HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Lucknow Sentinel, 2016-12-07, Page 88 Lucknow Sentinel • Wednesday, December 7, 2016
Medpot user says she was wrongfully charged with DUI
Darryl Coote
Goderich Signal Star
Linda Birks was only a
handful of kilometers away
from her new home in Port
Albert when she became
caught in a thunderstorm
and drove her car off the
road, down a ditch and into
a hydro pole.
The trip was supposed to
have been the beginning of a
new start, she said.
Her plan that night of Aug.
17 was to drive her car,
loaded with most of her
belongings, the two hours to
her new apartment, unload
and then head back to
Guelph to care for her 10 cats
and four ferrets that were
waiting for her.
Instead, the 58 -year-old
would spend the night in a
jail cell at the Walkerton OPP
detachment, charged with
driving a motor vehicle while
impaired by a drug, specifi-
cally marijuana.
However, she claims she
never took the drug that day
and says she was targeted
because she is a medical
marijuana user.
For over a year Birks has
been taking one gram of
medical marijuana daily for
chronic pain caused by
degenerating disks in her
back, among other issues,
she told The Signal Star in an
interview from her apart-
ment near Goderich.
"What I have to do is, basi-
cally, if I'm not going any-
where is have a few puffs off
and on all day long so this
way it maintains a certain
level in my blood stream and
that is what gives you the
long-term benefits," she said.
However, on the day of her
arrest she says she had not
taken her prescribed mari-
juana knowing that she'd
have to drive later that
evening.
"I was busy packing and
sorting things and I loaded
up the vehicle and I decided
to drive up around six
o'clock; this way I could beat
the rush hour traffic and it
would be nice and quiet
when I came back because it
was close to a four-hour trip,"
she said.
She said her doctor had
told her when he prescribed
her the medicine that if she
plans to drive not to vape
marijuana a minimum of
four hours before she gets
behind the wheel, and this is
a rule she said she adheres
to.
Dr. Danial Schecter,
Darryl Coote/Goderich Signal Star
Linda Birks, 58, pictured here in her Port Albert apartment, says her life has been turned upside down since her arrest three months
ago for driving under the influence of marijuana. She says she didn't take her medicine that August day, but is now facing a criminal
conviction. She says she's fighting the charge.
medical director and co-
founder of the Cannabi-
noid Medical Clinic in
Toronto and the doctor
who prescribed medical
cannabis for Birks, con-
firmed that this is what he
tells his patients.
"We tell our patients that it
is not recommended to drive
for at least four hours after
inhaling cannabis and for
eight hours if they feel
'euphoria' or have ingested
(instead of inhaled) canna-
bis," he wrote to The Signal
Star in an email.
Birks says that the police
officer built a case against
her once she told him that
she was a medical marijuana
user.
"As soon as he found out 1
had a prescription for medi-
cal marijuana he pricked my
finger right then and there,"
she said.
However, the police dis-
closure on Birks' case, which
Birks gave to The Signal Star,
598 Campbell Street Lucknow
Tue-Fri-l0am-5pm • Sat-l0am-4pm
4 'us. -519-5 8-5486 • CeII-519-441-8146
coil ri: Hs., t1'tiI:
Book Your
Holiday
Party Today
IEat, drink
and be merry
648 Campbell St.
1Lucknow, ON
519-812-1777
does not mention that a
sobriety test was performed
at the scene of the accident.
There are many other dis-
crepancies between the
court document and the
account Birks has given The
Signal Star.
CONTINUED ON PAGE 9
•
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 8
The disclosure also quotes
Birks as telling the officer
that she did not have any-
thing to drink that day. She
says that's incorrect. She told
The Signal Star that she
answered the officer saying
she had had a cooler several
hours before driving during
lunch that day.
Also, Birks asserts that she
required the assistance of
the officer and a witness to
open her door to exit the
vehicle following the acci-
dent while the disclosure
states she was already free of
the car when the OPP
arrived.
The officer's notes also say
she had appeared wobbly
and her speech was "slow,
slurred, deliberate" and with
a "blank glazed stare in her
eyes" as reasons to suggest
Birks was under the influ-
ence of a narcotic. Birks
accounts for those signs of
impairment as having to do
with her wearing heeled san-
dals in a muddy area, suffer-
ing from symptoms of shock,
concussion and pain in her
back and from ill-fitting
dentures.
She said she had "great
difficulty" standing because
of the conditions of the field,
and when paramedics
arrived they suggested she
go to a hospital due to the
possibly that she might have
a concussion. She declined
the paramedics' suggestion
because she had her pets
back in Guelph waiting for
her, though she did agree
that if her symptoms wors-
ened she'd go to the hospital
as they suggested.
"So the police officer
heard all this," she asserts.
