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UK: Pensioner guilty of cooking with cannabis faces eviction
Robert Verkaik Belfast Telegraph
Thursday 08 Mar 2007 A grandmother who extols the virtues of cooking with cannabis has been sentenced to 250 hours' community service after being convicted of illegally growing the drug at her home. Patricia Tabram, 68, a former chef from Humshaugh, Northumberland, told the court that she used the drug to ease her depression, aches and pains. But she now faces being evicted from her housing association bungalow after a jury at Carlisle Crown Court found her guilty of the cultivation and possession of the class C drug. Judge Barbara Forrester told the grey-haired pensioner yesterday that she must pay £1,000 costs as well as carry out 175 hours' community service for cultivating four cannabis plants and a further 75 hours for possessing powdered cannabis which she stored in her kitchen and added to cakes, curries, casseroles and soups. Tabram was unbowed after the case, insisting she would defy the law and continue to take cannabis. She said: "I am still going to medicate with cannabis. This court is not fit for purpose and I am taking up an appeal and putting in a complaint about the fact I was not allowed to have a defence. The law and justice do not exist in this country any more." Tarbam has for many years campaigned for the legalisation of cannabis, appearing on television shows as well as writing a book entitled Grandma Eats Cannabis. At the 2005 general election, she stood unsuccessfully against the cabinet minister Peter Hain on a pro-cannabis ticket. In May 2004 she was caught with 31 plants and blocks of cannabis worth £850 at her home which the former chef used to make dishes for the elderly and infirm people in her area. She said she used it to relieve the depression she suffered since finding her 14-year-old son Duncan dead in bed in 1975. She also claimed eating the drug helped combat aches and pains she suffered as a result of two car crashes. At her trial, Judge David Hodson, Newcastle's senior judge, said he refused to make her a martyr and imposed 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 her village, directing them to a bedroom wardrobe where four plants were being nurtured with light and heat. She also told them about jars of cannabis powder in her kitchen and about dope-laced food in her freezer, curries, casseroles and ice cream, which the police declined to seize because they did not want to deprive her of food. The jury of six men and six women came back with unanimous guilty verdicts for the two counts, one of possessing the drug and one of cultivating it. When asked before her sentence 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." Tabram could be evicted following her second drug conviction. She is a tenant of Milecastle Housing Association, which will hold a meeting to decide what to do next. The charity has met her several times to discuss her drug use and a spokesman said she was aware she had breached her tenancy agreement. "Their decision will be taken after sentence and [will] take all aspects into consideration," the spokesman said. Changed status of an illegal substance * The penalty for possessing cannabis was lowered in January 2004 after David Blunkett, as Home Secretary, downgraded the drug from a class B to a class C substance. This followed a liberalisation drugs trial in the south London borough of Lambeth that allowed the police to concentrate on class A drugs, such as heroin and cocaine. Under the reclassification, cannabis is still illegal, only the penalties have changed - although some people still mistakenly believe it has been decriminalised. Most offences of cannabis possession now result in a warning and confiscation of the drug. However, if there are aggravating factors, such as smoking in a public place or repeat offending, they may be cause for arrest and prosecution. People under the age of 18 caught with the drug should be arrested, taken to a police station and given a formal warning or reprimand. Further offences will lead to a final warning or charge. The maximum penalty for possession has been reduced from five years to two years imprisonment. But for cannabis supply, dealing, production including cultivation) and trafficking the maximum penalty has increased from five to 14 years' jail. In 2006, when Charles Clarke was Home Secretary, he chose not to reverse the decision to downgrade cannabis to a class-C drug, after a review found evidence that cannabis use had fallen among those aged 16 to 24. Further research on the mental health implications of using strong cannabis is under way. http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/
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