Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:


After you have finished reading this article you can click here to go back.

UK: Drugs campaigner'a suffragette

BBC News

Wednesday 07 Mar 2007

---
Cannabis crusader Patricia Tabram has likened her struggle against
Britain's drug laws to Emmeline Pankhurst's battle to win the vote for
women.

The 68-year-old had already appeared before one Crown Court judge prior
to this week's trial in Carlisle.

In May 2004 she was caught with 31 plants and blocks of cannabis valued
at £850 at her home.

The former chef said she used the drug to relieve the depression she has
suffered since finding her 14-year-old son Duncan dead in bed in 1975.

She also claimed eating the drug helped her combat the aches and pains
she suffers following two car crashes.

Bedroom wardrobe

Britain's least likely-looking dealer admitted possession with intent to
supply and became a prominent advocate for legalising the drug.

Judge David Hodson, Newcastle's senior judge, said he refused to make
her a martyr and handed her a six-month jail sentence suspended for two
years when she appeared before him in April 2005.

But just five months later, Northumbria Police received a tip-off that
she was growing more cannabis.

She was compliant when three officers arrived at her bungalow in the
village of Humshaugh, Northumberland, directing them to a bedroom
wardrobe where four plants were being nurtured with light and heat.

She also told them about the jars of cannabis powder in her kitchen, and
even confessed her freezer was packed with dope-laced curries,
casseroles and ice cream - which the police declined to seize because
they did not want to deprive her of food.

When asked if she feared going to jail, Tabram, who used to run a
restaurant in Leith, Edinburgh, said: "Emmeline Pankhurst had to go to
prison three times before women got the vote so I am not going to be
worried about it."

After hitting the headlines, she began writing a book - Grandma Eats
Cannabis - and appeared on a number of chat shows.

At the 2005 general election, she stood unsuccessfully against leader of
the House of Commons Peter Hain on a pro-cannabis ticket.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/tyne/6427217.stm

 

 

 

After you have finished reading this article you can click here to go back. 




This page was created by the Cannabis Campaigners' Guide.

Feel free to link to this page!