Disabled Black Iraq war veteran sentenced to 5 years for possessing medical marijuana to battle depression
Sean Worsley's medical treatment by authorities has made him out to be a criminal. Arrested, charged and prosecuted for possessing medical marijuana that he had a prescription for, Worsley is now months into a five-year sentence as Covid-19 continues to decimate prisons and jails. It doesn't end there. His wife, Eboni, a constant source of support by his side, has seen her health falter. She now needs heart surgery, but cannot afford it because of the fines and legal costs that her husband has accrued in his almost-surreal battle with the criminal justice system.
Worsley, now 33, is a disabled Black war veteran with a traumatic brain injury, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression from his deployment in Iraq. He had used medical marijuana to calm his nightmares and soothe his back pain. The only mistake he made? Going to Alabama.
His tragic current situation can be traced back to August 2016, according to a detailed account of his story written by Leah Nelson, the Director of Alabama Appleseed, a non-profit that is now helping highlight his plight and advocating for his release. After a trip to Mississippi, where they had stayed with Eboni's family, they were driving to North Carolina to surprise his. They stopped in Pickens County, Alabama, for gas, which was when Officer Carl Abramo of the Gordo Police Department approached the car. He told them their music was too loud, which was a violation of the noise ordinance of the city, and asked to search their vehicle. The couple agreed, having no reason to believe they had broken any law that could get them in trouble. Abramo said he smelled marijuana in the vehicle, something Sean confirmed. He said he was a disabled veteran who had a medical marijuana card and had purchased it in Arizona, where it has been legal since 2011. However, marijuana is still illegal in Alabama, regardless of where it has been purchased. Marijuana is still a Schedule One Controlled substance, which means possession of any amount is a felony. First-time possession is charged as a misdemeanor if the arresting officer believes it is for personal use and as a felony for "other than personal use." Despite Sean having a medical marijuana card, Ambramo charged him with a Class C felony. The officer also found some of Eboni's pain pills. She had a prescription for them, but they were in the wrong bottle, which, in Alabama, is reportedly a felony. The alcohol was technically illegal, too, because Pickens County is one of the state's 23 partially dry counties.
Both she and Sean were charged and had to spend six days in jail but that was only the beginning of their legal troubles. That one arrest would set off a series of events that left them broke, homeless and helpless. After they were released from prison, they had to shell out $400 to get their car out of an impound and have it professionally cleaned because the venison they were transporting from North Carolina had gone rotten. When they returned to Arizona, the felony charges meant they found it difficult to find housing and forced them to move to Nevada.
Almost a year later, the bail bondsman called them to tell them the Alabama judge who had overseen their case was revoking bond on all the cases he had managed. If they didn't rush back, not only would they lose their bond money but they would also be charged with failing to appear in court. They borrowed money and made it in time, but were taken into separate rooms, which damned them further. When Sean was 28, the VA determined "he was totally and permanently disabled due solely to (his) service-connected disabilities." His impulsivity, cognitive difficulties, sleep disturbances and depression were so debilitating, that Eboni had been made his caregiver. In her role, she provided her husband with "maximal assistance" with planning and organizing, safety risks, sleep regulation, and recent memory, and “total assistance” with self-regulation.
She explained to prosecutors that she needed to be in the same room as him to help him understand the process and make an informed decision, but was denied. He ended up signing a plea agreement after he was told not doing so would mean Eboni would face the same charges as him. The plea agreement included 60 months of probation, as well as drug treatment and thousands of dollars in fines, fees and court costs that put the couple in further financial turmoil. And because the Worsleys lived in Arizona at the time of their arrest, the probation was transferred there, which meant they had to break their lease agreement in Nevada and move back.
Sean's probation officer subsequently told them that the month-to-month rental did not constitute a permanent address and directed them to contact the probation officer in Alabama, who told them to come back to Pickens County.
Meanwhile, the veteran could not get the drug treatment ordered in the probation because the VA said smoking cannabis for medical purposes “does not meet criteria for a substance use disorder or meet the need for substance abuse treatment.” Eboni, a certified nursing assistant who works with traumatized children, lost her job because of the felony charges as well.
In January 2019, they became homeless, but it still wasn't rock bottom. Eboni's health failed and she needed heart surgery, and in the process of saving up, Sean forgot to pay the $250 to renew his medical marijuana card. Following an arrest at a traffic stop earlier this year for illegally possessing marijuana, he was extradited to Pickens County.
The cost for extradition, $4,345, was added that to the $3,833.40 he already owed in fines, fees, and court costs. On April 28, a Pickens County judge sentenced him to 60 months in prison, a sentence that would have already begun were it not for overcrowding and Covid-19. He is currently still behind bars in the Pickens County jail, waiting to learn of his fate. "I feel like I’m being thrown away by a country I went and served for," Sean wrote in a heartbreaking letter to Alabama Appleseed. "I feel like I lost parts of me in Iraq, parts of my spirit and soul that I can’t ever get back."