Almost Legal

West Marin medical-marijuana activist Jacqueline Patterson was born with cerebral palsy and started using cannabis while she was still in her teens to help a severe stuttering problem.

Born in the Midwest, Patterson took a rocky path to Marin County and full-time cannabis activism. She was sexually assaulted in Kansas City about 15 years ago, got pregnant as a result of the rape and moved home to Iowa, where her mother lives. The plan was to stay with Mom, have the baby, put it up for adoption.

Then in her early 20s, Patterson started going to college to study rape, its causes and how to prevent it. Her discovery: "You have to end the drug war to prevent rape," she says. "Cannabis makes for a less violent society."

Vindication would come years later, as she watched unfolding legalization dramas in Washington and Coloradoand the acceptance of medical cannabis in nearly half the country. Now California is set to vote on legalization in 2016 through a proposed referendum.

"Domestic violence rates are going down in states where cannabis is at least medically available," says Patterson, citing a growing body of available research, "and they are going down a lot where it is recreationally available."

Years ago, the news wasn't so rosy for Patterson. After giving her child up for adoption, she got married and had another childonly to lose custody over her medical-marijuana use.

California was a different story, especially when she wrecked her car, says Patterson. "It was really freeing to know that I was finally in a place where my human rights were respected," she says. "I feel safe not only in my community but with the people in my community who are entrusted to keep the order."

Part of Patterson's work involves helping patients with severe medical conditions relocate to California, a sort of underground railroad. But as she learned, in California, some safe havens are safer from police harassment than others. She's experienced different degrees of law-enforcement engagement as an approved medical marijuana user, disparities that state lawmakers have repeatedly failed to address.

This year, a dispensaries bill sponsored by the League of California Cities and the California Police Chiefs Association showed some promiseit would have created a set of medical marijuana regulations, until a flurry of last-minute tough-on-crime amendments tanked it.

"Police around the state are all over the map, and they don't always correspond to what the public wants," says Dale Gieringer, director of California NORML, the legalization advocacy group.

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