hmmmm..... yesterday i was looking at one of those marijuana magazines high times or maybe one of the otherones and on the ads run by this guy selling marijuana seeds by mail order they had pasted stamps saying something like "danger dont buy this guys seeds you may be arrested because the feds are shaking him down" Original Article 'Prince of Pot' faces charges Could get up to life in prison in United States Peter Lewis Seattle Times Oct. 30, 2005 12:00 AM VANCOUVER, B.C. - Marc Emery differs in so many ways from most people accused of big-time drug dealing, it's hard to know where to start. Even though he faces the possibility of decades in a U.S. prison for selling marijuana seeds to Americans, Emery regularly welcomes a steady stream of journalists. That's an approach most people accused of drug dealing avoid instinctively, or on advice of their attorneys. Not Emery, founder of the B.C. Marijuana Party, who maintains that his legal troubles spring from the U.S. government's desire to muzzle him and the movement he claims to lead. He relishes his reputation as the "Prince of Pot" and "Mayor of Vansterdam," the latter a reference to Vancouver and Amsterdam, the Dutch city where marijuana can be purchased from "coffee shops." He proudly proclaims his long-term vision to "overgrow the government" by spreading marijuana faster than drug agents could eradicate it. No secret Unlike others accused of drug dealing, Emery has for years made no effort to hide the fact he earns his living from marijuana, making millions selling marijuana seeds and paraphernalia through his Vancouver store and the Internet. It's that marijuana-centered business that has landed Emery in hot water in the United States, where a Seattle-based grand jury has indicted him and two of his employees on drug and money-laundering charges. Emery, who is free on bail, freely expounds on the virtues of marijuana for both recreational and medicinal purposes. He claims to have poured nearly $4 million (Canadian) into political and legal causes to decriminalize marijuana and/or to make it available for medical use, including ballot initiatives in Nevada, Alaska and Arizona. Emery contends a news release issued July 29, the day of his arrest, reveals the U.S. government's intention to mute his efforts to advance the spread of marijuana. In the release, Karen Tandy, head of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, wrote: "Today's DEA arrest of Marc Scott Emery, publisher of Cannabis Culture Magazine, and the founder of a marijuana legalization group, is a significant blow not only to the marijuana trafficking trade in the U.S. and Canada, but also to the marijuana legalization movement. ... Hundreds of thousands of dollars of Emery's illicit profits are known to have been channeled to marijuana legalization groups active in the United States and Canada." Tandy's office has declined to comment about the statement, but in Seattle, federal prosecutors have distanced themselves from her remarks. Todd Greenberg, the lead assistant U.S. attorney on the case, said he could understand how her comments could be interpreted as having a political dimension but added, "No one locally has made such a statement. No prosecutor, no agent, no one in Seattle." "As the chief (federal) law-enforcement official here, I'm not interested in his political speech in the slightest," Seattle U.S. Attorney John McKay said. "He's a legitimate target." Huge supplier Prosecutors contend that Emery was targeted because he was Canada's largest supplier of seeds and marijuana-growing equipment, and because the majority of his customers were U.S. citizens. Prosecutors allege that Emery also has provided customers with detailed instructions on how to grow marijuana and sold specialized lights, fans and fertilizer. "He was a one-stop shopping facilitator for marijuana growers," Greenberg said. Emery does not quarrel with the substance of the charges, though he has much to say about the U.S. government's "war on drugs," which he described as "immoral and lethal." "If I'm going to be sentenced to life in prison in a U.S. jail, it'll be for what I've done, and I'm proud of what I've done," Emery said. "And there's no going back on that. I helped facilitate hopefully millions of Americans to grow marijuana." Fighting extradition At the request of the U.S. government, Canadian prosecutors are working to force Emery and co-defendants Michelle Rainey-Fenkarek and Gregory Williams to appear in Seattle federal court to answer drug-conspiracy and money-laundering charges stemming from Emery's seed and marijuana-growing business. They are fighting extradition, a process that legal experts say could take up to two years. Theirs will be an uphill fight, acknowledges John Conroy, a Canadian lawyer assisting the defendants. Conroy notes that the U.S.-Canadian treaty under which Emery and the others were arrested creates an exception for extradition in the case of offenses of a "political character." The problem, Conroy adds, is that the treaty goes on to deem certain crimes, including drug offenses, as ineligible for the political-character exception. Another argument likely to be advanced is "cruel and unusual punishment," Conroy said, referring to the much harsher sentence the defendants would face in the United States - up to life in prison.