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Will Foster is Free! He Walked Out of Prison in Oklahoma Today

November 25th, 2009 By: Phillip Smith, Chronicle Blog

Medical marijuana patient Will Foster is a free man. According to a phone call I just received from his partner, Susan Mueller, Foster was released on parole and walked out of prison in Oklahoma today.

As you who have followed the Will Foster saga know, he became a poster boy for drug war injustice when he was sentenced to a mind-blowing 93 years in prison in Oklahoma back in the 1990s for growing a closet-full of medical marijuana. Thanks in part to the efforts of Stopthedrugwar.org (then known as DRCNet), Foster eventually got his sentence cut to a mere 20 years--for growing plants!--and was eventually paroled to the care of Guru of Ganja Ed Rosenthal in California, who had taken up his case.

Last year, Foster was raided and charged with an illegal marijuana grow in California, although his grow was perfectly legal under the state's medical marijuana law. He spent a year in jail in Sonoma County before prosecutors dropped all charges, but by then, Oklahoma parole authorities demanded he return to the state to finish his sentence. Foster dropped his fight against extradition and returned in September.

A good sign occurred a few weeks ago, when the parole board decided he had not violated his parole and should be released. This week, Oklahoma Gov. Brad Henry must have agreed--he had the final say in the matter.

Right now, Foster is making his way to parole offices in Oklahoma City to sign the paperwork. He should be back with his loved ones in California in a matter of days.

Thanks to everyone who agitated for his release. Every once in awhile, we win one.

Source: http://www.stopthedrugwar.com/chronicle/special/medical_marijuana_patient_will_foster_free

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Recommendation of Release by Will Foster's Judge

November 12th, 2009 By: Garret Overstreet, Tulsa NORML

The judge in Will Foster's case recommended Wednesday that Will Foster be released and not sent back to prison.  This came as a surprise Wednesday during Will's parole revocation hearing.  There is no timetable as to when the hearing's administrative judge will make the recommendation, though under Oklahoma law, the governor has the final say whether convicted felons may be released from parole or have their parole revoked and sent back to prison.  As of now, it is up to Brad Henry to sign off on his release to allow him to go back to California to receive the proper treatment for his back pain.

Backstory:

William Joseph Foster, arrested and charged in 1995 for growing marijuana at his home in Tulsa (after a bogus informant's tip of other accounts). Sentenced to 93 years in prison, this was considered to be an an unusually extended punishment by family and marijuana advocates. A year later and after much attention, a state appeals court reduced his sentence to 20 years. He was out on parole by 2001 with the parole terms that he leave the state, so he moved to California, where he would be supervised. In 2007, California ended its supervision, causing Oklahoma's Administrator of Parole and Interstate Services for the Department of Correction, Milt Gilliam, to revise Foster’s supervision. A disagreement emerged between Foster and Oklahoma over the terms of the parole, causing the state to issue a warrant, bringing Foster back to Oklahoma in 2009.

What You Can Do To Help:

Call, write, email, or meet with Governor Brad Henry urging him to sign off on the release of Will Foster and to let him move back California to be with family and save Oklahoma tax dollars on continuing such a bizarre case!

Governor Brad Henry
2300 N. Lincoln BLVD, Room 212
Oklahoma City, OK 73105

Phone: (405) 521-2342
Fax: (405) 521-3353
email: http://www.ok.gov/governor/message.php

 

Source: http://edrosenthal.blogspot.com/2009/11/will-foster-almost-free-man.html

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More marijuana found, destroyed in Bryan Co.

September 1st, 2009 by Rita Kotey (KXII News)

BRYAN CO, OK-A large stash of marijuana found in Bryan County now authorities are looking for the people responsible. Sheriff's deputies say the plants were found out in the open on, but the growers are still on the loose. Rita Kotey has the story.

Police and the Bryan County Drug Task Force found the 236 marijuana plants, potted and scattered along Wilson Street just outside of Durant.

