein pointed out that Magnesi had just called the detective at his desk at the police station: "Of course he knew where he worked. How is that a threat?"
"Armed and dangerous"
Smith's reference to Magnesi being "armed and dangerous" involved a 2003 arrest for assault in which Magnesi allegedly threatened three people with a handgun in downtown Seattle, firing a shot between the legs of one of the victims.
When Magnesi was arrested, police confiscated a handgun, a concealed-carry permit and Magnesi's Hells Angel jacket and patches — his "colors," considered sacrosanct by members — which were never returned, Bernstein says.
Bernstein says Magnesi believes that Smith has them, although Smith denies it on the recording. The detective says he wouldn't "want my hands on the filthy red and white."By the time of the phone calls, the assault charges had been dropped because the witnesses refused to testify. One claimed he was contacted by a man thought to be Joshua Binder, the Nomads' onetime "enforcer" and a member of the "Filthy Few" — Hells Angels who have killed for the club — and told not to testify, according to court records.No witness-intimidation charges were ever filed.
Binder and several other Nomads were convicted last year of conspiracy and racketeering, and Binder admitted to a role in the murder of a man who posed as a club member.Smith testified briefly at their federal trial about a run-in he had while a bicycle officer with Binder and another Hells Angel in a bar in Pioneer Square. Both men were carrying guns.Magnesi called Smith a second time that same morning, this time recording the conversation without telling the detective. Washington is a two-party consent state, meaning that everyone involved in taped conversations must be told they're being recorded.Bernstein acknowledges this, but says the law has an exception where threats are involved. No charges were filed in connection with the tape.Once Smith figures out he's being recorded, he tells Magnesi that "playing on the telephone ... is a crime."Telling a police detective that you know where he works at is a bigger crime, OK? Being a member of the Hells Angels Outlaw motorcycle gang is even a bigger crime."
Smith has been disciplined twice by the department. In 2005, he was suspended for two days for conduct unbecoming an officer after taunting fans at a Seahawks football game. That same year, he had a verbal altercation with a restaurant employee.In the first instance, he received two days off. The second incident resulted in a letter in his file.

Trial of Chad Wilson, 32, of Lynnwood, Wash., and John Midmore, 34, of Valparaiso, Ind. will kick off this fall in a Minnehaha County courtroom.The two Hells Angels bikers are charged with shooting at and injuring six members of a rival gang, the Outlaws, at the 2006 Sturgis Motorcycle Rally.To accommodate witnesses, the trial won't start until November. That's the latest in a series of complicated procedural delays that have stalled the trial. But here's a timeline of the events so far.
Two men pull up outside Legion Lake Resort in Custer State Park in the afternoon and open fire on a small group of people, according to witnesses at a campground across the street. Six are injured - five by gunfire - and the men speed away.
The same night, Wilson and Midmore are arrested and charged with five counts of attempted murder. The South Dakota Attorney General's Office identifies the victims as members or associates of the Outlaws and Wilson as a member of the Hells Angels. Midmore was described as a prospect for the Hells Angels. Experts and law enforcement officials say the two gangs have been at war.In the first court action, Custer County States Attorney Tracey Kelley argues successfully that the Hells Angels are capable of coming up with massive amounts of bail money. Bail for Wilson and Midmore is set at $5 million each. Court documents say authorities found a .40 caliber magazine on the floorboard of a truck leased to Wilson, and that investigators collected 16 spent cartridges from the scene.The rally ends without retaliation, as the Outlaws pack up their campground and leave the Black Hills.
Both suspects are arraigned in Rapid City. Wilson is charged with five counts of attempted first-degree murder and one count of conspiracy to commit a crime. Midmore is charged with five counts of aiding, abetting or advising attempted first-degree murder and a count of conspiracy. Both plead not guilty in what the judge calls a "free-for-all shooting."The trial of Wilson and Midmore is scheduled for June.
The trial is postponed until Sept. 24 because of an argument over defense requests to have evidence - a gun clip - tested by their own expert.After the trial is again delayed, prosecutors protest Circuit Judge John Delaney's decision, at the request of the defense, to seal documents from an independent test on a vehicle allegedly used in the crime. Prosecutors also object to closed meetings between the judge and defense attorneys. The South Dakota Supreme Court agrees to hear the appeal, further delaying the trial.Arguing before the state Supreme Court, special prosecutor and Beadle County State's Attorney Michael Moore says prosecutors should have been present for the meetings about evidence.The high court agrees with the prosecutor. Delaney's ruling regarding testing of the truck is overturned. A hearing should have been held to allow arguments from both prosecutors and defense lawyers before Delaney dealt with the defense request to examine a pickup that is evidence in the case, the high court said.Retired Judge Gene Paul Kean hears the case as Midmore and Wilson plead not guilty to new, superceding counts: one count of conspiracy to commit first-degree murder, five counts of attempted first-degree murder and one count of commission of a felony while armed. Kean rejected prosecutors' requests to include information about previous convictions.The judge rules in favor of a motion to bring the case to Sioux Falls. The trial is scheduled for Nov. 3.

Chilliwack realtor gunned down in his car late Wednesday was closely associated with the notorious United Nations criminal organization, The Vancouver Sun has learned.
In fact, Mike Gordon, 33, had bought and sold a number of properties for the UN gang's jailed leader Clayton Roueche. Roueche, an accused international trafficker, is scheduled to go to trial in Seattle Sept. 8 on a series of cocaine- and marijuana-smuggling charges. Gordon, who worked for the Surrey office of Best Bet Realty, was shot to death about 8:30 p.m. Wednesday in the 5600-block of Promontory Road in Chilliwack. Chilliwack RCMP said Gordon was known to them and was killed in a targeted slaying. The UN gang has suffered a number of blows in recent months, at the hands of both law enforcement agencies and gangland rivals. Gordon's slaying comes just a month after another UN realtor, Elliott (Taco) Castaneda, was shot to death in Guadalajara, Mexico along with the gang's Mexican connection, Ahmet (Lou) Kaawach. Castaneda had been working for Abbotsford's Homelife Realty, but resigned from his job in June. At his wake in the Fraser Valley city July 25, police searched mourners and seized two guns.

Open-air drug market in the Englewood area that authorities believe had ties to the Gangster Disciples was shut down, Chicago police said Wednesday.Police conducted 19 undercover crack cocaine buys during a six-month sting that monitored drug sales in a block of West 56th Street between South Elizabeth Street and South Racine Avenue, police said in a news release.Six people were arrested on drug charges during Operation Lackawanna, and police are looking for two people who allegedly sold drugs on the block.Police said it was the 47th open-air drug market that has been shut down this year.

Five-time Mexican supercross champion was brutally murdered in his home by a biker gang on Monday.Rene Tercero Reyes Aguirre was shot by an armed gang who broke into his home in Juarez, Mexico.Two friends of the 24 year old rider were also murdered in the attack, which followed a series of violent gang-related attacks in the town on Monday that left a total of 11 people dead.The violence raged on into Tuesday, when a further three people were killed.

violent brawl may have started because the Hells Angels thought a Christian motorcycle ministry was claiming an affiliation with them, according to court documents made public Thursday.
The 52-page search warrant affidavit, filed in Orange County Superior Court, also cites an anonymous tipster who called police shortly after the July 27 brawl and said the Set Free Soldiers were planning a "war party" at an abandoned chicken farm in Riverside County.
One member had readied a "truckload of guns" there, the caller told authorities.
Set Free's leader, Phillip Aguilar, and four other biker ministers were charged with weapons and gang felonies after the fight at a Newport Beach bar that ended in two stabbings. The dust-up prompted police to raid the Set Free Christian Ministries compound in Anaheim, where they allegedly recovered thousands of rounds of ammunition and dozens of guns and knives. They also raided Hells Angels homes in Costa Mesa and Rancho Santa Margarita. Attorneys for Aguilar and the Set Free Soldiers didn't immediately return calls seeking comment on Thursday.
Aguilar, 60, started his counterculture church in 1982 after saying he found Jesus while doing time in the state penitentiary for child abuse. His church, which prides itself on its outreach to criminals, drug addicts and biker gangs, has attracted thousands of members nationwide and operates several drug rehab homes around Southern The brawl began at Blackie's By the Sea, when five Hells Angels met with Aguilar and two other Set Free Soldiers, according to police reports and the affidavit. During am argument, eight other Set Free Soldiers entered the bar and surrounded the Hells Angels, who then began throwing punches. Police have said they believe the Set Free Soldiers initiated the meeting and wanted to ambush the Hells Angels. One Set Free pastor caught fleeing with a bloody knife in his car told police the brawl began when the Hells Angels' leader confronted Aguilar and told him Set Free had been claiming affiliation with the Hells Angels, the documents state.
