Peacetown Jonathan
04-29-2015, 12:26 AM
Our new free online website, the Sonoma Independent, officially launched this week, from the new Sebastopol based non-profit, Informing to Empower. My first article is about Yarrow Kubrin, a Sebastopol father of two small children who will be sentenced next week for a victimless marijuana crime, and the grassroots effort to stop the County from wasting our tax dollars and destroying families for the District Attorney and Probation Department's secret war on weed. The full article, and a petition that 400 people have already signed, can be read here. (https://www.sonomaindependent.org/stop-incarcerating-parents-for-victimless-marijuana-crimes/) The first few graphs of the article are below. The title is taken from the new petition:
“Stop Incarcerating Parents for Victimless Marijuana Crimes”
On April 3, 2015, Sonoma County’s secret war on marijuana confronted an unprecedented roadblock. A freedom flash mob had gathered, overfilling a courtroom and packing the hallway outside. Nearly 100 upstanding citizens had taken off work that morning and made their way through a crowded security checkpoint to challenge the recommended four-year imprisonment of Yarrow Kubrin. A tax-paying real estate broker, husband, and hands-on parent of two young children, Kubrin was due to be sentenced for a four year old victimless crime of a “legal grow” operation that had violated a few technicalities of the state’s arcane marijuana laws.
Sonoma County had never seen anything like it. Kubrin was unwilling to leave his family to walk quietly into the dark night of shameful criminality for a victimless crime. He was asking for help, and his community was rising up to support him.
Last fall, the Assistant District Attorney prosecuting his case had revoked her own plea bargain offer of probation but no jail time, as “too sweet a deal” for her supervisor. The D.A.’s office had requested that the judge sentence Kubrin to a prison term of no more than five and a half years. Sonoma County’s Probation Department, on its part, recommended a jail term of four and a half years with three additional years of probation, during which time, according to the Probation recommendation, Kubrin could be sent back for more jail time if he violated unrelated technical prohibitions like drinking alcohol or stepping foot in a bar.
The rest of the article can be read at the SonomaIndependent.org (https://sonomaindependent.org)
“Stop Incarcerating Parents for Victimless Marijuana Crimes”
On April 3, 2015, Sonoma County’s secret war on marijuana confronted an unprecedented roadblock. A freedom flash mob had gathered, overfilling a courtroom and packing the hallway outside. Nearly 100 upstanding citizens had taken off work that morning and made their way through a crowded security checkpoint to challenge the recommended four-year imprisonment of Yarrow Kubrin. A tax-paying real estate broker, husband, and hands-on parent of two young children, Kubrin was due to be sentenced for a four year old victimless crime of a “legal grow” operation that had violated a few technicalities of the state’s arcane marijuana laws.
Sonoma County had never seen anything like it. Kubrin was unwilling to leave his family to walk quietly into the dark night of shameful criminality for a victimless crime. He was asking for help, and his community was rising up to support him.
Last fall, the Assistant District Attorney prosecuting his case had revoked her own plea bargain offer of probation but no jail time, as “too sweet a deal” for her supervisor. The D.A.’s office had requested that the judge sentence Kubrin to a prison term of no more than five and a half years. Sonoma County’s Probation Department, on its part, recommended a jail term of four and a half years with three additional years of probation, during which time, according to the Probation recommendation, Kubrin could be sent back for more jail time if he violated unrelated technical prohibitions like drinking alcohol or stepping foot in a bar.
The rest of the article can be read at the SonomaIndependent.org (https://sonomaindependent.org)