The plants have a street value of about half a million dollars. 
Undersheriff Ken Golden says investigators are trying to figure out why the plants were left out in the open.

"It's possible it may be revenge. Maybe and angry spouse or somebody just getting even with a partner. But this stuff was really taken care of, they knew what they were doing," Golden said.

He says whoever is responsible for the plants was most likely and experienced grower.

"This was grown indoors and taken care of maybe in a large of some sort but this was well taken care of. There are no signs of wind dame or bugs or anything," Golden said.

"Marijuana today is probably ten times more potent than it was in the 70's," investigator Jay Whitney said.

Criminal Investigator Jay Whitney with the Grayson County Sheriff's Office said growing marijuana is becoming a detailed operation, requiring a lot of equipment. It's becoming more common South of the Red River, as well.

"They are buying lights, watering systems, timers and climate control systems and they are getting very elaborate with their grow operations," Whitney said.

Whitney says the growers' lifestyle often leads investigators right to the criminals.

"You watch for people who pay in cash, you watch for odd activity hours, for the windows being closed up all the time, for lights coming on at odd hours of the night," Whitney said.

He says this time of year many plants are popping up across Texoma. Already this summer there have been several large busts including one in the city of Sherman, one in Marshall County, and one in Pushmataha County that's being called the largest pot bust in Oklahoma history. Twenty six thousand plants were confiscated in that bust.
Whitney says he and Law Enforcement across Texoma have a message for marijuana growers.

"It's only a matter of time before we come, before we come get you," Whitney said.

Source: http://www.kxii.com/home/headlines/56669142.html

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Will Foster Extradited to Oklahoma

August 24th, 2009 - Chronicle Blog by Phillip Smith

Medical marijuana patient Will Foster is en route to prison in Oklahoma after being picked up Friday by Oklahoma law enforcement officials. He had been held at the Sonoma County Jail in Santa Rosa, California, for the past 15 months as he fought bogus marijuana cultivation charges there--he was a registered patient with a legal grow--and, after the California charges were dropped, on a parole violation warrant from the Sooner State.

Foster had been arrested and convicted of growing marijuana in Oklahoma and sentenced to 93 years in prison in the 1990s. After that draconian sentence focused national attention on his case, he was eventually resentenced to 20 years in prison. He later won parole and moved to California, where he served three years on parole and was discharged from parole by California authorities.

That wasn't good enough for vindictive Oklahoma authorities, who wanted to squeeze more years out of Foster. He refused to sign Oklahoma paperwork requiring him to return there to serve out the remainder of his sentence. He also refused to sign paperback that extended his original service. Oklahoma authorities issued a parole violation warrant, and the governors of both states signed it.

Foster had sought to block extradition by filing a writ of habeas corpus--he had won a similar writ against Oklahoma earlier--but that effort failed on Friday, and Oklahoma authorities were there to whisk him away. Foster is scheduled to be held at the Tulsa County Jail before being assigned to a prison in the Oklahoma gulag.

Efforts by Foster supporters to secure his release continue and are now focusing on Oklahoma parole authorities and the state governor. For more information about the Foster case, see our Chronicle story here and at Ed Rosenthal's blog here.

Drug War Chronicle will continue to follow the Foster case. Look for a feature article next week.

Source: http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle_blog/2009/aug/24/will_foster_extradited_to_oklaho

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Neighborhood tips lead to 300-pound marijuana bust

August 13th, 2009 By Tulsa World Staff Reports

Neighborhood complaints led to a large marijuana bust for the Tulsa County Drug Task Force Tuesday night. 

Sgt. Bob Darby said deputies responded to the 4400 block of south 43rd West Avenue upon hearing neighborhood complaints of suspicious activity from the area. 

After obtaining a warrant, deputies searched the attic of a residence and discovered 300 pounds of marijuana with a street value of $250,000, Darby said. 

