Kreiger trial
<<< Back to About Our Judges
<<< Back to Judge Chrumka
A Calgary jury has sent a strong message that Canadians abhor
Draconian laws on marijuana, a message that should encourage the incoming
federal government of Paul Martin to move forward on decriminalization.
The jury crafted its message cleverly, by accepting a judge's
order to convict in a medicinal-marijuana case but taking nearly 10 hours to
do so. The message was that Canadians are law-abiding, but the laws must
make sense to be obeyed.
It wasn't quite jury-nullification, but it did contain an echo
of the four jury acquittals of abortion doctor Henry Morgentaler in the
1970s and 80s, acquittals that helped bring down an unjust law. Grant
Krieger, who has multiple sclerosis, and who admitted to keeping 29 cannabis
plants to produce marijuana for other seriously ill people, was charged in
1999 with drug trafficking. Mr. Justice Paul Chrumka of the Alberta Court of
Queen's Bench instructed the jury to convict Mr. Krieger, since the accused
offered no defence other than necessity, which did not apply since none of
his customers faced immediate, life-threatening peril.
Even so, hour after hour ticked by. At the seven-hour mark,
two jurors emerged to ask the judge to excuse them. "I believe that I could
not live with myself if I'm part of the conviction of this man," a male
juror said, tearfully. A female juror added, "I can take your instructions.
But it's not in my heart." Judge Chrumka sent them back to the jury room to
finish the job .
It all seems an absurd exercise. Mr. Krieger, who was
sentenced to one day in jail (or rather, "one day in jail," which he will
serve only on paper), will have a serious conviction on his criminal record.
Yet Judge Chrumka acknowledged that Mr. Krieger ran a non-profit operation
designed to help the sick (including those with AIDS, cancer and Lou
Gehrig's disease), which hardly fits any common-sense definition of
trafficking.
Although his actions were illegal at the time, the law has
since been changed. A year after he was charged, an Ontario court ruled the
marijuana law unconstitutional because it contained no exemption for
medicinal use -- the very flaw Mr. Krieger was trying to address. New
regulations have since been written to permit severely ill people to use
marijuana. Two months ago, the Ontario Court of Appeal rewrote those
regulations, saying they dehumanized users by forcing them onto the black
market to obtain a safe, reliable supply. The court struck out provisions
that prevented licensed growers from producing marijuana for more than one
person and from being compensated for providing marijuana to ill people.
In short, there is no reason now that Mr. Krieger cannot go
back to doing exactly what he was just convicted for. There is also no
reason not to press ahead with legislation to decriminalize the possession
of small amounts of marijuana. Ottawa tabled a bill last May that would have
treated possession as a non-criminal offence akin to speeding, worthy of a
fine. The bill died when Parliament was prorogued.
The Alberta jury was unlikely to have been composed of
hippie-era radicals. While its focus was on the medicinal use of marijuana,
its statement seems an accurate reflection of how many Canadians feel about
the treatment of marijuana users in general. They have no heart for a
blindly punitive approach.
Back to top of Document
