The trial and persecution of Dakta Green

Tonight, Dakta Green is spending his second night in prison, the start of an eight month lag for convictions relating to The Daktory. I have just returned to the Wellington region after spending the last seven months living like it's legal, living on premises at The Daktory.

It is too soon, too raw an experience to write up quite yet, at least not without a sizeable advance from a publisher to entice that dense tale out of the cranium. What I can make out of the saga right now is that Dakta Green should not be in prison. He is not a menace to society.

A fellow supporter texted me yesterday with the sentence. 8 months, possibly out in 4. Dakta Green might still run for the Aotearoa Legalise Cannabis Party in New Lynn this election. National Party MP Paul Quinn's vicious private member's bill last year has thrown this campaign awry for no good reason, so here's hoping 8 = 4 and that slimy creep's loose noose is avoided.

It could have been worse. The police/ The Crown/ The Queen was seeking four years jail for 61 year old Green. So much for culture change within the police/ state.

What did the MSM have to say? TV3 gave 30 seconds on primetime. Dan Satherley's written report live from the scene had a better impact. NatRad's Checkpoint squeezed out a reasonable three minutes. Stuff did a story using the photo that started this prosecution in the first place, so there's a few more advertising dollars at someone else's expense. Oh for Dagg's sake do not get me started on it all right now...

Tim Selwyn at Tumeke has written up a good defence of Dakta Green, begging the question I was trying to avoid in the last paragraph:

Having said that I am amazed that a stonking great barn devoted to the purpose of cannabis was able to run for so many years unmolested when it is:
a) known by all, with a facebook page,
b) is visible from Great North Rd with letters three metres high saying 'DAKTORY', and -
c) the big Avondale Police station is just a few minutes drive down the road.
It took the cops how many years to twig something was up?

Doing my best to avoid defamation proceedings from Fairfax lawyers, I'll stick with making these points:

• In court and under oath, the man at the drug squad, Detective Rhys Wilson of Waitakere CIB, said that until his superiors handed him the case, he had not heard of The Daktory.
• Further, Detective Wilson said how on receiving the case, he proceeded to Google "The Daktory" and found the website (The site has undergone some renovations since Det. Wilson Googled upon it, but suffice to say the content remains much the same).
• Detective Wilson was given the case after a reporter rang Police National Head Quarters (aka Bullshit Towers) asking for comment on this The Daktory thing. Shit rolled downhill from there to Detective Wilson. This picture was not drawn by Wilson, more of a particularly simple Join the Dots Puzzle. Dakta Green was arrested because he embarrassed the bullshitters.

It is a shame much of the life has gone out of The Daktory since the conviction and closure. The members who played chess or read a book or made new friends or met old ones or painted protest placards or played piano or DJed. There's none of that now. A new and harmless species of meeting place was killed by the powers that be.

I don't want to get all Don and Hone on the matter, throwing Godwin's Law around with abandon or comparing apples with oranges, but the real crime by Dakta Green in society's eyes was that of corrupting the youth. Socrates was poisoned for similarly incorrigible convictions. Society might be getting a bit more civil with its injustices, but a wrong's a wrong and Dakta Green should not be in jail on these hypocritical charges.

Kia kaha Dakta Green!