Scientists who study medical marijuana will soon have access to a wider variety of strains. The National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA) — the federal "dealer" that supplies the drug to scientists — has received numerous complaints from researchers that the drug they supply is too weak compared with what's sold on the streets, legal or otherwise. But the complaints aren't responsible for the change, Nature reports. NIDA's willingness to expand the types of plants available to researchers is tied to the fact that legal marijuana is becoming increasingly available.

"We want to be able to evaluate the claims that marijuana is therapeutically beneficial," Nora Volkow, director of NIDA in Rockville, Maryland, told Nature.

There were days when David Kralik would arrive at his landscaping and snow-removal business in Mississauga and stay just a few minutes – the heady odour of marijuana from the grow-op next door was too powerful.

“You open the door to come in, go into my office, and I just sit down, fire up the computer and – ” He lets out an expletive. “And you just leave. It’s that bad.”

Mr. Kralik couldn’t call the police to complain about the grow-op, or another in the same building, because they’re both legal and under federal jurisdiction.

Ohio has taken the first step toward legalizing marijuana for recreational use after the state’s attorney general approved paperwork that would allow the issue to be decided by voters. On Friday, Attorney General Mike DeWine, a Republican, certified ResponsibleOhio’s petition to put pot legalization on the ballot and has sent it to the Ohio Ballot Board, which has 10 days to review the language of the petition and approve it for signature gathering, the Columbus Dispatch reported.

Boris Shcharansky stresses that he's no outlaw.

The Urbandale businessman is selling what he calls hemp oil — made from a plant that is closely related to marijuana. He knows his customers are using the oil to treat chronic ailments. But he swears he's not peddling medical marijuana before Iowa lawmakers decide whether to legalize such sales.

"I'm not hiding in the shadows with this," he said. "I'm totally out in the open."

In 1997, Dr. Dennis Forsythe, described in Forsythe v Director of Public Prosecutions and Attorney General (1997 34 J.L.R. 512) as a sociologist, holist, author, Rastafarian and attorney-at-law, petitioned the Supreme (High) Court for a declaration that his constitutional rights to freedom of conscience and freedom of religion had been infringed by the Dangerous Drugs Act 1924. Forsythe had been arrested for illegal possession of marijuana (called ganja in Jamaica) and a chillum pipe (used to smoke marijuana) at his house. Rastafarians are adherents of a religious movement originating from Jamaica that smoke marijuana as a religious sacrament.

Forsythe stated in his affidavit that:

The former head baker of the Victoria Cannabis Buyers’ Club heads to Ottawa today in hopes of overturning Canada’s medical marijuana laws and securing the right for patients to use cannabis oils, cookies, teas and lotions.

Owen Edward Smith will appear before the Supreme Court of Canada on Friday after victories at the B.C. Court of Appeal and B.C. Supreme Court.

It’s the first time Canada’s highest court has heard a medical marijuana case.

Smith was arrested at a Victoria apartment in 2009 and charged with possession for the purpose of trafficking THC after police found pot cookies and other cannabis-infused foodstuffs on the premises.

A new Nevada bill introduced on Tuesday could allow pets to use pot. The proposal is part of a larger bill that would overhaul the state’s medical marijuana law, remove penalties for drivers who test positive for the drug, and require more stringent training for marijuana vendors.

Senator Tick Segerblom, D-Nev., is sponsoring a bill that would allow animal owners to acquire marijuana with the certification of a veterinarian if the animal’s pain could be alleviated by the drug, the Associated Press reported. Segerblom admitted that the drugs may have adverse effects on the animals, but said, “You don't know until you try."

A group which has been holding banner drops on overpasses around the Dallas/Fort Worth area was approached by the Dallas Sheriff’s Department and told they had to take their banner down.

The DFW Medical Marijuana Bridge Brigade was on the Preston Bridge over the George Bush Turn Pike displaying a banner which reads “Honk For Medical Marijuana” in Dallas.

Deputies arrived and told the group that they were were breaking city code, however when asked which codes the group was breaking, the deputy stated “I don’t have to tell you that, it’s not my job to inform.”

Risking arrest, the group took the banner down despite believing that they were exercising their First Amendment rights.

On Texas’s Independence Day, Republican David Simpson filed a sweeping bill (HB 2165) that would end marijuana prohibition in Texas. Simpson’s bill aims to delete any mention of marijuana from state law, completely deregulate and decriminalize it and treat it as any other vegetable.

A release from Simpson’s office called the proposal a first in the nation. The statement read:

“I am proposing that this plant [marijuana] be regulated like tomatoes, jalapeños or coffee.

Because cannabis makes you lazy, right? Well, no. A report from the frontline of cannabis activism.