Shona Banda became another victim of the country’s draconian marijuana laws last year when her son was taken from her by Kansas police and DCFS workers. Why? Because her 11 year old son told his classmate’s how important his mother’s medicine was to her in a mandated drug education class. Now, she’s fighting back with a lawsuit of her own.
Shona’s lawsuit is against some pretty powerful people: the state, Gov. Sam Brownback; Kansas DCFS Secretary Phyllis Gilmore; the Garden City Police Department and its chief, James R. Hawkins; and Garden City Unified School District 457 and one of its former counselors, Tyler Stubenhoffer, as defendants.
The lawsuit claims:
- The state and it’s agencies have deprived her of her civil rights to treat her debilitating condition and to parent her child.
- Employees of her son’s school and Garden City Police violated her constitutional rights by questioning her son with parental consent, and searching her property without a warrant.
- The suit claims that “emerging awareness” of the medical uses of cannabis, the active and pending legislation in much of the country, and the studies that show cannabis as significantly effective against the pain and symptoms of her disease when no other prescription drug or remedy has been all give her and others a fundamental right to use it for treatment.
Shona has been charged with 3 felonies and 2 misdemeanors because her son was illegally questions and her home illegally searched. Because her medical cannabis was out in the open, much as any other adult would leave out pain medication or insulin in their home for their use. She could face 30 years in prison, because she was taking medicine to treat an illness.
Shona is a cannabis advocate and author of “Live Free or Die: Reclaim Your Life… Reclaim Your Country.” She is representing herself in the federal case.