Medical
MarijuanaGrower/Cancer Patient Featured on Frontline Busted the Next Day
See
NY Times Reports
on Frontline’s "Busted: America’s War on Marijuana;" Airs Tuesday
Night: "Flexibility, Not Legality" The Indianapolis Star
Front Page
stareditor@starnews.com
http://www.starnews.com
May 13, 1998
By Rob Schneider, staff writer
(Ed. note: The Star is owned by Dan Quail’s family, so this is
a remarkably friendly article. Most activists may already have heard about this, but -- as
is frequently the case -- Keenan’s attorney did not want any premature publicity, so
I delayed writing about this.
Frontline contacted NORML last year trying to get a grower who would go on camera.
NORML tends to discourage this sort of thing for obvious reasons. Frontline also wanted to
avoid the medical marijuana issue, because their guru, DEA contractor Mark Kleiman, who
was featured on the show, is condescending toward it. The whole program was aimed at
presenting the "third way" – between the "drug warriors" and
"legalizers."
After word went out on DRCnet, looking for a volunteer, Frontline had to settle for
Keenan, even though he is a medical marijuana user.
Of course, the Star does not report that when the narks raided the Keenan’s home,
they behaved in their usually thuggish manner, wrecking the house, abusing the children
and eating out of the refrigerator, and of course, carting off the family computer and
everything else of value.
It will be interesting to see how Frontline covers the story of what happens to people
who are really on the frontline in the battle for freedom, rather than DEA contractors and
timid pseudo-journalists.)
HEMP ADVOCATE PAYING FOR MINUTES OF FAME
Appearance on PBS’ ‘Frontline’ leads to court appearance today, but
Noblesville man has no regrets.
Doug Keenan talks with a speed and passion of a man who has seen the light.
Even if it’s an illegal one.
So when an opportunity arose to air his views on the subject, Keenan did. On April 28,
the electrical engineer showed off a handful of marijuana plants in his Noblesville home
for a PBS Frontline program: Busted: America’s War on Marijuana.
The program title was prophetic for Keenan.
Police obtained a warrant to see just what was going on at the home, said Hamilton
County Deputy Prosecutor Jeffrey D. Wehmueller.
"Although there may be some people who would like to see
marijuana legalized, until that happens, it’s still illegal and we frown on that type
of behavior in Hamilton County," he said.
Keenan’s segment of the program, which focuses on Indianapolis and Indiana, was
filmed just before Thanksgiving. Wearing a buttoned shirt and tie, Keenan looks like a
recruiting poster for computer programmers.
Knowing his name was being used and his face shown, Keenan said, he disassembled his
growing operation.
However, the day after the program aired, police descended on his
home and found a small amount of marijuana inside.
Keenan, 35, and his wife Theresa, 37, were charged with possession of less than 30
grams of marijuana, a misdemeanor, and a felony charge of
maintaining a common nuisance.
Today they’ll appear in court for the first time, before a Hamilton County
magistrate.
It all started when Keenan spotted a message on an Internet site that said Frontline
was looking for a Midwest marijuana grower.
He figured there had to be someone better than him because he had only a few plants.
But he let it be known that if no one else came forward, he’d consider doing it.
Afterall, the timing seemed right.
In recent years, he and his wife had become outspoken advocates of hemp and helped put
on an annual hemp festival.
He had also been diagnosed with testicular cancer four years ago.
It was treated and is in remission. During his treatments, he found that eating "hemp
treats" helped him deal with the nausea.
But the experience left its mark.
"After you get cancer, your whole life is free," he said. "Every day you
go after that, you can devote it to whatever purposes you want to."
While the Frontline program focused on its recreational use -something Keenan does not
reject- he is drawn to its industrial and medicinal qualities, too.
He believes hemp will become a viable crop and says Indiana could become a production
and manufacturing state. He skips through history and other possibilities of its use, like
a dealer fanning a deck of cards.
He figures others share his views. He’s not really all that different from his
neighbors, he says.
"I was born here. Educated here. I wouldn’t mind dying here. I love this
state."
A native of Martinsville, he has an electrical engineering degree from Rose-Hulman
Institute of Technology. He is the father of two children, ages 14 and 9.
Among his accomplishments is a patent on the universal remote control for the operation
of a video-cassette recorder, cable box and television. He acquired the patent, since
sold, while working for RCA, now owned by Thompson Consumer Electronics.
He left Thompson last year and has been writing a book. Most recently he and his wife
became partners in a Broad Ripple store called the Magic Bus, which sells hemp clothes and
other items.
He just thinks people are misguided about cannabis.
"When we first got into this, people asked,
‘Why?’" Keenan said. The answer was simple: "Because no one else is
and someone has to."
Theresa, whose friends call her Tee, adds: "I found it amazing for a plant that
God put here, how did it ever get so out of hand."
It’s not so much that the couple are for legalizing
marijuana as they believe society has to stop throwing people in prison for it.
"There’s better uses for police resources," Keenan said.
Any marijuana he’s grown has been only for the couple’s use, and even his
arrest hasn’t made him regret his decision to go public.
"If anything, it makes me sleep easier at night," he
said. "The one thing which I was keeping a secret in my life, I’m not keeping a
secret anymore."
Supported