Buzzby

Pot Painting Sparks Free Speech Debate
Matt Scott | WTNH | 03/16/2006

A big drug debate has some fired up in Winsted. It all centers on one man who is using his house in a unique way to promote drug use.

Controversy is blowing in the wind in Winsted. It started a month ago, when Christopher Seekins painted cannabis leaves on his house.

"I actually think they're a little small," he says. "I was thinking about putting it on a few more sides."

The paint job is his way of promoting the legalization of marijuana.

"Cannaboids increase brain functions, help with depression, no negative side effects," he says. "But people have an objection to it." "People don't understand it."

Not everyone agrees with Seekins opinions. Some neighbors we spoke to not only object to the message, but how he's broadcasting it.

"Is this sending a message to children that it's okay? I have two children and I don't think it's okay," says David LaPointe.

LaPointe, a state correction officer, doesn't want hemp leaf pictures on his street even though it doesn't violate building codes.

"He wants to go that route in the comforts of his own home, that's his business, but don't start putting it out there," says LaPointe.

"It's never killed a single person in the history of mankind and there's no reason it should be illegal," says Seekins.

"I've seen the first-hand effects of one thing leading to another," says LaPointe.

Seekins is currently facing charges of cultivating marijuana in his home after police confiscated 100 marijuana plants.

"What's your goal in all of this? What are you trying to do?"

"Get this legalized," says Seekins. "Bring education to the plant that our founding fathers of our nations grew on the best planet in the world."

"As a neighbor would you be happier if the walls were just painted white?"

"Well, that's what they were before and there wasn't any problem," says LaPointe.

But now this big leaf outside is creating a smoke screen between neighbors.

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