COURIER POST - March 13, 2000
 South Jersey section - Page 1

 
Arrest force Ed Forchion to reconsider agenda
Marijuana reform campaign falters

(Cherry Hill-NJ) - Ed Forchion has stumbled in his campaign for marijuana reform. The former cross-country trucker pleaded guilty recently in two municipal courts to violating state laws by lighting up marijuana joints at Camden County Democratic Headquarters in Cherry Hill and at the office's ofU.S. Rep. Rob Andrews in Haddon Heights, both in April 1998, while he was campaigning for county freeholder on the "legalize Marijuana Party" ticket. But Forchion, 35, has appealed the convictions, saying he needs the drug for pain relief and to fully exercise his Rastafarian religion.

He also faces trial in State Superior Court in Camden on charges he conspired to posses with intent to distribute about 40 pounds of marijuana, stemming from an arrest on route 42 in bellmawr in November 1997. His planned defense at that trial will be to push for Jury Nullification, where the jury decides not to enforce the law. He argues that, as with alcohol during Prohibition, the use of marijuana isn't considered law breaking by most citizens.

The soft-spoken Forchion doesn't fit the image many have of him from news reports and his WEBSITE. At his recent Cherry Hill court hearing, some police and court officials assumed another defendant - one with a ponytail, jeans and a stomach over hang barely contained in brightly colored suspenders - was "NJWEEDMAN" Forchion's internet identity.

In fact Forchion was the guy in the hallway, trying to soothe his son who's not yet 2 and entertaining his 4-year old daughter. Now unemployed due to health problems and the loss of a truck he used for work, he's a fulltime baby sitter and house-husband. He didn't bring his children with him to court for sympathy, he said, but only because his back-up sitter, his mother-in-law, was sick.
 
 

Ed Forchion wears a "Legalize Marijuana Party" T-shirt to his recent hearing in Cherry Hill Municipal Court on drug charges.

And Forchion, who will be looking at a prison sentence if he's convicted in the Superior Court case, is beginning to question why he didn't just stay in his house and smoke marijuana out of site. "I never was a troublemaker," he said. "Growing up in Sicklerville, I was a nerd. I was the guy who spent my spare time in high school going fishing. I talk to the world on ham radio's. I'm a guy who loves the internet.

"I thought I was doing the American thing, pushing for marijuana reform. If you think you have a right to free speech, just put a sticker on your car saying, "Legalize Marijuana" he said. While campaigning for state Assembly and county freeholder again last year summer, Forchion said, he was ordered to leave public property in WOODBURY. He has backed away from his visible push - he also ran for Congress in 1998 - to change state laws that classify marijuana, along with herion and cocaine, as a Class 1 substance, carrying with it a state prision term if convicted of distribution. That campaign was most visible via the pro-marijuana banners he attached to his van, often parking in public areas and entertaining questions from passers-by.

Arrested again last months in Collingswood on a second charge of conspiracy to distribute marijuana, Forchion has learned law enforcement doesn't forget. Although he posted bail overnight on that charge, with the help of a national marijuana law reform group, Forchion remained in Camden County jail for 10 days, unable to satisfy a $1,300 fine imposed in Gloucester Township on charges of drug and drug paraphernalia possesion and resisting arrest. He has appealed that conviction, which usually puts collection of fines and penalities on hold. The charge was based on FORCHION'S refusal to permit a township officer to search his van without a warrant in May 98. 

Coming home from jail after his 10 day of incarceration last month, Forchion removed the banners and has softened his campaign to legalize marijuana. I never went around knocking on doors, but when I put up banners, people stopped and talked to me. There are just as many 45- and 50- year olds as 18- and 19-year old- kids. I don't think marijuana should be used by children. I wouldn't allow my children (FORCHION has four) to smoke marijuana and I don't smoke in front of them. "Sometimes I wonder why I'm doing this. A few years ago, my life was perfect. Today I'm thinking this is my last winter as a free man."

 While living in Arizonia a few years ago, where marijuana is legal, Forchion said he never got a ticket or arrested. 

But after the 1997 arrest in bellmarw, the government tried to confiscated his Kenworth Tractor Truck. But he had not paid it off fully, and since he was behind on the payments, the truck company took it back when they found out about his arrest. Forchion said he had paid off all but $16,000 of the $56,000 purchase price.
 
 

That changed his personal situation from being fully employed as a coast-to-coast truck driver to being unemployed. "You don't get road rage when you smoke," Forchion said of his former profession. "being mad at anyone, about anybody, is not a worry."

After that, Forchion signed up for a computer trianing program in burlington county run by the state Office of Vocational Rehabilitation in the Labor Department. Despite being innocent until proven guilty. "They said I couldn't be considered until my legal status was settled," he said. 

Now he is a full-time caregiver, a house-husband for three of his children. He lost custody of the fourth child when her mother challenged his appropriateness as a parent in view of his marijuana arrest. Forchion, who lives in Browns Mills, said becasue he began using marijuana when he was a teen-ager. Plagued with asthma, he couldn't smoke tobacco, but marijuana eased his breathing and he soon was able to stop using an inhaler, he said. 

 He served with the New Jersey National Gaurd and later with the U.S. Marine Corps until getting a medical discharge because of asthma. He then served in the U.S. Army from 1987-1991.

"I'm a patriot" he said.

Forchion said he thinks it more than a coincidence that his Feb. 7 arrest in Collingwoods came momments after he talked to an associate he now believes is a government informant. The arrest also came soon after Forchion offered to provide some information that could discredit a Camden police officer who was involved in the investigation of convicted drug kingpin Jose "JR" Rivera.

 I always felt the marijuana laws were wrong," he said. "I've participated in the July 4 protest every year across from the White House and I've been on C-SPAN. I believe in the constitution and I've never been in trouble before. My driving abstract was empty and my first arrest was when I was 32.

I want a trial on this (distribution charge). I believe plea bargains are illegal. It's nothing but bribery by the state, an offer to give up your right to a jury trial in return for walking away," Forchion said.

I don't believe the government has the right to regulate my body. I think it's a freedom issue, and I have the right to freely exercise my religion," he said, asserting marijuana is as much a part of his religion as Catholic's who use communion wine or native american's who use Peyote a cactus that forms natural LSD.