Newsgroups: rec.drugs.cannabis
From: [bc 616] at [scn.org] (Darral Good)
Subject: A NURSE FOR LEGAIZATION
Date: Tue, 19 Dec 1995 21:37:08 GMT

Registered Nurse Contacts NORML In An Appeal To Save The Life Of Her
Patient

August 4, 1995, Phoenix, AZ:  In an attempt to stimulate national
attention and awareness to the plight of her patient, Richard G.
Martinez, neuro-rehabilitation nurse and Martinez's legal guardian,
Constance Theis, has contacted NORML with a story of unparalleled
injustice.

After having been shot through the left eye in 1991, Richard Martinez
was left with an excruciatingly painful nerve disorder known as
trigeminal neuralgia.  In addition, many fragments from the bullet
could not be removed during surgery and still remain lodged in
Martinez's brain.  The presence of these fragments induces cognitive
deficits and seizure disorders and also gives rise to frequent bouts
of intense nausea and severe depression.  To help alleviate Martinez's
daily pain, he was granted a legal prescription for Marinol -- a
federally approved THC synthetic drug.

The Marinol, however, ended up being far too expensive ($636.00 per
month) for Martinez to afford on his social security disability-based
income.  As a result, Martinez turned to the next logical substitute,
natural cannabis.     Martinez was turned in to authorities for
possessing marijuana by a relative in exchange for a small financial
reward.

He now sits in Durango County Jail in Phoenix, Arizona, where he is
forced to sleep on a dirty floor and is p revented from taking his
proper medication.  While in jail, Martinez has suffered numerous
staph infections in the eye socket and ear.  Staph infections put
tremendous pressure on the heart and, if left untreated, can be fatal.
The tremendous swelling from these infections is causing green pus to
flow from Martinez's right nostril.

In addition, Martinez's serious infections are destroying valuable
tissue and bone in his face.  This deterioration has gotten so extreme
that Martinez now believes that his eye may actually be "rotting."

Martinez is also experiencing critically high blood pressure and is
now at risk of suffering a stroke.  This occurrence is a natural
physical result of untreated pain and infection.  The threat of a
severe stroke -- in addition to his constant fevers, infections,
tissue deterioration, and ear aches -- makes Martinez's incarceration
highly life threatening.

According to the reports of three separate physicians, Martinez's head
wound seriously damaged his right frontal lobe and has rendered him
mentally incompetent.  Therefore, he can not legally stand trial.  The
state, however, wants Martinez to appear in court regardless.

Consequently, psychologists at the Durango County Jail are working
round the clock to have Martinez declared mentally competent.
Ms. Theis maintains that this process can last as long a seven or
eight months -- a time frame that she believes Martinez will not
survive.

The bitter irony is that the state is trying to legally rehabilitate a
man with braln damage solely for the purpose of throwing him back in
jail.  All this because Martinez was trying to alleviate daily pain,
nausea, and seizures with the only effective therapeutic agent he
could financially afford -- marijuana.

Constance Theis maintains that her patient's life is in danger every
additional day he stays in the Durango County Jail.  She can be
contacted at the following numbers: (602) 790-1595 (home) or (602)
325-1300 EXT 4435 (work).

http://www.norml.org/
NORML's home page.

End The Drug War.




--
"Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one strand within it.
    Anything we do to the web we do to ourselves all things are bound 
           together all things connect."  CHIEF SEATTLE.