Leaf Brief

No recreational weed for New Mexico

The big news in the New Mexico cannabis world this month: We're not getting recreational weed this Legislative session. A bill passed the House of Representatives and made it as far as the Senate Finance Committee, where it languished until the end of the session. SFR broke the news that it was not likely to get a hearing early last week, which you can read below. We've also got a roundup of all the cannabis news from the session.

Regional News

Weed bars in Alaska

The last frontier became the first in the country to allow smoking rooms inside dispensaries. Starting April 11, Alaska will begin issuing licenses, and once dispensaries get their smoking rooms established, customers can sample products inside the store. Once this takes off, if any Leaf Brief readers are in Alaska for some reason, send a selfie with your report to will@sfreporter.com.

Denver overturned a bunch of cannabis convictions

More good news from slightly-less-far-north: Denver started erasing thousands of low-level marijuana possession charges from before Colorado adopted full legalization back in 2014. About time, but better late than never.

Missouri cops hassle a stage 4 pancreatic cancer patient

A Missouri man hospitalized for pancreatic cancer got the cops called on him because somebody "smelled marijuana." The man, Nolan Sousley, said that was impossible, because he didn't smoke. He did freely admit to taking THC capsules, but as real heads know, those things don't smell. Missouri actually legalized medical marijuana in November, but the new law hasn't been fully implemented yet—and Sousley said he didn't even know if he'd live long enough to get a medical card. He streamed the entire thing over Facebook Live, so if you want to watch a couple cops rummaging through a cancer patients bags in the middle of a hospital room, be my guest.

Around the Web

Son of couple implicated in college admissions bribery scandal defends mom and dad while smoking joint

If you're not familiar with this whole thing, a bunch of wealthy parents, including big Hollywood names like Felicity Huffman and Lori Laughlin, were found by the FBI to be using a number of different schemes to get their kids into Ivy League and other prestigious schools. That doesn't have much to do with cannabis, of course, but it did give us this hilarious moment, where the son of one of the implicated couples posted a video defending his parents while smoking a joint and promoting his mixtape, Cheese and Crackers. 

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