Discrepancies aside, the
issue comes down to
whether she was impaired at
the time of the accident.
Following her arrest, Birks
was taken to the OPP Walk-
erton detachment where she
was required to give a urine
sample to a drug recognition
expert, who said "that there
were grounds for Impaired
by Drug [charge];' reads the
disclosure.
According to Dr. Schecter,
this urine test is only qualita-
tive and not quantitative,
"which means that it is
impossible to know how
much cannabis is in your
system."
In other words, it can reg-
ister the presence of canna-
bis in one's system, but not
the quantity, which is a
problem for medical mari-
juana users who take the
drug frequently enough for it
to always be present.
"Your urine drug screen
can be positive for days or
weeks after having last con-
sumed cannabis, depending
on how regularly the patient
is using cannabis," Dr.
Schecter wrote. "Even blood
work is difficult to interpret
as there is no standard num-
ber at which patients are
considered 'impaired. "
The Walkerton crown
attorney did not return The
Signal Star's request for
comment.
Birks says that she was
treated well by the arresting
officer until she told him she
was a medical marijuana
user.
"His demeanour and
behaviour to me completely
changed," she said. "Treated
me like a perp, didn't take
anything I said to him about
my condition into
consideration."
At the police station she
said she was required to per-
form a sobriety test, which
she failed.
"I was extremely wobbly,"
she said. "I had shooting
pains from the one area of
the vertebrae where the
disk is almost completely
gone and I was in a tremen-
dous amount of pain so I
was having difficulty in
standing up, and every time
I went to take a step I was
scared my back would give
out."
She said she told the
officers at the detachment
about her medical condi-
tions, but "they didn't care."
She was then put into a
cell, where, she asserts, she
began to suffer more
acutely.
"When I got in there I
started really having prob-
lems. I would try and get up
and walk and my back
would give out and I would
fall and I fell into the steel
door three times and I
couldn't get my self back
up," she said.
She said she lay on the
floor sobbing from pain,
and only after the first time
that she collapsed into the
door did an officer come
check on her, but he did not
provide any assistance.
She was released into the
custody of her friend the
following morning.
She has been charged a
$1,000 fine for the offence
and a year's suspension to
her license.
She will have a criminal
conviction if found guilty.
But she says she is fight-
ing it.
However, Legal Aid
Ontario has informed her
that she is ineligible for
legal assistance because
she is not facing incarcera-
tion if convicted.
Birks is also poor, living
on disability and she says
she can neither pay the
$1,000 fine or the fees of a
lawyer.
If she is convicted, she
said the charge would
051140491 5°- V IJ
IF,rai�t
(4 5101 Lad Oprvclrd S &tr 1Y1I�
Wednesday, December 7, 2016 • Lucknow Sentinel 9
haunt her for longer than
the one-year suspension.
"It will affect my life for
the rest of my life," she said.
"And I wasn't impaired and
the accident was not cause
by my inability to operate
that vehicle safely."
She says the charge will
prevent her from driving for
the foreseeable future
because she won't be able
to afford the insurance.
According to Paul Wett-
laufer, sales manager at
Excalibur Insurance in
Mitchell, the criminal con-
viction could affect her for
a minimum of six years.
If convicted she will be
dropped by her current
insurer and have to go to
what is called a non-stand-
ard insurance company
and though rates vary these
companies tend to have a
higher base rate with a 50
per cent surcharge.
The tool they use to
measure what someone
should pay for insurance is
a driver's abstract of their
record.
This abstract will contain
a person's impaired convic-
tion for three years, he said.
However, the conviction
comes with a suspension,
which must be revealed to
the insurance company for
the next six years.
"There are two things at
play in an impaired driving
conviction: The conviction
itself, which stays with you
for three years, and the sus-
pension of your driver's
license," he said.
This, Birks said, will pre-
vent her from driving,
which will greatly restrict
her independence.
"I'm extremely upset and
I'm not going to have my
life totally disrupted by
something that is not true,"
she said.
What was supposed to
have been a new start has
now left her life in "limbo,"
she said.
Without the ability to
drive, she must rely upon
friends and taxis services
for getting groceries and
her medicine and she says
she has been forced to
become something of a
"hermit."
"I can't move forward
with my life here until this
is resolved in my favour,"
she said.
Her next and fourth court
appearance is Dec. 7.
"This has terribly dis-
rupted my life beyond
belief," she said. "And I
think it should be thrown
out because it is a complete
waste of tax payer money."
She says she is currently
considering taking legal
action against the OPP for
how she was treated under
their care.
from your local
•
237 Arthur St. Wingham, ON
519.357.2912
612 Campbell St. Lucknow, ON
519.528.2242
-- '+
www.montgomeryfordsales.com
.,
.^r9 rix®h-�F+s��■ Acs
5A;