(CMR) MINOT, Nort Dakota (AP) — A practicing Rastafarian is suing a North Dakota county social services agency to get her name off a child abuse registry.
The Minot Daily News reports that a judge heard arguments Tuesday in Shanika Lister's civil suit against Ward County Social Services.
North Central Human Services had placed Lister's name on the registry after the agency deemed services were required because her baby daughter had traces of marijuana in her system. Lister argues putting her name on the registry is illegal after a judge later ruled the woman's use of marijuana is a protected religious practice.
Rastafari is an Abrahamic religious sect that developed among disenfranchised Afro-Jamaican communities in the 1930s largely as a reaction against Jamaica's then-dominant British colonial culture. The religion promotes marijuana use in rituals and medicine.
Information from: Minot Daily News, http://www.minotdailynews.com
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