The Hells Angel leader allegedly told Aguilar they were not authorized to take business from the Hells Angels. Set Free member Glenn Schoeman told police he was afraid the Hells Angels would now be "greenlighted" to kill him and other Set Free members since they had drawn blood in the fight, the documents state. Schoeman has since been charged with a felony count of concealing evidence in the stabbing for allegedly hiding the knife, as street terrorism and gang enhancements.

Reputed member of West Oakland's Acorn drug gang died early Wednesday from gunshot wounds sustained Tuesday night in East Oakland, police said.
He was identified as Jonathan Gonzalez, 21, whose street name was "Redbone," police said.A 34-year-old man who said he was Gonzalez's cousin was also wounded. His name was not released, and police were not sure if he lived in Oakland or Emeryville.
The shooting happened about 9:53 p.m. Tuesday at a housing project in the 1200 block of 65th Avenue.The older man told police he and Gonzalez were walking back from a store when they were confronted by a man with a gun who began shooting at them. Both men were hit several times by gunfire.Gonzalez died from his wounds at 2:29 a.m. Wednesday at Highland Hospital. The other man was in critical condition at a local hospital.The survivor told police he did not know why the man shot them, nor what he and Gonzalez were doing in East Oakland.One investigator said Gonzalez "may have got caught slippin," a street term for someone who gets overconfident about their safety and is not as careful as they should be.Police said Gonzalez has been seen lately in East Oakland and was arrested Aug. 1 in the 5900 block of Bromley Avenue — a few blocks from where he was fatally shot — on suspicion of selling drugs, but was not charged.Police said numerous people witnessed the shooting, and at least 30 people were present when officers first arrived on the scene. However, so far no one has been willing to talk to police.Sgt. Jim Rullamas said there could be several motives for the killing.Police said there was not enough evidence to arrest Gonzalez in a police roundup of the Acorn gang June 17 that followed a two-month investigation focusing on drug dealing, shootings and other acts of violence linked to the group. More than 50 suspected members were jailed and are being prosecuted.
Police said Gonzalez had been shot at least once in the past and was suspected of but never charged in several gang-related shootings.Police said Gonzalez was ambushed Jan. 31, 2006, by four suspected members of the Lower Bottoms gang, another violent West Oakland group, outside a store at 8th and Adeline streets.Gonzalez was wounded in the arm, but one of the bullets killed Gamel Attayeb, 25, a San Leandro father of two who was about to go into the store. Police described Attayeb as "a totally innocent victim."The four arrested and charged in the shooting were all convicted earlier this year of counts ranging from first degree murder to second degree murder to voluntary manslaughter; all counts included gang enhancement clauses. The gunman got life in prison without parole, another man got 15 years to life, another 24 years and the fourth a 14-year sentence.Gonzalez's killing was Oakland's 87th homicide of the year. Last year at this time, there were 85 homicides.

The Red Scorpions are considered to be one of the most violent gangs in B.C. and members have been identified as suspects in the slaughter of six people in a Surrey highrise in October 2007.Victoria police say they've dismantled a chapter of the Vancouver-based Red Scorpions gang that aggressively expanded in the capital city's drug trade by threatening other dealers and sometimes giving crack cocaine away for free.Police arrested six people, in their late teens and early 20s, last week and raided a Saanich house -- on Borden Street, near McKenzie Avenue -- they called the base of operations for a burgeoning Greater Victoria "dial-a-dope" operation.In addition to the arrests, police seized $3,000 in cash, $1,000 in cocaine and a loaded sawed-off shotgun, said Const. Colin Brown, a lead investigator.The raid was the culmination of a month-long undercover operation by the Greater Victoria Regional Crime Unit, and Victoria and Saanich police. Plainclothes officers bought crack cocaine from dealers downtown, said Brown."We certainly believe that we've made a dent in this group," said Brown.During the undercover work, police identified 11 people they thought were either members or associates of the Red Scorpions. Six were arrested and face court dates this week. Two are in custody for unrelated charges, and three remain on the loose and are wanted, say police.Those arrested face a variety of drug trafficking and possession for the purpose of trafficking charges. They are to appear in court this week. Victoria police will ask the court to ban some of them from returning to Vancouver Island, said Brown.
The Red Scorpion gang was recruiting members in Victoria by distributing free crack cocaine with a phone number for orders it filled 24 hours a day, said Brown. The Scorpions were also "very aggressive" to other dealers and police were concerned about the potential for future violence, said Brown.
It was established in the Lower Mainland eight years ago by a group of young men who met each other in a youth detention facility and has grown over the years. Many members have a "RS" tattoo on their wrists, neck or shoulders.
Two years ago, several Red Scorpions were arrested in connection with a large crack cocaine "dial-a-dope" operation in Coquitlam, Burnaby, New Westminster and Port Moody. After 10 accused in the ring pleaded guilty, it was believed the Scorpions had been disbanded but police said earlier this year the gang was still active.
Sgt. Shinder Kirk, of the B.C. Integrated Gang Task Force, said he's aware people in Victoria are affiliated with the Red Scorpions, but he didn't know whether they are associates or members.He said many individuals will operate under the moniker of certain groups, such as the Scorpions, in a franchise-type situation in order to intimidate and sell their drugs. "No community is immune; if there's a market for their product, they'll operate there," said Kirk.Police pressure on the Lower Mainland may have played a part in the gang's decision to expand to Vancouver Island, said Sgt. Dave Bown, head of the Greater Victoria Regional Crime Unit

The investigation into the Columbus Hotel fire is still in its earliest stage, but you can be sure police are well into considering the first thing that was on the mind of a lot of people Tuesday.
The Columbus's reputation as a biker bar led many to assume the fire was gang related -- with one gang striking at the other by torching one of the places some of its rivals were known to frequent.
It had been only two weeks since the last public violent encounter involving the local underworld took place, that being the downtown shootout allegedly between rival factions of the Independent Soldiers.
If people's assumptions are correct and the Columbus fire is the work of gang members, it escalates an already tense situation that has become increasingly and frighteningly public.
Two men, residents of the hotel said to be unconnected to any gang, are feared dead in the charred rubble where only three brick walls still stand.
If the Prince George Fire Department determines arson is the cause, the police investigation takes on a double-homicide element. Those intent on misspending their youth by succumbing to the allure of being a drugged-out minion, a gang footsoldier, might want to consider the grave consequences. They're damned if they do carry out their masters' wishes and damned if they don't.
Among those watching the scene in disbelief Tuesday were several youths with at least a passing familiarity with street life in Prince George. One rode his bicycle downtown to place a resume at the Centre for Learning Alternatives, directly across Second Avenue from the still-smouldering remains of the Columbus. He hadn't heard about the fire by Tuesday afternoon and couldn't believe what he saw.
"It's probably gangs," he said without prompting, getting back on his bike after finding the centre closed for the day because of the fire.
"I was going to meet a guy down here. We were both going to try for (job) placements. He used to be in a gang and I read that he got out.
"They should all do that," he said as he rode off, still clutching his resume.
The young man was close enough to street life to know how things work, but smart enough to know it's a dead end, sometimes literally.
Oh, for more like him.

A man who was shot by an off-duty police officer during the annual Sturgis Motorcycle Rally is still recovering from his injuries at Rapid City Regional Hospital, officials reported Sunday.
Joseph McGuire, 33, of Imperial Beach, Calif. who is a member of the notorious Hells Angels Motorcycle Club, was shot at about 1 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 9 at the Loud American Roadhouse, a bar in Sturgis. According to previous reports in the Seattle Times, he had suffered wounds to his stomach and his leg. His condition is improving, as McGuire has been moved from the intensive care unit to a different floor of the hospital.Ron Smith, 43, an off-duty Seattle police officer who is a member of the Iron Pigs Motorcycle Club, an organization of law enforcement officers and firefighters who are also motorcycle enthusiasts, allegedly shot McGuire. According to previous reports, the shots were fired after an altercation started between Smith and several Hells Angels. McGuire has reported to the Seattle Times that he felt as though his life was in danger during the attack.While there has been some speculation that the reason for the fight between the Hells Angels and the Iron Pigs was because the officers refused to remove their motorcycle club “colors” or patches, authorities now think there could be more to the case. Less than a year ago Smith testified against members of the Hells Angels group, a testimony that sent at least four members of the gang to prison on racketeering and attempted murder charges. Authorities have not uncovered any evidence that suggests the Hells Angels altercation was related to Smith's testimony, but officials are not ruling it out as a possibility.Smith has not yet been charged in the shooting. After being detained for questioning Saturday night, he was allowed to return home to Seattle, where he and other officers who were present during the shooting have reportedly been relieved of duty while an investigation continues. A grand jury, which was originally assembled Sunday, Aug. 10, is scheduled to reconvene Aug. 27 at the Meade County Courthouse to hear testimony from witnesses in the bar, law enforcement investigating the case, and others.One of the issues to be discussed is whether Smith legally had a firearm with him while in the Loud American Roadhouse, a popular hangout during the Rally. While state law prohibits off-duty police officers from carrying firearms into an establishment that sells alcohol, a federal law entitled the “Law Enforcement Officers Safety Act of 2004” allows officers to carry firearms at all times, with few exceptions. The law does not allow officers to carry the weapons when they are intoxicated.

