Though mainstream corporate cameras were on scene during the front gate stand-off between sick and crippled patients and the DEA attempting to escape with the stolen crop of plants, they say the story has gotten little national coverage and airtime. The most powerful facts, pictures, and video are being ignored by big media.

PBS is filming a piece on WAMM, but it will not be aired for about 18 months due to internal scheduling and bureacracy.

Valerie and Mike have already replanted part of the devastated garden... and then on the advice of their lawyer, dug up their own plants. The couple now fear retalliation in the form of federal prison sentences, which according to federal mandatory minimum sentencing laws would be 13 years (1 year for each 10 plants).

Also, they fear that replanting would provoke the US District Attorney to attempt a "civil asset forfeiture" move, where the USDA - with or without any conviction or charges even filed against the Corrals - would file a lawsuit in civil court against *the property itself* on which WAMM operates, to confiscate the land as "the proceeds of a drug-related crime" or as "material to the performance of a drug-related crime".

Though a blatant violation of the 4th Amendment to the US constitution and an afront to common sense, identical "civil asset forfeiture" horror stories have become common in the last 30 years of the federal government's War on (some) Drugs. The land on which WAMM has operated, is in fact owned by a Bhuddist organization. WAMM's generous hosts would thus be robbed of their property by the DEA.

Nevertheless, Valerie and Mike have boldly resolved to defy the DEA and continue dispensing medical marijuana from the remains of last year's harvest to their sick and dying patients, until reserves run out completely. Beyond that point, WAMM patients will be left by the DEA to suffer with legal FDA prescription drugs that cost far more, have powerful and deleterious side effects rendering the patients unable to live normal lives, or in some cases just left to die all the sooner for their inability to keep down such potent prescription medication - even anti-nausea pills! - due to the symptoms of nausea brought on by their existing ailments.

Press have been asked not to visit the farm or attend WAMM dispensary meetings for the time being. They say this is out of consideration for the feelings and frazzled nerves of the WAMM patients over this ordeal, who still come first.
WAMM remains first and foremost a hospice caregiver operation, with political activism being a 2nd priority. 40 WAMM patients have died this year alone, 5 of them in the last few weeks.

However, WAMM board members are rumored to be staging a public medical marijuana dispensation in front of Santa Cruz City Hall during the next city council meeting. This would be another valiant act of public defiance of the DEA.

Unfortunately, defiance cannot now replace a year's worth of destroyed and stolen medicine. It appears that Asa Hutchinson and the Drug Enforcement Agency, Attorney General John Ashcroft and the US Dept of (in)Justice, and the American Medical Association and the pharmaceutical industry, have won this round.

The sick and dying, have lost.

-Edison Carter