Kansas authorities have dropped a drug possession citation against a terminally ill cancer patient caught using THC products in his hospital room.
The son of defendant Greg Bretz, 69, voiced mixed feelings about the entire incident.
“Well, it makes me feel good, but it still don’t stop the fact that, you know, the damage is done to him,” Lee Bretz told local NBC affiliate KSN on Tuesday. “We just want the best for our loved ones, you know.”
Kansas is one of three states in the U.S. where medical marijuana remains illegal.
Greg has inoperable cancer, his son said. The elder Bretz spoke to Wichita Eagle reporter Dion Lefler by phone from his room at Hays Medical Center in a Tuesday report. He had been using vaping and THC paste on bread to ease his symptoms since his hospitalization three weeks earlier. He described himself as “flat on my back” in the hospital bed and unable to stand without help.
Both father and son say that Greg turned to THC products to treat his symptoms. A hospital staffer discovered him vaping, Greg said.
“So the chemo hadn’t been too kind to him, so he’s been exploring some other options, and it seemed to be helping him out a little bit, but that all went south when he got turned in by one of the hospital staff,” Lee said.
A hospital staffer reportedly alerted authorities, and three officers arrived at Greg’s room. They seized Greg’s vaping device and the THC-infused paste he would eat on bread. Officers had said that the vaping device was a fire hazard because the room was equipped with oxygen, though the elder Bretz said he was not on oxygen.
“They were concerned about the potential fire hazard, but more importantly, they were also concerned about how it made him feel sick,” Hays Police Chief Don Scheibler told KSN.
Court was reportedly scheduled for Monday, but Greg will not have to appear: the case was dismissed this past Tuesday, the same day as Eagle article. Hays Police Chief Don Scheibler told KSN an officer “didn’t feel comfortable writing the ticket.”
“That day, the officer sent an email to the city prosecutor requesting that the charge be dismissed,” Scheibler said.
He maintained, however, that police followed state and city law.
“Kansas really needs to legalize medical marijuana and help those who actually need it,” Lee Bretz told KSN.
[Screenshot via KSN]