The chronology of cannabis

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2737 BC: Cannabis referred to as a "superior" herb in the world's first medical text, or pharmacopoeia, Shen Nung's Pen Ts'ao, in China
1500 BC : Cannabis-smoking Scythians sweep through Europe and Asia, settling and inventing the scythe.
1400 BC : Cultural and religious use of ganga or cannabis, and charas or hashish (resin) recorded used by Hindus in India.
c.600 BC : Zend-Avesta, Indian scripture, speaks of hemp's intoxicating resin.
c.500 BC : Gautama Buddha said to have survived by eating hempseed. Cannabis used in Germany (Hochdorf Hallstatt D wagon burial site). First botanical drawings of cannabis in Constantinopolitaus.
450 BC : Herodotus records Scythians and Thracians as consuming cannabis and making fine linens of hemp.
300 BC : Carthage and Rome struggle for political and commercial power over hemp and spice trade routes in the Mediterranean.
100 BC : Chinese make paper from hemp and mulberry.
70 BC : Roman Emperor Nero's surgeon, Dioscorides, praises cannabis for making the stoutest cords and for its medicinal properties.
c.30 AD : Jesus teaches: Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man (Matthew 15:11). The Gospels refer to the New Wine and declare that it is best when the clusters are ripe.
100 AD : Roman surgeon Dioscorides names the plant cannabis sativa and describes various medicinal uses. Pliny reported of industrial uses and wrote a manual on farming hemp.
400 AD : Cannabis cultivated for the first time in the UK at Old Buckenham Mere
500 AD : First botanical drawing of hemp in Constantinopolitanus
600 AD : Germans, Franks, Vikings etc all use hemp fibre.
800 AD : Mohammed allows cannabis but forbids the use of alcohol.
1000 AD : The English word "hempe" first listed in a dictionary. Moslems produce hashish medicine and social use.
1150 AD : Moslems use hemp to start Europe's first paper mill. Most of the paper is made from hemp for the next 750 years, including Bibles.
1379 AD : Emir Soudon Sheikhouni of Joneima prohibits cannabis consumption amongst the poor, destroys the crops, and punishes offenders by pulling out their teeth.
1484 AD : Inquisitor Pope Innocent VIII outlaws hashish.
1494 AD : Hemp paper industry starts in England.
1545 AD : Hemp agriculture arrives in China.
1554 AD : The Spanish grow hemp in Peru.
1563 AD : English Queen Elizabeth I decrees that land owners with more than 60 acres must grow hemp or be fined 5 pounds.
1564 AD : King Philip of Spain orders hemp grown throughout his empire from modern Arhentina to Oregon.
1600 AD : Dutch achieve the "Golden Age" through hemp commerce. Explorers find "wilde hempe" in North America.
1606 AD : The British take cannabis to Canada for maritime uses.
1611 AD : The British start growing cannabis in Virginia.
1619 AD : Virginia colony makes hemp cultivation mandatory, followed by most other colonies. Europe pays hemp bounties.
1621 AD : Burton's The Anatomy of Melancholy claims cannabis is a treatment for depression.
1631 AD : Hemp used as money throughout American colonies.
1632 AD : The Pilgrims take cannabis to New England.
1637 AD : The General Court at Hartford, Connecticut, orders that all families plant one teaspoon of cannabis seeds.
1639 AD : Massachusetts Courts follow Hartford.
1753 AD : Cannabis Sativa classified by Linneaus.
1763 AD : New English Dictionary says cannabis root applied to skin eases inflammation.
1776 AD : Declaration of Independence drafted on hemp paper.
1791 AD : President Washington sets duties on hemp to encourage domestic industry. "Make the most of the Indian Hemp Seed" ........President George Washington. (Library of USA Congress 1794 vol. 33 p.270). President Jefferson calls hemp a necessity and urges farmers to grow hemp instead of tobacco.
1800 AD : Cotton gins make cheaper fibre than hemp. Napoleon prohibits his men in Egypt from using cannabis, but to little effect.
1835 AD : The Club de Hashichines is founded.
1839 AD : Homeopathy journal 'American Provers' Union' publishes first report on effects of cannabis.
1840 AD : "Prohibition... goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control mans' appetite through legislation and makes a crime out of things that are not even crimes... A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our Government was founded"...........Abraham Lincoln (December 1840)
1841 AD : Dr. W.B.O'Shaughnessy, "On the Preparation of the Indian Hemp or Ganja" introduces cannabis to western science.
1845 AD : Psychologist and inventor of modern psychopharmacology and psychotomimetric drug treatment, Jacques-Joseph Moreau de Tours documents physical and mental benefits of cannabis.
1850 AD : Petrochemical age begins. Toxic sulphite and chlorine processes make paper from trees: steamships replace (hemp) sails; tropical fibres introduced.. USA census records 8327 hemp plantations of over 2000 acres each.
1854 AD : Bayard Taylor essay Visions of Hashish.
1857 AD : Fitz Hugh Ludlow publishes The Hasheesh Eater;
1857 AD : Smith Brothers of Edinburgh market cannabis indica extracts.
1860 AD : First governmental commission study of cannabis and hashish conducted by Ohio State Medical Society. It catalogues the conditions for which cannabis is beneficial: neuralgia, nervous rheumatism, mania, whooping cough, asthma, chronic bronchitis, muscular spasms, epilepsy, infantile convulsions, palsy, uterine haemorrhage, dysmenorrhea, hysteria, alcohol withdrawal and loss of appetite.
1868 AD : The Emir of Egypt makes the possession of cannabis a capital offence.
1869 AD : Tales of Hashish by A.C. Kimmens
1870 AD : Cannabis listed in US Pharmacopoeia as a medicine.
1870 AD : South Africa worried about cannabis use among Indian workers, passes a law forbidding the smoking, use or possession of hemp by Indians.
1876 AD : Hashish served at American Centennial Exposition.
1877 AD : The Sultan of Turkey makes cannabis illegal, to little effect.
1894 AD : British Indian Hemp Drugs Commission studies social use of cannabis and comes out firmly against its prohibition.
1895 AD : First known use of the name "marijuana" for smoking, by Pancho Villa's supporters in Sonora, Mexico.
1909 AD : Shanghai Conference: first international meeting on drugs is held to discuss opium. The USA passes an act to prohibit the buying or selling of opium for non-medicinal purposes.
1910 AD : African-American "reefer" use reported in Jazz Clubs in New Orleans, said to be influencing white people. Mexicans smoking marijuana in Texas. South Africa prohibits cannabis.
1911 AD : Hindus reported to be using ganja in San Francisco.
1911 AD : South Africa bans cannabis.
1912 AD : "Essay on Hasheesh" by Victor Rolson. Possibilities of putting controls on cannabis use is first raised.
1912 AD : Hague Conference; second international meeting on drugs. 46 nations discuss opium, morphine, cocaine, heroin and cannabis. The Hague Convention for the Suppression of Opium and Other Drugs, was drawn up, requiring parties to confine to medical and legitimate purposes the manufacture, sale and use of opium, heroin, morphine and cocaine; Cannabis was not included. (From Mandeson, D. From Mr Sin to Mr Big, A history of Australian Drug Laws, Oxford University Press Melbourne 1995)
1912 AD : First suggestions that cannabis should be banned internationally, at the First Opium Conference.
1915 AD : Utah State, then California and Texas outlaw cannabis. Cocaine banned in the USA.
1916 AD : USDA Bulletin 404 calls for a new program of expansion of hemp to replace uses of timber by industry.
1919 AD : Texas outlaws cannabis. Alcohol is prohibited throughout the USA. Cannabis is still legal in most States.
1920 AD : DuPont experiments with petrochemicals. Gang war takes over the alcohol industry, homicides increase drastically.
