Cops Crackdown on Hemp Store

By David South

Id Magazine (Canada), December 27 to January 8, 1997

London hemp crusader Chris Clay has been hit with a string of charges after police raids. 

Clay’s house and both the Hemp Nation shop and warehouse he owns were raided by London police and the RCMP on December 6. Two of Clay’s employees were charged with trafficking and two of his friends with possession. Clay faces six charges, including possession of a narcotic (a single gram of pot), cultivation of marijuana, selling drug paraphernalia and breach of bail conditions. 

The breach of bail charge stems from Clay’s arrest over a year ago for selling small marijuana plants out of his shop. Along with Toronto law professor Alan Young, Clay is turning those charges into a constitutional challenge to be heard next year. It is this legal challenge that Clay suspects is the reason for the raids. “It is obvious the police are trying to put pressure on me to plea bargain and drop my upcoming court challenge; the government wants me to stop it at all costs.”

London police would not allow id to talk to the arresting detective, Tom Gaffney. A bristly and rude public relations flack, Sergeant Jack Tourney, would only confirm the arrests and charges. He refused to give a reason why Hemp Nation was singled out for a raid, while almost every major city in Southern Ontario has at least one store selling hemp merchandise and paraphernalia. 

Clay is looking for help with his high legal bills.