Deputies arrested 49-year-old Michael Ullrich and his son, 24-year-old Mitchell Ullrich, on a complaint of trafficking marijuana, Darby said. 

According to Tulsa County Jail booking reports, both were released on bond Wednesday night. 

This is a substantial find for the Tulsa County Drug Task Force, Darby said. 

"This is a lot for us, because we usually find street-level operations," Darby said.

 

Source: http://

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American Nightmare: Will Foster and Justice, Oklahoma Style

June 26th, 2009 from Drug War Chronicle, Issue #591

Will Foster became a poster child for the mindless cruelties of the drug war more than a decade ago. The Tulsa small businessman and medical marijuana user -- he suffers from degenerative arthritis -- was raided by police with a warrant for a methamphetamine lab back in 1993. Police found no meth, but they did find a small marijuana garden. The unfortunate Foster was quickly sentenced to a mind-blowing 93 years in prison.

It took a growing national movement and, ultimately, an Oklahoma Supreme Court decision to get that sentence redressed. After the state high court threw out his sentence, Foster was resentenced to 20 years, twice denied parole, then finally paroled to the more medical marijuana-friendly state of California, where he moved in temporarily with "Guru of Ganja" Ed Rosenthal, who had testified in his defense in Oklahoma and then befriended him.

And they all lived happily ever after, right? Wrong. Although Foster settled into a law-abiding life in Northern California, picking up a new family along the way, and successfully completed what the state of California considered an adequate parole period, that wasn't good enough for the state of Oklahoma. Upset that California officials hadn't kept him on parole as long as they would have, Oklahoma parole officials demanded that he return to that benighted state to finish his parole and when he, perhaps understandably, declined, issued a warrant for his arrest for violating the terms of his parole.

Nothing came of that until Foster had his ID checked in a police encounter, but then, the pending Oklahoma warrant popped up, and Foster was jailed in California to be returned to Oklahoma to finish the rest of his sentence. With nothing to lose, Foster fought the warrant by filing a writ of habeas corpus and winning its dismissal in the California courts in 2006.

Once again, Foster was a free man, but Oklahoma still wasn't done with him. Oklahoma parole officials then offered to reinstate him in the interstate compact, which governs the supervision of parolees who parole to states other than the one in which they were sentenced, but then added that they had made a mistake when originally calculating the length of his parole period. His parole didn't end in 2011, but in 2015, they said, demanding he sign a document to that effect. Again, perhaps understandably, Foster declined that offer, and again, the state of Oklahoma issued another warrant for his arrest for violating the terms of his parole.

By then, Foster had moved to Santa Rosa, California, about 50 miles north of San Francisco, and made a home with a local woman, Susie Mueller, and her three daughters. There, he had a medical marijuana grow, all completely legal under state law and county guidelines. But he also had a vindictive ex-girlfriend, who told law enforcement officials he was operating a major marijuana grow operation.

The next thing Foster and Mueller knew, DEA agents and Sonoma County sheriff's deputies were kicking down their door, the couple was arrested on state marijuana cultivation charges, and Mueller's youngest daughter was taken into custody as an endangered child.

"It was terrible," said Mueller. "They did a full-on raid and arrested him over seven mature plants, and they arrested me and took my daughter away. They thought because he knew Ed there was something big going on. They said if I told them where the other grows were, they wouldn't arrest me and take my daughter. I told them that's all there was and that he was within the guidelines, and they said 'take her kid,' and they arrested me."

A hard-nosed Sonoma County prosecutor delayed months before dropping the baseless charges, and Foster sat in the Sonoma County Jail the whole time. But even after the charges were dropped, Foster remains behind bars, fighting the extradition warrant back to Oklahoma. It's now going on 16 months of imprisonment for him.

"In their warrant, they said I violated the terms and conditions of parole in Oklahoma, then fled Oklahoma to escape justice," Foster said Wednesday in a phone call from the jail. "But I haven't been back in Oklahoma since I left in 2001. I successfully finished parole here, I beat back that earlier extradition effort, and they're still coming after me."