1923 AD : South African delegate at League of Nations calls for international controls on cannabis, claiming that it makes mine workers less active. Britain insists on further research.
1923 AD : Louisiana, Nevada, Oregon and Washington outlaw cannabis.
1924 AD : At the Second International Opiates conference Egyptian delegate claims serious problems are associated with hashish use and calls for immediate international controls. Sub-committee listens to Egypt and Turkey. Cannabis declared a narcotic. Cannabis Ruderalis identified by Lamarck.
1927 AD : New York outlaws cannabis.
1928 AD : UK Dangerous Drugs Act (September 28th) 1925 becomes law and makes cannabis illegal.
1929 AD : The Panama Canal Zone Report concludes that there is no evidence that cannabis use is habit-forming or deleterious, recommending no action be taken against cannabis use or sale.
1929 AD : South West states make cannabis illegal as part of a move to oust Mexican immigrants.
1930 AD : Henry Ford makes his motor cars out of hemp with hemp paint and hemp fuel. New machines invented to break hemp, process the fibre and convert the pulp or hurds into paper, plastics etc. 1200 hash bars in New York City. Racist fears of Mexicans, Asians and African-Americans lead the cry for cannabis to be outlawed.
1930's AD New mechanised hemp harvesting methods invented
1930 AD : Louis Armstrong arrested in Los Angeles for possession of cannabis.
1931 AD : Federal Bureau of Narcotics formed with Anslinger at the head. By now 29 US states have banned non-prescription cannabis
1934 AD : Anslinger refers to "ginger-haired ******s" in FBI official circulars.
1936 AD : South Western states call for FBI to ban cannabis.
1937 AD : Marijuana Tax Act forbids hemp farming. The Act was based on the Machine Gun Transfer Act which made it illegal to pass on machine guns without a government stamp - there being no such stamps available. By applying this strategy to marijuana, Anslinger was able to effectively ban hemp without contravening constitutional rights.
1937 AD : DuPont files patents for nylon, plastics and a new bleaching process for paper. Anslinger testifies to congress that Marijuana is the most violence-causing drug known to man. The objections of the American Medical Association are ignored. The Marijuana Transfer Tax Bill (14th April) introduced to US House, Ways and Means Committee, passed December, prohibits industrial and medical uses and calls flowering tops a narcotic. Violations attract 200 dollar fines. Birdseed, rope and cordage are exempted from tax.
1937 AD : DuPont patents plastics, seizing the opportunity created by cannabis hemp prohibition
1939 AD : LaGuardia Report started
1941 AD : Cannabis dropped from USA Pharmacopoeia
1941 AD : Henry Ford's car is made from and runs on cannabis.
1943 AD : Hemp for Victory program urges farmers to grow hemp to help war effort.
1943 AD : US Military Surgeon magazine declares that smoking cannabis is no more harmful than smoking tobacco.
1944 AD : New York Academy of Medicine reports marijuana use does not cause violent behaviour, provoke insanity, lead to addiction or promote opiate usage. Anslinger describes the authors as dangerous and strange.
1944 AD : New York Mayor's La Guardia Report "The Marijuana problem in the City of New York" concludes that smoking marijuana does not lead to addiction in the medical sense of the word, that juvenile delinquency is not associated with marijuana smoking and that the publicity concerning the catastrophic effects of marijuana smoking in New York is unfounded.
1944 AD : Anslinger threatens doctors who carry out cannabis research with imprisonment.
1945 AD : USA 'Newsweek' reports over 100,000 Americans use cannabis.
1948 AD : Anslinger now says cannabis users are peaceful and that cannabis could be used during a communist invasion, to weaken American will to fight.
1948 AD : United Nation's Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948 AD : Hollywood star Robert Mitchum arrested for cannabis.
1951 AD : UN Bulletin of Narcotic Drugs states over 200 million cannabis users in the world.
1952 AD : First UK cannabis arrest at Number 11 Club, Soho, London.
1955 AD : Hemp farming outlawed again.
1960 AD : Hippies, Vietnam Veterans, pop fans adopt cannabis.
1961 AD : UN Treaty 406 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs seeks to outlaw cannabis use and cannabis cultivation worldwide and eradicate cannabis smoking within 30 years (by 1991). USA representative is Anslinger.
1962 AD : President Kennedy sacks Anslinger. Kennedy using cannabis as a pain relief.
1963 AD : Kennedy assassinated.
1964 AD : Thelin Brothers open first US 'Head Shop'.
1964 AD : THC, tetrahydracannabinol, first isolated
1966 AD : Donovan becomes first UK celebrity to be busted for cannabis.
1967 AD : SOMA Times Petition in the UK urges legalisation of cannabis. The Beatles sign it. 3,000 people hold a 'smoke-in' in Hyde Park.. Keith Richards and Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones are arrested and imprisoned for cannabis. This prompts a Times editorial 'Who breaks a butterfly on a wheel?'. The convictions are quashed on appeal.. In the UK 2,393 persons arrested for cannabis offences.. In the USA over 3,000 joints mailed to addresses at random by Abbie Hoffman and the Yippies.
1968 AD : John Lennon arrested for cannabis possession.
1968 AD : 1 November : UK Government Wootton Report recommends cannabis possession should not be an offence. "Having reviewed all the material available to us we find ourselves in agreement with the conclusion reached by the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission appointed by the Government of India (1893-94) and the New York Mayor's Committee (1944 - LaGuardia) that the long-term consumption of cannabis in moderate doses has no harmful effects."
1968 AD : Campaign to stop US soldiers in Vietnam from taking cannabis - they switch to heroin.
1969 AD : James Callaghan, UK Labour Prime Minister, rejects the findings of the Wootton Report.
1969 AD : George Harrison arrested for cannabis.
1970 AD : Social use of cannabis receives widespread acceptance despite illegality; policy of decriminalisation sweeps across USA and Britain.
1970 AD : LeDain Report (Canada) recommended that serious consideration be given to the legalisation of personal possession of marijuana. It finds that cannabis use increases self-confidence, feelings of creativity and sensual awareness, facilitates concentration and self-acceptance, reduces tension, hostility and aggression and may produce psychological but not physical dependence. The report recommends that possession laws be repealed
1970 AD : R. Keith Stroup founds NORML 'National Organisation for Reform of Marijuana Laws', in UDSA.
1970 AD : USA Marijuana Transfer Tax declared unconstitutional.
1971 AD : British Misuse of Drugs Act classifies cannabis as a Class B drug with stiff sentencing. This bans the medical use of cannabis, ignoring the Wootton Report.
1971 AD : UN Convention on Psychotopic Substances
1972 AD : US President Richard Nixon says 'I am against legalising marijuana'.
1972 AD : Baan Commission presents report to Dutch Minister of Health and suggests that cannabis trade below a quarter of a kilo ought to be considered as a misdemeanour only.
1973 AD : Oregon considering legalisation
1973 AD : US Shafer Commission, appointed by Nixon, declares that personal use of marijuana should be decriminalised as should casual distribution of small amounts for no or insignificant renumeration
1973 AD : UN Convention of Psychotropic Substances: cannabis is a narcotic.
1974 AD : US Senate report on Marijuana-Hashish Epidemic and its Impact on US Security claims that cannabis use cause brain damage, a-motivation and genetic and reproductive defects
1975 AD : Hundreds of US doctors call for more research on cannabis.
1975 AD : Alaska legalises cannabis for personal use. Limit on amount is one ounce.
1975 AD : After 3 years of campaigning to abolish penal sanctions for the consumption of drugs, Pannella forces the police to arrest him, by smoking a joint in public.
1975 AD : Jamaica Studies reveal good health amongst prolific cannabis users. "No impairment of physiological, sensory and perceptual performance, tests of concept formation, abstracting ability, and cognitive style, and tests of memory."
1976 AD : Holland adopts tolerant attitude to cannabis and many coffee shops and youth centres allowed to sell cannabis.
1976 AD : USA New York Times (Jan 5) declares 'Scientists find nothing really harmful about pot'.
1976 AD : Ford administration bans medical research on cannabis. Research on synthetic cannabis analogues allowed to continue. Robert Randal is the first US citizen to receive cannabis from Federal supplies made under the Investigational New Drug (IND) Program.
