Mom Could Face Jail Time for Healing Son with Cannabis Oil

The social stigma attached to marijuana use is steadily dissipating in the United States More states are legalizing some form of marijuana every year, which means the once vilified plant is gaining more support from the public. But that nation-wide legalization of at least medical marijuana couldn’t come fast enough for some who desperately want to use the plant for its healing powers.

That’s the case with one mom who used cannabis oil to heal her son; now she could face jail time.

A boy named Trey Brown suffered from a terrible baseball accident in 2011, causing a golf ball-sized area of his brain to bleed and leading to an unbearable buildup of pressure in his head. When brought to the hospital, Trey and his mother Angela Brown were told by doctors that his survival was questionable. After that, the doctors induced a medical coma. When Trey woke up, he wasn’t the same.

After waking, he began dealing with chronic pain, depression, and outbursts. In an attempt to treat the boy or at least alleviate his symptoms, they had gone through a whopping 18 medications.

They all failed to help.

“I cry like every day before I go to bed, like my brain is about to blow up, cause there is so much pressure. It just hurts in my brain everywhere. I really can’t explain the pain.” Trey said.

After having little success with conventional medicine, Angela Brown decided to try a not-so-conventional, or legal, treatment for her son – cannabis oil. After giving Trey the oil, which she obtained from Colorado, Trey reported feeling significantly better within just a week. The cannabis oil helped to treat and bring quality of life back in a situation where all else was tried and didn’t work.

“I felt better, the pain went away,” Trey Brown said.

“I was afraid to go to the bathroom, he’d be harming himself,” Angela Brown said. “No mother should have to hold their child so they don’t hurt themselves. He didn’t want to live… Within an hour of him taking it, we could tell a difference.”

Read: Man Says Cannabis Oil ‘Cured his Cancer’

But it didn’t take long for the authorities to come stomping in to seize and arrest. It only took a week for the sheriff’s department to confiscate the oil. Later, county officials charged Angela with child endangerment which required child protection to get involved. If she is convicted of her charges she could face up to two years in jail and $6000 in fines.

“It was a week later when my mom called and said, ‘The cops are looking for you,'” Angela Brown said. “The prosecutor’s version of this is that a good mom allows her child to be in pain, to self-harm, and attempt to take his life. I guess that’s a good mom in his eyes…It’s asinine, I didn’t hurt my son; I was trying to prevent him from being hurt.”

To make the outcome of this story even more ridiculous, Minnesota became the 22nd state to approve specific forms of medicinal marijuana. The law, however, won’t go into effect until 2015.

Even though cannabis will be utilized to heal in less than a year, apparently helping someone with the oil is still an unfathomable crime.

Marijuana has been used and studied for its abilities in cancer and Alzheimer treatments, helping to reduce seizures, and replacing potentially harmful medications, yet it is still vilified. Although cannabis is finally becoming legal in more states and even nations every year, there is still resistance we need to overcome so that people can freely utilize this healing plant.