The Resistance: San Diego Style (Part 2)

Written and Photographed by A.J. Herrington

IG: @A.J.Herrington

I meet Eugene Davidovich at a Golden Hill coffee shop. Sitting at an outdoor table as we chat, it’s evident he’s been in the neighborhood for a while. When jetliners roar overhead on their descent to Lindbergh Field, Eugene will stop talking in mid-thought, then continue when the noise subsides.

Eugene was a Navy vet and father of an infant son when he threw himself into ASA and its activism. As a medical marijuana patient, he had been going to meetings, listening while quietly standing in the back of the room. As anyone who has been in a cannabis dispensary can tell you, legal pot isn’t cheap. To mitigate the cost of their medicine, Eugene and some friends were considering cultivating it themselves.

“I read as much as I could, did as much research as I could, and decided that the best way to go would be to form an informal collective, under the law,” Davidovich recalls.

His newly formed collective rented a commercial building to set up their cultivation operation. The landlord would later testify that he was aware that his property was being used to grow medical marijuana.

But the efforts to comply with murky laws weren’t good enough for San Diego’s Finest. After obtaining a California driver’s license and doctor’s recommendation for medical marijuana in a false name, an SDPD narcotics detective placed an order with Eugene’s collective. Davidovich made a delivery, as requested, to a home in Pacific Beach. Three months later, in February 2009, he was arrested as part of Bonnie Dumanis’ war on medical marijuana providers known as Green Rx.

It wasn’t long before Eugene was the San Diego chapter chair of ASA. His mission was twofold. He felt that if more people in San Diego County knew how law enforcement was treating medical marijuana, which had been legalized by Prop 215 in 1996, things might get better. He also, admittedly, wanted support for his own pending case. He was convinced, and still is, that courtroom support from ASA activists helps win acquittals.

The prosecution of Eugene Davidovich illustrates the waste that occurs when medical marijuana patients and providers are targeted. His trial for six felony counts of marijuana possession and sales took two weeks.

“I spent—three or four hours at a time—two days on the stand being questioned by the prosecutor what color the pots were. I mean, it was ridiculous.”

Apparently thinking a video of the transaction leading to Eugene’s arrest guaranteed a conviction, it was shown to the jury. But in the video, Davidovich can be seen ensuring that the identification provided by the “patient” matched the doctor’s recommendation, which had been verified when the order was placed.

“In fact, the video that they recorded … is what was really proof that it was a legal transaction,” he remembers incredulously.

The jury took less than four hours of deliberation to return not guilty verdicts on all six charges.

Whatever the cost of the Davidovich trial borne by taxpayers, it wasn’t nearly as expensive as it was for Eugene. He paid all his legal fees himself, borrowing from family and friends when the money ran out. The stress on his marriage caused the new parents to divorce.

During his tenure as chair, the San Diego chapter of ASA continued the legacy of creative protest. In 2012, they and other activist groups including LGBT rights organization Canvass for a Cause were invited by the San Diego Museum of Art to a YesLab workshop. YesLab is a project of the Yes Men, a pair of activists with the goal of bringing media attention to “issues relating to the corporate takeover of our society,” according to their website.

At the workshop, the groups chose access to medical marijuana as the cause for their cooperative efforts. Together, they planned a stunt to bring attention to the attacks on San Diego’s medicinal cannabis providers.

I ask Eugene if he was involved with the YesLab project. Nearly six years later, he’s not sure what he should admit to.

“I wonder what the consequences of that answer are—legally,” he muses, leaning back in his chair.

“I’m pretty sure it was protected free speech,” I offer hopefully.

Pride, then passing headlights, flash in his eyes. Eugene drops the equivocation.

“I was absolutely involved in the effort.”

The morning of July 31, 2012, a press release, purportedly from the office of U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of California Laura Duffy, was emailed to media outlets. Duffy had previously announced a crackdown on medical marijuana providers. In the release, it was announced that 20 pharmacies in La Jolla, Carmel Valley, and PB were being targeted for closure and seizure under asset forfeiture laws, for “distribution of drugs for illegal purposes.” At five corporate pharmacies, actors posted phony cease and desist orders.