1976 AD : DuPont declares cannabis is less harmful than alcohol or tobacco and calls for its decriminalisation.
1976 AD : USA President Ford bans medical research on cannabis.
1977 AD : President Carter thinks cannabis should be legalised.
1977 AD : The Australian Senate Standing Committee on Social Welfare (the Baume Committee) recommends treating drug use as a social / medical rather than legal problem. Also that criminal sanction of possession of cannabis be replaced by fines while retaining penalties for possession of hashish, oil and purified THC.
1978 AD : New Mexico allows cannabis sale for medical use.
1978 AD : The New South Wales Joint Parliamentary Committee upon Drugs recommends eliminating criminal sanctions for personal use of cannabis, implementing bond and probation penalties for first offenders and expunging records upon successful completion of these punishments. Also suggest retaining penalties for trafficking in cannabis.
1980 AD : Paul McCartney arrested for cannabis and spends 10 days in prison in Japan.
1980 AD : Costa Rica study reports good health in cannabis users.
1980 AD : May 10 : Smokey Bears in Hyde Park
1981 AD : The Coptic Study claims 'No harm to human brain or intelligence' through cannabis use.
1982 AD : An Analysis of Marijuana Policy, National Research Council of the National Academy of Science, concludes that "a policy of prohibition of supply is preferable only to a policy of complete prohibition of supply and use"
1983 AD : In the UK over 20,000 convictions for possession.
1983 AD : The USA government (Reagan / Bush)orders American Universities to destroy all 1966-76 research work on cannabis.
1985 AD : Winters and DiFranza reveal radioactive material in tobacco may account for half the lung cancer deaths; no radioactive material in cannabis.
1986 AD : 8 July : UK Drug Trafficking Offences Act introduced to enable confiscation of assets from drug dealers
1987 AD : The USA Merck Manual of Diagnosis and Therapy says: "Cannabis can be used on an episodic but continual basis without evidence of social or psychic dysfunction. In many users the term dependence with its obvious connotations, probably is mis-applied... The chief opposition to the drug rests on a moral and political, and not toxicologic, foundation".
1988 AD : 6 September : DEA chief administrative judge, Judge Young, rules the US government should allow the medicinal use of cannabis. He says "Marijuana in its natural form, is one of the safest therapeutically active substance known to man". DEA rejects report.
1988 AD : 20 December : UN Convention against illicit traffic in narcotic and psychotropic substances, Vienna, includes cannabis
1988 AD : UK 23,229 people arrested for cannabis offences.
1989 AD : Presidents Reagan and Bush declare war on cannabis; shops selling smoking apparatus outlawed. Urine testing introduced. Recriminalisation, asset and property seizure, armed forces, prison camps, 'Just Say No' campaign, PFDA, DARE, tobacco and nuclear subsidies. Price - per - ounce cannabis worth more than gold. Worldwide prohibition entices organised crime to take control of the cannabis market and make huge profits. Reagan declares victory in War on Drugs. Secretary of State James A Baker reports global war on narcotic production is 'clearly not being won'.
1990 AD : Jack Herer, in his book 'The Emperor Wears No Clothes' offers $10,000 reward to anyone who can disprove his assertion that hemp can 'save the planet'.
1990 AD : Alaska recriminalises cannabis possession
1990's AD :USA voters pass regional measures to allow medicinal use of cannabis. Interest in this and other uses of hemp add new support to campaign for the legal right to social / recreational use of cannabis.
1991 AD : THC receptors found in the brain.
1991 AD : UK 40,000 people arrested for cannabis.
1991 AD : 'Mr. Marijuana', Howard Marks, arrested, taken from Spain to USA, and given 25 years imprisonment for trafficking in cannabis.
1991 AD : UK Judge Pickles advocates legalisation of drugs..
1991 AD : UK MP Tony Banks (labour) advocates legalisation of cannabis.
1991 AD : IND program dropped in USA.
1992 AD : January 22 :California Research Advisory Panel reports that prohibition has a more harmful effect on society and the individual than illegal drugs themselves.
1992 AD : February 19 : UK Government issue licenses to grow cannabis for industrial uses or scientific research
1992 AD : "Medicines often produce side effects. Sometimes they are physically unpleasant. Cannabis too has discomforting side effects, but these are not physical they are political"... The Economist March 28th 1992
1992 AD : USA over 340,000 arrests for cannabis.
1992 AD : Australia licenses hemp farm.
1992 AD : US Investigational New Drug (IND) Program dropped.
1992 AD : USA President Clinton admits he smoked cannabis but did not inhale. Howard Marks admits that he smoked cannabis but never exhaled.
1992 AD : 17 European Cities sign Frankfurt Charter agreeing to tolerate social use of cannabis.
1992 AD : USA Jim Montgomery, a paraplegic who smoked cannabis to relieve muscle spasm, busted for two ounces of marijuana in Oklahoma, arrested and sentenced to life plus 16 years.
1993 AD : Britain eases restrictions on hemp farming. Hempcore is first British company to get a license. Hemp clothes sold in High Street shops. February 19th.
1993 AD : Commander John Grieve of the Metropolitan Police calls for decriminalisation of cannabis.
1993 AD : Raymond Kendall, Head of Interpol, calls for decriminalisation of cannabis.
1993 AD : British Law Lord, Lord Woolf calls for legalisation of cannabis
1993 AD : 22 British MP's call for the establishment of a Royal Commission.
1993 AD : 44 British MP's call for a Royal Commission.
1993 AD : German High Court in Kruhe rules that cannabis prohibition is unconstitutional.
1993 AD : 19 British MP's 'welcome' the German court ruling.
1993 AD : 55 British MP's call for cannabis to be recognised and allowed for treatment of Multiple Sclerosis.
1993 AD : British Home Secretary Michael Howard declares 'War on drugs' and increases maximum fine for possession of cannabis to £2,500.
1993 AD : Over 72,000 UK citizens arrested for cannabis offences.
1993 AD : Canada permits a hemp farm in Ontario province.
1995 AD : Holland lowers the amount one can possess without prosecution to 5 grams (from 30) as a result of powerful international pressures from neighboring countries.
1995 AD : UK Channel 4 Pot Night (March) and BBC Panorama's High Risk (April).
1995 AD : UK Home secretary Michael Howard increases penalties for cannabis offenses.
1995 AD : Clare Short MP (Labour) calls for a Royal Commission on Cannabis and is reprimanded by her party bosses. (October)
1995 AD : European Cannabis Consumers' Union founded in Amsterdam.
1995 AD : USA Dan Perron forms Cannabis Buyers Club to distribute cannabis to the sick.
1995 AD : The European Council which defines political guidelines, orders a study of drug legislation and practice in the Union.
1995 AD : September 16 : First CHIC (Cannabis Hemp Information Club) conference in London.
1995 AD : Under the Clinton administration 1,450,751 people had been arrested for cannabis, 86% being for possession only
1995 AD : November 11 : British journal of the medical profession, The Lancet, states that "The smoking of cannabis, even long term, is not harmful to health".
1995 AD : Dutch Policy in the Netherlands Studies
1995 AD : Henrion Commission Report, the official French State Commission in charge of drug policy supports decriminalisation of cannabis and calls for a two-year trial period of regulated retail trade in cannabis. The French Government reject these proposals.
1996 AD : Victoria (Australia) State Council urge decriminalisation of cannabis.
1996 AD : May 17 : Sow the Seeds Day, London. 1996 AD : CLCIA announce parliamentary candidates in forthcoming General Election
1996 AD : UK Liberal Democrats Party calls for a Royal Commission on cannabis.
1996 AD ; Lord McCluskey calls for consideration of decriminalisation in UK.
1996 AD : The Institute for the Study of Drug Dependence - Drug Notes - Cannabis 1996, p.8 says:
"All that can be said definitely is that 1) Cannabis use generally precedes the use of other illegal drugs. 2) Cannabis use does not necessarily (or even usually) lead to the use of other illicit drugs."
1996 AD : UK Janet Paraskeno, magistrate and director of National Youth Agency calls for 'legalisation and not decriminalisation'.
1996 AD : George Howarth MP (Labour) says his party do not want a Royal Commission because it might conclude that cannabis should be legalised which a Labour Government would not do anyway.
1996 AD : The Parliament of Luxembourg passes a motion calling for a program 'of common measures for the liberalization of cannabis and its derivatives' along with Belgium and the Netherlands, and the harmonisation of drug laws in Benelux countries.
1996 AD : UK Cannabis Awareness Month (September) on 68th anniversary of the law.
1996 AD : Ireland announces their plans to use cannabis as fuel to replace the use of the dwindling supplies of peat
1996 AD : Dutch town council at Delfzij decides to sell cannabis through their own coffee shop. They name the shop 'Paradox'. Profits used to provide information campaigns against 'soft drugs' in Dutch schools. Meanwhile the Dutch close many coffee shops, bowing to pressures from Germany and France.,br 1996 AD : The Canton of Zurich calls for legalisation of cannabis.
