McMahon v. Board of Pharmacy, No. CV 7415, Iowa District Court in and for Polk County.
The ACLU, the Board of Phamacy, and me, had our hearing this morning at 10:00 a.m. in Polk County, Iowa, District Court in front of Judge Joel D. Novak. The Board of Pharmacy had no objection to any of my motions, so all three of my motions were granted: (1) my Motion to Intervene; (2) my Motion to supplement the record with a copy of DEA Judge Young's 1988 ruling in the federal medical marijuana rescheduling case; and (3) my Motion to supplement the record with the Memorandum of Law I filed with the Board in May of 2008.
The argument centered around an 8-factor test the Board uses to determine potential for abuse. Since marijuana is in both Schedule I and Schedule II in Iowa, and since both schedules have the exact same potential for abuse, the ACLU and me argued that potential for abuse was not relevant to the question of removing marijuana from Schedule I. The only relevant evidence to removing marijuana from Schedule I is whether it has accepted medical use in treatment in the United States. We argued that 13 state medical marijuana statutes prove marijuana does have accepted medical use in treatment in the United States.
Judge Novak appeared to understand the issues and took the case under advisement. Stay tuned.