Despite clues the email might be suspect, venerable publications including The Los Angeles Times and the San Diego Reader ran with the story and rushed it online: The Feds were shutting down CVS.

Almost three hours later, press rooms received another email from a different, but just as fake, Laura Duffy email address. In this email, “Duffy” announced that the first release was a hoax, and that the responsible parties would be identified and prosecuted.

As the buzz spread, the real Laura Duffy was forced to address the issue. She scheduled an 11 a.m. press conference. At this point the team behind the action improvised a bit. Two more press releases were still planned, so the group decided Duffy’s appearance was the perfect venue for the next one.

As Duffy spoke to reporters who had gathered on the steps of the federal courthouse downtown, another actor announced loudly “Laura Duffy is a Benedict Arnold, nothing but a Benedict Arnold.” He then handed out copies of the new release, from the nonexistent Federal Accountability Coalition. The coalition derided her prosecution of cannabis outlets as “insubordination” of President Obama’s decision to allow providers complying with state law to operate.

After distributing the release to the assembled media, the actor walked away. Deciding he was the bigger story, the reporters followed the actor down the sidewalk. The U.S. Attorney’s press conference had just been hijacked.

Later, the Federal Accountability Coalition announced a press conference would be held in Balboa Park. The story had been swirling through the news all day, so even more media showed up. In front of the Veteran’s Memorial, it was announced that the San Diego Chapter of Americans for Safe Access and Canvass for a Cause were the perpetrators of the commotion.

Eugene says the intricacy of the plan was what made it work. One bogus release would be quickly debunked, and the story would have ended there. But the succession of releases, coupled with live appearances, kept the media running.

“It had to have multiple layers to be successful,” he says.

***

As I make my way to Vey Linville’s front door, I notice a half-dozen green oxygen bottles, waiting in the driveway to be swapped for fresh ones. Just inside the door, I see Vey, the board secretary of the San Diego ASA waiting for me.

“A.J.!” He beckons with his hand. “Come on in!”

As I enter, I notice he’s leaning on a table for support. A silver box hangs from Vey’s shoulder on a black nylon strap. The box hums as it pumps oxygen into the thin plastic tubing that snakes up and over his ears, before looping under his nose.

Vey leads me to the backyard, stopping to grab a couple of orange sodas on the way. His Spring Valley home is on the banks of the Sweetwater Reservoir, and a warm breeze blows off the lake as wavelets lap the water’s edge. Vey moves the purring oxygen machine from under his arm to the floor next to his feet as we settle into patio chairs to talk.

Ten years ago, after he had been experiencing some shortness of breath, Vey visited the doctor. After some exams and lab tests, he got the diagnosis. He was told he had advanced COPD, and the outlook was grim. Without a double lung transplant, doctors estimated he would live at most three more years.

“I thought I was just going to go home and face it like a man. That’s an easy thing to think. But when you get right down to it, you start squirming around in the chair like everybody else. Nobody wants to die.”

Vey was put on a regimen of pharmaceuticals to make him as comfortable as possible. That was the idea, anyway.

“I had a big red bucket that I carried my medicines around, sixteen or seventeen different prescriptions. Three of them were stomach medicines to keep the other pills down. It’s just insane. That was killing me more than the disease.”

At the time, the life expectancy for double lung transplant patients was about five years. After weighing the risks and costs, Vey decided against the operation. He knew he had to look for something else, so continued his research. What he found was cannabis.

“[While] reading about things that might help me, I ran across some old pictures. One was a picture of cannabis cigarettes. Emblazoned across the front: ‘Asthma!’ And I remember thinking the first time I saw that picture, ‘Who in their right mind would give a cigarette or a joint to someone having an asthma attack?’ … It seemed so completely incongruous, that you might do that. Although, it turns out that was a very common treatment for lung trouble at the time.”

Vey kept digging, and found a way to create his own medicine from cannabis.

“I actually used an 1870s pharmacopeia. It had a number of cannabis tincture recipes. Five of them were from Eli Lily and Company, which seemed like a good bet. I picked the strongest one and used it.”