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger routinely signed off on the Oklahoma warrant without knowing all the facts, Foster said. "The governor has not been given all the information. Oklahoma didn't tell him I had finished parole, had an earlier extradition attempt thrown out, or that they had tried to extend my parole six years after the fact," he pointed out.

Neither the California nor the Oklahoma governors' offices nor Oklahoma parole officials responded to Chronicle inquiries about the Foster case.

Now, with his options running out, Foster and his supporters are pursuing two strategies, one political and one judicial. The first is aimed at the two governors, urging them to revoke the warrants. The second is to file another writ of habeas corpus, which Foster said he would do at the end of this month.

"I am asking the governor of Oklahoma to recall the warrant and commute my sentence and let me live in peace in California and just leave me alone," he said. "I'm asking Gov. Schwarzenegger to not honor the extradition request. There is case law suggesting that he does not have to grant extradition; he can deny it and recall his warrant."

Ed Rosenthal is leading the campaign to free Foster. On his blog is complete information about how to contact the two governors to ask them to recall the warrants.

"Every human being whose life is disrupted because of the marijuana laws deserves our attention, but Will's case is important first because people already know about the terrible injustice done to him back in Oklahoma, and second because it's just so weird and egregious," said Rosenthal. "People just shake their heads and say this shouldn't be happening. We're trying to get him out, and we're trying to bring this injustice to the attention of people who don't already know about it," he said.

"Apparently, Oklahoma has a lot of money to burn on this vindictiveness," he noted. "This is a sad and stupid case."

It's costing cash-strapped California, too. The cost for imprisoning Foster for the past 15 months is now in excess of $100,000, and that doesn't include the cost of the bogus marijuana cultivation prosecution.

"I'll be filing a habeas writ on June 29," Foster said, "and the state will have 15 days to respond. There will probably be a hearing in 30 days."

It's unusual for habeas writs to be granted, and Foster is uncertain about his prospects for victory, but is prepared for the long haul. "If I don't win there, I can drag this out for years. I could go all the way to the California Supreme Court, and then into the federal courts. But that would require that I continue to sit here in jail," he said.

Susie Mueller visits Foster in jail almost every day. "This is heartbreaking for me, it's very emotionally difficult because he shouldn't be in there," she said. "But I'm really devoted to him. I go almost every night, and we talk for an hour and play tic-tic-toe and go over the case."

In one of the strange ironies of Foster's ordeal, Mueller said she had gathered signatures for petitions seeking his release when he was imprisoned in Oklahoma a decade ago. "I met him at work here in Santa Rosa and didn't even realize he was that Will Foster," she laughed. "What a coincidence."

"Ed and Susie are the best advocates a guy could have," said Foster. "I'm so grateful for all they're doing."

For Foster, Oklahoma's efforts to punish him further are not about justice, but vengeance. "I beat them on the sentencing, I beat them on the first extradition warrant, and they want to teach me a lesson," he said. "They want to impose their authority."

Right now, the decision to extradite Foster back to Oklahoma is up to the two governors and their extradition specialists. An outpouring of public support in favor of allowing Foster to remain in California as a free man could make the difference.

Source: http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/591/will_foster_extradition_oklahoma_medical_marijuana

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Bartlesville Man Arrested On Marijuana Complaint

Jun 16, 2009 by NewsOn6.com

The director of Bartlesville's Westside Community Center was arrested over the weekend after a search of his home turned up marijuana and a "growing room," according to police.

Morris McCorvey, 58, was arrested Sunday on complaints of producing marijuana, possession of marijuana and paraphernalia.

Bartlesville Police say the "growing room" in the home contained heat lamps, potting soil and other equipment.

McCorvey is free on bond after being booked into the Washington County jail.

Source: http://www.newson6.com/global/story.asp?s=10542098

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