1996 AD : UK Crown Prosecution Service dropping cases of possession and cultivation against some ill people (MS) as 'not in the public interest to proceed'.
1996 AD : California and Arizona pass Propositions allowing the use of cannabis in the treatment of certain illnesses, Clinton is re-elected and the FBI threaten Doctors with prosecution.
1996 AD : A Swiss man, Zimmermann, is given a life sentence in the Maldives, for importing three cannabis seeds, found in his luggage as he flew in from India.
1996 AD : Legalise Ganja Jamaica formed.
1996 AD : In the New Zealand general election the legalise cannabis candidate in Mittertond received 30% of the vote. Overall they received 1.4% of the votes, insufficient to gain a seat under proportional representation.
1996 AD : 100 Italian MP's call for legalisation of cannabis in Italy.
1996 AD : The Sunday Times, 1 Dec, says that out of 45 UK judges questioned 16 wanted to see cannabis legalised.
1996 AD : CLCIA offices are destroyed by fire
1996 AD : June : Scottish Nationalist conference votes to allow cultivation for personal use and research into medical uses of cannabis
Sates "Relatively few adverse clinical effects from the chronic use of marijuana have been documented in humans. However, the criminalization of marijuana use may itself be a health hazard, since it may expose the users to violence and criminal activity."
1997 AD : An 8-year study at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) School of Medicine, concluded that long-term smokers of cannabis do not experience a greater annual decline in lung functions than non-smokers.
Researchers said: "Findings from the present long-term follow-up study of heavy, habitual marijuana smokers argue against the concept that the continuing heavy use of marijuana is a significant factor for the development of [chronic lung disease]"
"No difference were noted between even quite heavy marijuana smoking and non-smoking of marijuana."
Volume 155 of the American Journal of Respiratory and Clinical Care Medicine 1997
1997 AD : January16 : A court in Texas, USA, sentences medical marijuana user, William J. Foster to 93 years imprisonment for cultivation of one plant.
1997 AD : Two Swiss Cantons decide to legalise possession of cannabis in small amounts and ask the national Government to do the same.
1997 AD : The German State of Schlewig-Holstein legalise possession of up to 5 grams of cannabis.
1997 AD : After appeals for clemency from the Swiss Government and letters from CLCIA supporters, the Maldives releases Zimmermann, the man given life for three seeds.
1997 AD : Norwich City Council ban the CLCIA from more stalls because seeds had been given out at previous stalls, the seed being fishing bait. After a letter campaign the council agree that CLCIA can have the stall provided they agree not to give out 'anything which can be used to grow or take an illegal substance'.
1997 AD : In the USA a $2 million study to prove cannabis smoking can cause cancer fails and announces that it does not. The release of the report is delayed due to 'lack of supplies'.
1997 AD : Paul Flynn MP introduces an early Day Motion calling on the Government to recognise the medicinal uses of cannabis and to make it available in tablet form, also congratulating the citizens of California and Arizona.
1997 AD : February 11 : USA Federal Government Authorities, led by Barry R. McCaffrey, Director of National Drug Control Policy, resists the medical supply or cannabis in California and Arizona, threatening to prosecute Doctor's who prescribe or supply it.
1997 AD : UK Legalise Cannabis Party, sponsored by the CLCIA, nominates Howard Marks as Parliamentary Candidate for Legalising Cannabis in the General Election. He receives an average 1.3% of the vote over the four constituencies where he stands.
1997 AD : The UK elects a new Labour Government and the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, says he will not legalise cannabis.
1997 AD : Scottish Kirk (Church) comes out in favour of legalising cannabis
1997 AD : Rob Christopher, founder of CHIC - the Cannabis Hemp Information Club - in London, changes his name to Free Rob Cannabis and invites arrest by distributing cannabis cookies on the steps of the Department of Heath in London. He is not arrested.
1997 AD : USA marines use helicopters to destroy marijuana crops in Hawaii despite objections from the people.
1997 AD : The Kaiser Permanente Study (USA) - "Marijuana Use and Mortality" April 1997 American Journal of Public Health concludes "Relatively few adverse clinical effects from the chronic use of marijuana have been documented in humans. However, the criminalization of marijuana use may itself be a health hazard, since it may expose the users to violence and criminal activity."
1997 AD : Researchers at the University of California (UCLA) School of Medicine announced the results of an 8 - year study into the effects of long-term cannabis smoking on the lungs. In Volume 155 of the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Dr. D.P. Tashkin reported: "Findings from the present long-term, follow-up study of heavy, habitual marijuana smokers argue against the concept that continuing heavy use of marijuana is a significant risk factor for the development of [chronic lung disease. ..Neither the continuing nor the intermittent marijuana smokers exhibited any significantly different rates of decline in [lung function] " as compared with those individuals who never smoked marijuana. Researchers added: "No differences were noted between even quite heavy marijuana smoking and nonsmoking of marijuana."
1997 AD : June : A plaque placed on a park bench in Chapelfield Gardens in Norwich, commemorates Howard Marks stand as a Legalise Cannabis Candidate
1997 AD : July: The British Medical Association (BMA) recommends the provision of medicinal cannabis in the UK.
1997 AD : July: The Attorney General and Minister for Industrial Relations, Australia, JW Shaw QC MLC, announced the end of prison sentences for young cannabis offenders, saying that "I believe many parents would see the imprisonment of their son or daughter for using cannabis as particularly harmful."
1997 AD : July: SYDNEY MORNING HERALD July 21 1997 p5 reports "A survey of a traditionally conservative NSW electorate has shown overwhelming community support for the decriminalisation of cannabis." New South Wales then decriminalises possession of cannabis - up to 5 plants, 30 grams of leaf, 3 grms of resin and 2 grams of oil.
1997 AD : August: UK. After the shooting of a five-year old boy in Bolton in a drug-related attack, Labour MP Brian Iddon calls for a Royal Commission on drugs with a view to decriminalisation. The Sun conducts a poll that showed that over 40% of its readers are in favour of decriminalisation. Labour Home Office spokesman George Howarth says on Radio 4 News that cannabis causes harm and that Labour will never have dialogue on legalisation and that the only solution is to stamp it out.
1997 AD : On September 19th, Marco Pannella is sentenced by the Rome Court to 4 months imprisonment commuted to 8 months on probation, for distributing hashish at the Porta Portese.
1997 AD : September : Sir Paul McCartney, ex-Beatle, reconfirms his call to decriminalise cannabis.
1997 AD : September 28th : UK newspaper The Independent on Sunday, starts their committed campaign to decriminalise cannabis backed by over 100 names of celebrities, doctors, academics etc.
1997 AD : September 28th : A picnic in Chapelfield Gardens, Norwich, to commemorate the sad prohibition laws is attended by over 100 people and cannabis is openly smoked on film by TV cameras. On this the 69th anniversary of the Dangerous Drugs Act, Rob Christopher and some 300 others gather in Hyde Park, London, to distribute cannabis cakes free to medical users. Rob then unsuccessfully attempted to turn himself in to the police.
1997 AD : October 8: Lord Bingham of Cornhill, the most senior judge in England and Wales backed calls for a public debate on the legalisation of cannabis. Just days after Jack Straw, the Home Secretary, ruled out moves to legalise cannabis
1997 AD : November 5 : EU Parliament Committee on Civil Liberties suggests that soft drugs should be legalised
1997 AD : December 3: The French secretary of State for Public Health, Bernard Kouchner, in favor of the supply of heroin to people suffering from severe heroin addiction. He also supports the medical application of cannabis, according to an interview with Dr Kouchner MD in the newspaper Liberation.
1997 AD : December 11 : Independent on Sunday hold their "Should cannabis be decriminalised?" conference in Westminster, London. Although all the MPs have been invited only 5 turn up. The conference was overwhelmingly in favour of legalisation
1997 AD : December 19th : DEA formally asked the Department of Health and Human Services to conduct "a scientific and medical evaluation of the available data and provide a scheduling recommendation" for marijuana and other cannabinoid drugs. This DEA request of HHS means that the DEA has for the first time made its own determination that sufficient grounds exist to remove marijuana from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act (CSA). Schedule I is supposed to be limited to hard drugs with addictive propensities and with no legitimate medical usage.
1997 AD : December 20 : British Home Secretary, Jack Straw (Labour) is told by the Daily Mirror that his son, William, sold 10 pounds worth of cannabis to a reporter Dawn Alford. Straw immediately escorts his own son to a police station to turn himself in. The lad is cautioned several weeks later.