The irony of Vey leafing through the pages of a 140-year-old book at home in San Diego, a global hub of biotech research and development, isn’t lost on me.

After a 10-week course of treatment with a strong tincture, Vey began to feel better. THC, one of the active ingredients of cannabis, is well documented as a bronchodilator, allowing the lungs to take in more air with each breath. But Vey believes that there’s more to it than that and that clinical research is necessary to truly learn the medical benefits of cannabis.

Over the years, Vey’s cannabis regimen has evolved. About once a year, he repeats a 10-week course of treatment with the potent tincture. (“Wouldn’t you?” he asks, with a gleam in his eye.) The rest of the time, he relies on home-made edibles, vaporizers, and yes, the occasional joint, to help him breathe.

Just as Vey admitted he had been early on, I was skeptical that smoking anything could be an effective treatment for someone with lung disease. But upon reviewing the recording of my interview with Vey, I discovered something quite intriguing that I failed to recognize at the time.

About 40 minutes into our conversation, Vey invited me to light a joint he’d brought along. We enjoyed about half of it as we continued chatting. About five minutes later, while we were talking about government prosecution of medical marijuana patients, Vey asked if he could excuse himself. He switched off the oxygen machine, laid its tubing on the table, stood up, and walked across the yard.

After scaling an exterior stairway, Vey disappeared into a second-floor sliding glass door. About a minute later he came back through the doorway, now holding an unframed portrait of Marilyn Monroe. After he had descended the stairs, Vey returned to the table, replaced the tubing beneath his nose, and told me about Michael Pelletier, the artist that created the painting.

Pelletier is serving a life sentence without possibility of parole in federal prison for smuggling marijuana. He’s also a paraplegic. Vey believes as cannabis legalization advances, fairness dictates that the sentences for non-violent marijuana offenders should be commuted. People shouldn’t be rotting in jail for what others are now doing legally.

But it isn’t Vey’s sense of justice I find incredible. Awhile after returning with the painting, the oxygen generator makes a beep, and I ask if Vey needs a change of battery. No, he explains, he’d forgotten to turn the machine back on.

The man was having difficulty standing, while using oxygen, when I arrived. But then, after smoking half a joint, he not only climbed up and down a flight of stairs, it took him 13 minutes to realize the tube under his nose wasn’t even back on.

I’m not skeptical anymore.

Vey, who once supported Bonnie Dumanis, now feels betrayed by her. And he’s not alone.

“There are a number of different communities in San Diego that were sorely disappointed with Bonnie over time. She promised to help a lot of different folks, to get elected. And there were a lot of different groups that felt like she was their friend, savior even. And boy, was the reality different … She always said she was for medical marijuana, but we’ve all seen what that means to her. It has been one bias-driven prosecution after the next.”

Vey makes it clear that even with Prop 64 legalizing recreational marijuana passed, the campaign against medical cannabis providers continues as some businesses struggle to comply with new regulations and nonprofit collectives become illegal.

“Everyone thinks everything is fine. It ain’t a done deal. It’s not settled, people are going to jail right and left.”

Assuming I know the answer and will get a great quote, I ask Vey if he sees his activism as a matter of survival. I’m wrong about the answer, but right about the quote. Vey ponders the question, and forces out a puff of air three times in succession, as a hummingbird flits around the patio umbrella.

“You know, I don’t know that I really expected to survive. I think that my activism—that I’ve seen it as necessary for others. Again, everyone thinks everything’s OK. And if you live in La Jolla and have a Mercedes and a good lawyer, you have access. If you live in San Ysidro and clean toilets for a living, the view is somewhat different. And that isn’t right.”

Before we wrap up, Vey has one more thing to add. Despite the legality of medical marijuana, he notes that it’s not available to many patients in state homes and hospice care.

“I like to hope that when it’s our turn, that we can easily have anything we’d like to ease our passing—when it’s our turn. You’d think that we are a rational enough society, to allow for a bit of grace. Who’s it gonna harm?”