Marijuana activist Miguel Lopez moving on after dropped Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol beef
Update: Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol Act proponent Mason Tvert decided this week not to pursue an official complaint against activist Miguel Lopez for allegedly snatching a signed petition from a Regulate volunteer in July.
Miguel Lopez.
We've spoken with Lopez, who says he is happy to move on from this incident.
According to Lopez, he is looking forward to building stronger relationships within the community "on a positive note on things that are fair to all."
But he also urges voters to question all legalization and decriminalization proposals to ensure they are fair to every cannabis user.
"People should be engaged directly with people, face to face," he says. "We need to make sure that we create laws that make equal business opportunities, not create ones to inflate certain people. That's hypocrisy. I'm not a Catholic or anything like that. But there is a saying from Gandhi: 'I like Christ, but I don't like Christians.' The thing with that -- what I'm trying to say -- is that I like everything around us, but the biggest thing I can't stand is hypocrisy. And that includes myself. I tell people at my rallies all the time, don't just question the authority, but question me, also."
Lopez notes that he's already working on organizing next year's 4/20 rally, which he's trying to build to a two-day event.
Look below for our earlier coverage.
Original item, 12:24 p.m. August 3: Regulate Marijuana like Alcohol Act proponent Mason Tvert says he isn't going to go through with an official complaint against activist Miguel Lopez for taking a signed petition away from a volunteer last month. At least not yet.
Mason Tvert.
However, he's quick to point out that there is an eighteen-month statute of limitations on filing initiative petition tampering charges and that the Regulate team could always change its approach.
Tvert has released saying that his organization plans to put the matter behind it so long as Lopez avoids similar confrontations in the future. The decision was made in part, Tvert says, because the penalties could have been "severe" for Lopez.
"We aren't interested in spending time or resources on fighting with activists or any other negative actions," Tvert said. "We want to get this on the ballot and move on."
Lopez admitted to taking the petition last week, but said he did so to prevent it from being destroyed by other activists. He also maintained that the volunteers brought the incident on themselves by "physically interrupting" a July 17 cannabis rally that Lopez had organized.Miguel Lopez
More from our Marijuana archive: "Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol Act of 2012: Mason Tvert on petition drive launch."
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