1998 AD : March: Madrid - European and American scientists defended medical marihuana at an International Symposium on Cannabis and the Brain held at the Fundacion Ramon Areces. According to them, the plant is effective in treating people with cancer and multiple sclerosis, but is not addictive.
1998 AD : Australia : March : Victoria's police commissioner, Mr Neil Comrie, has admitted the fight against drugs has failed and is set to introduce a radical statewide plan to keep drug users out of courts.
1998 AD : Conservative MP David Prior becomes the third British MP to publicly admit having smoked cannabis. He is against legalisation.
1998 AD : MORE than 100 French artists and intellectuals signed a petition admitting to taking soft drugs and offering themselves for prosecution.
1998 AD : March 28: About 20,000 people marched from Hyde Park to Trafalgar Square in the Decriminalise Cannabis March organised by the Independent on Sunday, CLCIA and others. Speakers in the Square included Howard Marks, Rosie Boycott, Paul Flynn MP and Caroline Coon. The new UK Anti-Drugs Coordinator, Keith Hallawell, arrogantly stated that the march was a Red Herring (irrelevant).
1998 AD : UK : Times 24 March 1998 : A judge allowed a liver transplant patient to go free after he admitted growing and using cannabis to ease his pain. Sympathising with him, Judge John Hopkin said: "I accept that's why you were growing it; to relieve the considerable pain you must suffer. That is against the law as it stands at the present time, but there is very substantial mitigation in your case." Richard Gifford, 49, a father of 6 was given a two year conditional discharge at Nottingham crown court after pleading guilty to producing and possessing cannabis. The judge said "Whether this substance should be obtained by prescription is a matter for parliament, but it does seem from a number of cases that appear before me that it is benefit to a number of persons." Paddy Tipping, PPS to Jack Straw, the Home secretary said the government has no plans to decriminalise cannabis "People like Judge Hopkin say the acknowledge there is a valuable medical effect, but there has been no compelling research done to suggest that".
1998 AD : April: Czech Republic - President Vaclav Havel vetoes a law banning possession of drugs for personal use and sent it back to Parliament, citing human rights concerns. "The President reached the opinion that the law would lead to the prosecution of victims rather than culprits," said spokesman Ladislav Spacek. Drug experts have warned that the legislation could lead to an increase in crime and drug prices and a decline in the willingness of addicts to be cured. - Reuters
1998 AD : 4 April: A man accused of growing and giving cannabis to his wife, a multiple sclerosis sufferer, was cleared by a jury's majority verdict of cultivating, cultivating with intent to supply, and supplying cannabis. Cab driver Alan Blythe, 52, of Runcorn, Cheshire, had used the defence of duress of circumstances, which the jury at Warrington Crown Court accepted. He claimed he had grown the cannabis and supplied it to his wife Judith, 48, because he was afraid that without it the acute symptoms of MS could trigger her suicide. The jury ignored the judge's suggestion that Mr Blythe had failed to prove duress of circumstances for the charge of cultivation. But they followed this advice in relation to possession, for which Mr Blythe was fined £100.
1998 AD : 21 April Belgium officially decriminalises cannabis after a decision by Minister de Clerck of Justice. That is you will not be prosecuted for possession for personal consumption.
1998 AD : SAN FRANCISCO April 22, 1998 -- A San Francisco marijuana club reopened under another name just a day after a court order shut down its predecessor.
1998 AD : Italy decriminalises possession of drugs and permits small scale cultivation of cannabis for own use.
1998 AD : Danny Tungate polled 7.6% of the vote as a Legalise Cannabis Candidate in the UK local elections, Catton Grove ward, Norwich
1998 AD : June 12: The UK Government has granted a license to grow and possess cannabis for the purposes of medical trials, to Dr Geoffrey Guy of GW Pharmaceuticals. The crop at a secret location in south-east England, is guarded by electrified razor-wire fences, security cameras and guard dogs.
1998 AD : Whilst US Federal Authorities make threats and arrests of Californian doctors who recommend cannabis and force the closure of most medical marijuana clubs in the state, Oakland by-pass federal law by appointing medical marijuana suppliers as deputies thereby making them immune from arrest.
1998 AD : Germany: A petition of 30 thousand signatures organised by the "Selbsthilfegruppe Cannabis als Medizin" in Berlin was handed in to the Senat of Berlin in March 1998. All governing parties (CDU, SPD, PDS and Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen) discussed the issue and unanimously support it!
The signaturess being collected currently, will be handed to the "Petitionsausschuss des Deutschen Bundestages" together with the 30 thousand from Berlin.. ACM, Arbeitsgemeinschaft Cannabis als Medizin (Association for Cannabis as Medicine ) 1998 AD : June 5; Colin Davies acquitted of cultivation in the UK after informing the jury of his medical need and despite instructions from the judge that they had to rule on law and evidence alone. See Rights of Jurors.
1998 AD : A group of Welsh Cannabis Smokers headed by Chris Rawley lays prosecution papers upon Jack Straw, Tony Blair, Lord Bingham, a Crown Court Judge and Tenby Magistrates, in the process of a public prosecution for crimes against humanity and peace, and crimes against children, for upholding an illegal prohibition of cannabis.
1998 AD : September 5: Release and The Lindesmith Institute organise the symposium "Options for Control in the 21st Century", with experts from around the world gathering in London.
1998 AD : October: CLCIA Chairman challenges local Judge on cannabis safety
1998 AD : November 11: UK. The House of Lords rule that based upon the evidence presented for them the Government should make cannabis available to the sick without further delay, but that they are against legalisation for recreational use. Jack Straw, Home Secretary, immediately rejects the House of Lord's Report saying that cannabis will not be made available until a suitable pharmaceutical standard preparation has been thoroughly tested.
1998 AD : November: "We.. say that on the medical evidence available, moderate indulgence in cannabis has little ill-effect on health, and that decisions to ban or legalise cannabis should be based on other considerations.": The Lancet, vol 352, number 9140, November 14 1998
1998 AD : December 24: Prince Charles tells a sufferer of Multiple Sclerosis that he has heard that cannabis can help.
1999 AD : January 21 : USA: Medicinal Marijuana Advocate, Steve Kubby and Wife Busted
1999 AD : February 23: UK: 55-year-old arthritis sufferer jailed for one year for using cannabis to relieve his pain
1999 AD : March 4 : ALASKA: Medical Marijuana Law Starts
1999 AD : March 15: USA: Federal Judge Gives OK to Pot Case
1999 AD : March 21: USA: Government Study Labels Marijuana A Useful Medicine
1999 AD : March 21: Only 8 People Can Legally Use Pot As MedicineA
1999 AD : March 23: GERMANY: Health Minister Supports Medical Marihuana
1999 AD : March 30: CANADA: Pot Users Take Fewer Road Risks Than Drunks Study Says
1999 AD : April 1: USA: Farmers Lobby to Legalize the Growing of Hemp
1999 AD : April 7: USA: Florida Supreme Court Hears Medical Marijuana Case
1999 AD : March: The LEGALISE CANNABIS ALLIANCE becomes an official political party in the UK. 1999 AD : April 9: UK: Pro-Cannabis Lobby To Stand in Norwich
1999 AD : April 23: SWITZERLAND: Legalising Cannabis
1999 AD : May 1 : Many thousands march for legalisation around the world
1999 AD : May 6 : UK: Local Election Results, May 6 1999: Legalise Cannabis Alliance candidates poll average 3.5%.
1999 AD : May 10: USA: NV Assembly Bill Eases Marijuana Penalties
1999 AD : May 20: UK Government objects to cannabis bill 95 MPs support MM bill. Eric Mann's parole revoked to silence him.
1999 AD : June 9 : CANADA: Two Patients Get Federal Go-Ahead To Smoke Pot
1999 AD : June 11: US Kentucky: Hemp Museum Opens Doors To History Of Versatile Plant
1999 AD : June 11: NEW ZEALAND: Advice To Review Dope Law Repeated
1999 AD : June 13: UK: Cannabis Inhalers In First Legal Health Test
1999 AD : June 21: CANADA: Compassion Club To Grow Pot In Homes Of Members
1999 AD : June 21: SCOTLAND: Doctors Back Legalising Cannabis:
1999 AD : June 24: JAMAICA: Official Encourages Cultivation Of Hemp
1999 AD : June 30: UK: Jails Chief Says Drug Test Regime Is Useless
1999 AD: September 6: UK: MS Patients Recruited To Test Cannabis Pill 1999 AD : Oct. 14: Kingston, Jamaica: The Jamaican Senate has unanimously approved a resolution establishing a commission to explore the decriminalisation of marijuana.
