July 1, 2014 News update from Roger (still) in the Federal Detention Center at the Honolulu Airport
Aloha. I hope you’re in top-shape and high-spirits and having a terrific summer.
Big thanks for all the Happy Birthday good wishes, cards and letters! (Consider yourself well-hugged if that was you.) I’m grateful for the love and support that helped to make my day as I near my final time (days?/weeks?/months?) in prison.
I’m good. I’ll need some serious detoxing and rebuilding of my physical, dental and financial health as soon as I get outta here, but my mental, emotional and spiritual health is as good as can be. When Share’s happy - I’m happy. I’ve made some good use of this prison time, Share’s made lots of improvements to our farm while I’ve been away, and, Spirit-willing, we both look forward to winning our appeals and a Cannabis future of greater health, wealth and happiness for everyone.
Share’s still facing 27 months in prison - unless we win the appeals. We’ve GOT to win this. Please help us any way you can in this final stretch. We especially need amicus legal briefs to be filed from groups who see the value in winning our case as a precedent for religious freedom. Please pass the word and both of our websites to religious freedom groups and public interest law firms around the country. We’re down to a few hundred dollars left and I’m still prohibited from doing business or making any money. If you can afford to donate to us and you believe in our cause we would appreciate it. Thank you.
My official “release date” to come home is November 14th. By that time I’ll have served about 85% of my “mandatory minimum” 5 year sentence, or about 52 months. 15% or so gets automatically deducted for “good time”. Between now and Nov. 14th I’m supposed to go live at the “halfway house” called T.J. Mahoney Hale here on Oahu. It’s starting to feel like my release to the halfway house might be purposely delayed to keep me from being able to work on our appeals which are due to be filed on August 7th.
God, that’s great! Please show us the blessings in THIS situation .. and hurry! We are safe, we are loved and all is well.
After virtually zero sunshine for the last 46 months I was moved to a new unit and cell on the west side of the building where I get a few hours of direct sunshine in the 4″ wide x 6′ tall plexi-glass window most afternoons. I have a great view over Pearl Harbor (which I can’t see) to a large, flat-topped mountain which I can see. Sunsets on the mountain from my cell are often really beautiful as the weather at the airport is usually bright and sunny.
On July 31, 2013 Judge Kobayashi ruled that Share and I were “sincere” and “legitimate”, and the government “substantially burdened our legitimate religious practices”. A few weeks later however, she surprised us by ruling that the government had a “compelling interest” in arresting us because marijuana is still classified as a Schedule 1 most dangerous substance with “no recognized medical use in treatment in the USA”. (Hawai’i and 22 other states, plus Washington, D.C. have “recognized” its medical use.) She also ruled that the government used their “least restrictive means” in dealing with us, another falsehood. The government could have simply invited me to a meeting, called me, or sent me a threatening letter like they commonly do to dispensaries in California. I would have closed the Ministry in 60 seconds and then gone to court and sued the government to re-open it. The ruling in August meant that we were denied our all-important “religious defense” at trial scheduled for October 8th. We were facing a trial with zero defense.
On September 27th Share and I were offered a fairly reasonable plea deal under the corrupt circumstances, a “conditional plea of guilty”, a very rare thing. We took it. At that point all of our defenses for trial had been denied. We wouldn’t be allowed to “tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth” to the jury; the “whole truth” was going to be ruled as “inadmissible”! How’s that even possible? I had zero idea that federal Judges had this kind of power to prevent honest defenses with solid evidence and sincere witnesses to be presented to the jury. This needs to be corrected. Live and learn.
We were promised that our four good motions that had previously been denied were to be appealed to the Ninth Circuit Court in San Francisco sometime in the next 9 to 15 months where we could finally win the whole case. I was ‘offered’ a 5 year “mandatory minimum” prison sentence with 4 years of Supervised Release or Probation afterwards, and Share was ‘offered’ a 27 month sentence with 3 years of Probation. Fortunately Share gets to stay free until our appeals are decided in San Francisco.
In early February 2014 I was told by an email friend that Share and I had WON our Motion for a Defense of Entrapment by Estopple. He said the Order was dated Dec. 30, 2013 … three months AFTER we made our conditional plea of guilty! WTFlip? How’s that possible? It took four more weeks of calling my lawyer to get a copy of that ruling to me, and Share’s lawyer NEVER sent it to her. WTFlip? We WON that super-important motion, but we couldn’t use it. Huh? Really?
On April 28th Share and I were formally sentenced. I’m finishing my full sentence right now, and Share still faces hers. Fortunately, the truth about Cannabis is making forward progress every week and it seems like time is on our side.
I found a document from last year that’s evidence that could lead to proof that I/we were selectively and maliciously prosecuted - and had our civil rights violated by the government - because I was behind the Peaceful Sky ordinance that won in Hawai’i County in November of 2008. A lawsuit to force all of our Big Island officials (Mayor, Prosecutor, County Council and Police Chief) to obey the law is now at the Hawaii Supreme Court. Our county law is called the Lowest Law Enforcement Priority of Cannabis Ordinance and it passed with a clear majority of votes. Besides supporting 24 Cannabis plants being grown for personal, private use on every Big Island property for any reason or for no reason at all, and a few other important things, the ordinance cuts-off grants for our local H.P.D. from D.E.A. eradication funds which they’ve used for 40 years(!) to spy on and harass people in rural areas, to spray poisons on them from low-flying helicopters and to confiscate their Cannabis crops worth MILLIONS of dollars annually. Did someone want to retaliate against me for taking away their secret cash-cow? We’re getting closer to proving this.
The following TESTIMONY was submitted to the Hawaii State Legislature at a hearing to urge the federal government to grant me reasonable bail. Everybody interested in our case needs to know this.
Submitted on March 20, 2013
“Comments: Testimony for Roger Christie: I am a friend of Share Christie, and an attorney licensed in the State of Missouri since 1989. In the spring of 2011 I started working pro bono to help Share and Roger on their case. On several occasions I spoke by phone with Dana Ishibashi, the public defender representing Share until October 2011. Share told me that Dana was a friend of the prosecutor, Michael Kawahara. It seemed to me that the federal government’s prosecution of Roger was far above what seemed reasonable. On one of my phone calls to Dana I asked him if he knew the real reason the government wanted to prosecute Roger so much. Dana told me that when operation Green Harvest was in place, the program had a budget of $460,000. and the local government paid $60,000. When Roger helped get the Peaceful Skies initiative passed on the Big Island it prohibited the local government from spending that $60,000. Dana said that after that, the local authorities went to the federal authorities and complained about what Roger had done and that the federal authorities said they could still go after Roger and that is just what they did. It seemed clear to me that Dana believed Roger had been specifically targeted because of his work in getting Peaceful Skies passed. Dana did not share with me where he got this information. I hope the Senate can find out. Sincerely, __________ _________ , J.D.”
All the very best to you and yours!
With love to everyone,
Roger
[ www.thc-ministry.org ] and [ www.the-last-marijuana-trial.com ].
P.S. Please watch LEAF on Youtube.com and the work of Dr. Wm. Courtney at [ www.CannabisInternational.org ]
P.P.S. Check-out the “baking soda cure” at [ www.PHMiracle.com ].
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