Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com
Supporters of marijuana rights attacked the DEA’s tight regulation of pot in a potentially landmark case that could change the drug’s classification, Reuters reports.
Joseph Elford, lawyer for Americans for Safe Access, said the DEA has essentially ignored scientific research that suggests marijuana is safer than heroin and has medicinal value.
“This game of ‘gotcha’ will continue indefinitely unless this court intervenes,” Elford told a three-judge panel of the appeals court in Washington, D.C.
The DEA countered that research is not all conclusive and continued the line of rhetoric that marijuana is unsafe.
One of the judges appeared to agree with the DEA.
“Don’t we have to defer to the agency?” asked Judge Merrick Garland. “We’re not scientists. They are.”
