‘Prince of Pot’ Marc Emery Ordered Extradited to the U.S. to Serve Five-Year Prison Sentence

[Editor's note: This post is excerpted from this week's forthcoming NORML weekly media advisory. To have NORML's media advisories delivered straight to your in-box, sign up for NORML's free e-zine here.]

Canadian Justice Minister Rob Nicholson has reportedly signed off on an order extraditing longtime Canadian marijuana activist and publisher Marc Emery to the United States, according to the Associated Press.

Emery’s attorney stated that he will be transferred to the US imminently.

United States law enforcement officials indicted Emery in August of 2005 for selling marijuana seeds to US customers.

Under a plea agreement, Emery faces up to five years in US prison. Under Canadian law, he would face no more than one month in jail (and probation), if convicted.

In a letter from MP (member of Parliament) Libby Davies sent this week to Public Safety Minister Vic Toews, she criticized, “Your government took a rare and unnecessary step today, by extraditing a Canadian citizen to serve a prison sentence in America for actions that are not worthy of prosecution under Canadian laws.”

Marc Emery has long maintained that his prosecution was politically motivated. Upon issuing his indictment in 2005, former US DEA administrator Karen Tandy asserted that Emery’s arrest struck “a significant blow to the marijuana legalization movement. … Drug legalization lobbyists now have one less pot of money to rely on.”

For nearly two decades, Emery operated a highly visible seed bank in Vancouver. Emery declared hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxes to the Canadian government, and officials at Health Canada – which oversees the nation’s legal medicinal cannabis program – frequently advised patients to purchase his seeds. Virtually all profits from Emery’s business ventures were distributed among various national and international drug law reform organizations.

Cannabis Culture has posted additional information on this development, as well as the essay: ‘75 Things You Can Do to Free Marc,’ online here.

U.S. DEA Finally Gets Its Man

Just over four years ago, former U.S. DEA administrator Karen Tandy announced to the world that her agency had struck “a significant blow … to the marijuana legalization movement” by indicting Canada’s so-called ‘Prince of Pot,’ Marc Emery.

For nearly two decades Emery operated a successful marijuana seed bank operation in Vancouver, British Columbia — a venture which he used to directly fund cannabis law reform efforts around the globe, including the magazine Cannabis Culture, the internet site Pot TV, and the founding of the British Columbia Marijuana Party.

Emery’s seed business was hardly a secret. For many years, Emery mailed copies of his seed catalogue to Canadian politicians. A Canadian court convicted him in 1998 and sentenced him to a $2,000 fine. Undeterred, Emery continued to sell seeds — and pay federal taxes on his profits — up until his arrest. Canadian authorities were happy to accept his tax money, and officials at Health Canada, which oversees Canada’s legal medical marijuana program, often recommended that patients contact Emery for grow advice. Nevertheless, when the Feds came calling, the Canadian authorities were swift to throw Marc Emery to the wolves.

Even though Emery’s alleged crimes would have warranted, at most, a month in jail in his home country, Canadian authorities yesterday placed Marc into custody so that he can be extradited to the United States. Once here, he faces up to five years in prison for pleading guilty to one count of conspiracy to manufacture marijuana (more than 100 plants) in violation of 21 USC 841(a)(1) and 841(b)(1)(B).

But lets not kid ourselves. Marc Emery was hardly a high level target because he sold marijuana seeds to the U.S. — a simple google search will yield dozens of listings of competitors that presently engage in similar activities. No, it wasn’t so much what Marc did (“There isn’t a single victim in my case, no one who can stand up and say, ‘I was hurt by Marc Emery.’ No one,” he told the Vancouver Sun) as it was what he did with his money that aroused the ire of U.S. anti-drug officials.

And we have Karen Tandy’s own words to prove it.