PotShot

'Prince of Pot' sows the seeds of his own destruction
Tony Thompson | The Observer | April 30, 2006

Marc Emery is not your average international drug kingpin. The man described by the American Drug Enforcement Agency as Canada's biggest trafficker and self-styled 'Prince of Pot', who faces the death penalty if convicted in the US, freely admits to having made millions from marijuana. He ensures as many people as possible know about it and even listing his profession as 'marijuana seed vendor' on his tax returns.

In Canada, possession of less than 30 grams of marijuana or seeds carries a 12-month prison sentence and a $1,000 fine, but the law is almost never enforced, making marijuana all but legal.

The proof of this is everywhere. Cafes in a Vancouver district known as 'Vansterdam' allow customers to bring their own marijuana and smoke it at their leisure, often testing out a variety of bongs and vaporisers.

Emery's influence has reached well beyond Canada. In the past decade he has sold more than 5 million seeds over the internet and, via mail order, at least 3 million to the US. Though locally the authorities were willing to turn a blind eye, the DEA saw things differently.

After repeatedly finding his seeds at the heart of illegal growing operations throughout the US, it made Emery its sole Canadian target and launched an 18-month investigation which ended in his arrest last July.

On Thursday, Emery will appear at a preliminary hearing before his trial for extradition to the US for selling marijuana seeds - a crime for which no Canadian has even been jailed.

Under American law, selling more than 60,000 seeds qualifies for the death penalty. Emery is the first person to be arrested with enough seeds to qualify. In the basement of the shop that doubles as the headquarters for the pro-legalisation party he founded, Emery is the first to admit that, in many ways, he has brought his troubles on himself.

'I guess I've spent the last few years undermining the DEA and mocking their war on drugs. They are the ones with the guns; the only thing we had on our side was the plant. The only thing we could do to win was to spread the plant.

'I wanted to increase the number of people growing it, lower the price and spread it throughout the world. I wanted to start a self-financed capitalist revolution. A revolution through retail.'

The business made C$4m (£1.9m) profit, but Emery gave it away to pro-cannabis causes. He makes no secret of his vision - to 'overgrow' the governments of the world by spreading marijuana faster than anti-drug agents can eradicate it.

'They call me a drug kingpin and say that I am bigger than any other gang in Canada, yet when they raided me they found no drugs, no sports cars, no palaces, no money. I have spent it all on supporting the cause.'

Emery believes the DEA is politically motivated. In a hastily withdrawn official statement issued on the day of his arrest, attributed to Karen Tandy, head of the DEA, his arrest was described as 'a significant blow not only to the marijuana trafficking trade in the US and Canada, but also to the marijuana legalisation movement ... Drug legalisation lobbyists now have one less pot of money to rely on.'

Emery describes his arrest as 'the greatest battle of my illustrious career' and compares himself to Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi. Becoming a martyr - preferably a living one - for the legalisation movement is the quickest way to achieve his goal of seeing marijuana legalised. 'The war on marijuana is the most important issue of our time. I want to see drug-peace in my lifetime.'

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