1999 AD : Nov 25: The Legalise Cannabis Alliance candidate in the Kensington and Chelsea By-election, Colin Paisley gained 141 votes, 8th out of 18 candidates.
2000 AD : Jan 12: CANADA: Hepatitis C Patient Wins Right To Smoke Pot
2000 AD : March 6: UK: First Conference Of The Legalise Cannabis Alliance
2000 AD : March 25: UK: Inquiry Calls For Softer Line On Hard Drugs - But Blair Says No
2000 AD : March 29: SWITZERLAND: Swiss Parliament Legalises Cannabis
2000 AD : March 30: Malaysian Gets Life For Growing Cannabis Plant
2000 AD: April 4: MALAWI: Minister Steps Up Campaign To Legalise Marijuana
2000 AD: May 4: The Legalise Cannabis Alliance fields 5 candidates in Norwich local elections (Sarah Homes, Mick Pryce, Hugh Robertson, Trevor Smith, Tina Smith), one in Peterborough (Marcus Davies). Derrick Large receives over 400 votes in the Romsey by-election won by a Liberal Democrat.
2000 AD: May 6: Hundreds of thousands of people march for the end of the War on Cannabis
2000 AD: June 28: CANADA: Medical Pot Grower Cleared
2000 AD: June 28: NETHERLANDS: Dutch cannabis vote irks cabinet
2000 AD: July 17: USA CA: Federal Judge Clears Way for Oakland Club to Distribute Pot to Seriously Ill Patients
2000 AD: July 31: CANADA: Pot Prohibition Unconstitutional, Rules Court Of Appeals
2000 AD: August 1: UK: Rheumatoid Arthritis Treatment From Cannabis
2000 AD: August 15: USA CA: Appeals Court Approves Marijuana As Medicine
2000 AD: September 6: EUROPE: Dutch, Swiss and German Governments To Act on Marijuana
2000 AD: September 8: USA CA: Doctors' Rights Backed Under Pot Law
2000 AD: September 9: GUAM: High Court Ruling Backs Rastafarian's Sacrament - Cannabis:
2000 AD: September 14: USA CA: Feds Rule Doctors May Recommend Pot
2000 AD: September 28: UK: MS Sufferer Cleared Of Cannabis Charge
2000 AD: October: Canadian Government Will Legalize Medical Marijuana Use
2000 AD: October 20: UK: Cannabis Less Harmful Than Aspirin, Says Scientist
2000 AD: November 24: USA: CA: Study Of Pot's Benefits To AIDS Patients Gets DEA's Blessing
2000 AD: December 22: CANADA: Legal Marijuana Operation Opens
2001 AD: 4 January: CANADA: Firm Grows Medical Pot In Mine Shaft
2001 AD: 19 January: BELGIUM: Seen Decriminalising Cannabis Use
2001 AD: 10 March: SWITZERLAND: Move To Legalise Cannabis
2001 AD: 21 March: MEXICO: Leader Backs Call To Legalize Drugs
2001 AD: 22 March: UK: Lords Urge Legal Use Of Cannabis
2001 AD: 7 April: CANADA: Gravely Ill To Get Medical Pot
2001 AD: 26 April: USA: Legalize Marijuana, New Mexico Governor Urges
2001 AD: 11 June: Pot Smokers Just As Healthy - Study
2001 AD: 25 June: UK: Home Secretary Praises Cannabis Scheme
2001 AD: 1 July: UK: Drug Czar Recants: Cannabis Use Does Not Lead To Heroin
2001 AD: 4 July: CANADA: Legal-Marijuana Users To Get Photo Id Cards
2001 AD: 5 July: UK: In One Part Of London, Police Turn Blind Eye To Marijuana To Target Harder Crime
2001 AD: 19 August: FIJI: Marijuana a Fiji Election Issue: A Fijian high chief has said his people should be shot dead if found planting marijuana
2001 AD: 13 September: FRANCE: Koucher Opposes Drugs Law
2001 AD: 20 October: THE NETHERLANDS: Dutch Government Plans To Put Cannabis On Prescription
2001 AD: 14 December: INDONESIA: Marijuana Trafficker Gets Death Sentence
2001 AD: 16 December: UK: Study Finds No Cannabis Link To Hard Drugs
2002 AD: 25 January: NORWAY: Commission Set To Call For Decriminalization
2002 AD: 16 February: KENYA: Hashish Traffickers Jailed For 45 Years
2002 AD: 9 March: UK: Lib Dems back radical drug reforms
2002 AD: 12 March: CANADA: Doctors Want Marijuana Decriminalized
2002 AD: 14 March: UK: Reclassify Cannabis, Says Official Report
2002 AD: 1 June: MEXICO: Chihuahua Considers Legalizing Pot
2002 AD: 29 June: PHILIPPINES: Death For Marijuana
2002 AD: 10 July: David Blunkett's Announcement of reclassification of Cannabis, and Oliver Letwin's reply in Parliament
2002 AD: July: Australian Police Close Cannabis Cafe.
2002 AD: July: UK Drugs Tsar Halliwell Resigns Over Plans To Reclassify Cannabis Possession.
2002 AD: July: Canadian Judge Says Medical Cannabis Is Not Illegal.
2002 AD: August: Israeli Government Approves Use Of Cannabis By Terminally Ill.
2002 AD: October: Colin Davies Who Opened The Dutch Experience Cannabis Cafe In Stockport, UK, Is Sentenced To Three Years In Prison For Cannabis Offences.
2002 AD: November: Kenya Considers Legalising Bhang.
2002 AD: November: UK Doctors Announce Cannabis Extracts Used In Trials On MS And Pain Patients Proving Effective.
2002 AD: November: Czech Doctors Claim Cannabis Helps Sufferers Of Parkinson's Disease.
2002 AD: December: US Study Defies Gateway Theory That Cannabis Use Leads To Use Of Hard Drugs.
2002 AD: December: Canadian Judge Orders Police To Return Medical Cannabis.
2002 AD: December UK: Oakland, US, City Authorities Deputise Medical Marijuana Club Founders.
2003 AD: February: US Jurors Become Angry That Trial Judge Had Not Informed Them That Ed Rosenthal Was Deputised by City Authorities in Oakland, after they convicted him of cultivation.
2003 AD: February: UN Narcotics Control Board Questions Canada's Policy On Use Of Marijuana
2003 AD: February: US Police Arrest 55 Suppliers Of Cannabis Paraphernalia.
2003 AD: March: Pharmacies in The Netherlands Sell Medical Cannabis Which Is More Expensive Than Many Coffeeshops.
2003 AD: March: Danish Drug Dealers Go On Strike
2003 AD: March: JAMAICA: Bill To Legalise Ganja For Private Use
2003 AD: April: RUSSIA: Nostalgic Small Town Puts Cannabis On Its Flag
2006 AD: April: "Marijuana is the equivalent of heroin and cocaine". FDA issues statement denying that marijuana has
any medical benefits at all
2006 AD: May: Mexican Congress passes bill legalising all drugs for private personal use. The officially permitted quantities: up to five grams of marijuana; five grams of opium; 25 milligrams of heroin; 500 milligrams of cocaine; a few tabs of Ecstasy; small quantities of amphetamines and magic mushrooms; and up to a kilo of the sacred cactus peyote. Vicente Fox, Mexico’s president, pledges to sign the Bill - but capitulates to US government pressure 24 hours later. The bill is returned to Congress for revision.
2006 AD: October: CNN reports that Canadian troops "...battle 10-foot Afghan marijuana plants".
2006 AD: October: Medical marijuana advocate Ed Rosenthal, "the guru of ganja",is indicted on new criminal charges.
2006 AD: December: A UK court rules that chocolate bars laced with cannabis for multiple sclerosis sufferers are unlawful. The owners of “Canna-Biz” posted some 36,000 cannabis-laced chocolate bars to more than 1,800 multiple sclerosis victims
2006 AD: December: official US statistics suggests that marijuana is America's leading cash crop
2007 AD: April: Harvard university study shows that Delta-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the active ingredient in marijuana, cuts tumour growth in common lung cancer in half and significantly reduces the ability of the cancer to spread
2008 AD: Medical marijuana vending machines take root in Los Angeles. The DEA is not amused.
2008 AD: May : UK government announces cannabis will be upgraded from class C to Class B. Its scientific experts, the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, recommend cannabis should remain class C.