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the necessity defense is unavailable to prisoners, like Bailey, who fail to present evidence of a bona fide effort to surrender as soon as the claimed necessity had lost its coercive force.” Although the Act here “does not explicitly abrogate the defense,” the “determination of values” expressed in the Act makes it clear that the defense doesn’t apply by listing marijuana as a Schedule I drug with no appropriate medical uses. Stevens, writing for Souter and Ginsburg, concurs, agreeing that the cooperative couldn’t use necessity to justify distributing marijuana, but rejecting majority’s dicta stating that individual users also couldn’t present a medical necessity defense. Buckalew v. State, 249 Ga.App. 134, 547 S.E.2d 355 (March 23, 2001). Defendant was not entitled to a jury charge on justification in his trial for boating under the influence. Although defendant claimed he boarded his brother’s boat because it was tangled in another boat’s lines and then was drifting, “there was no evidence of any imminent danger to anyone’s safety or property.” Thus, “[n]o ‘emergency situation’ authorized Buckalew’s actions.” Moon v. State, 244 Ga.App. 443, 535 S.E.2d 771 (June 12, 2000). Theft by taking conviction affirmed; trial court wasn’t required to sua sponte charge jury on defense of justification where the circumstances “justifying” his theft of victim’s truck were of defendant’s own making. “Moon's decision to take the truck was not the only option available to him. Further, his own addiction, his failure to leave home earlier, and the failure of his relatives to come for him after repeated calls created the situation in which he made his choice.” Citing Odum v. State, 220 Ga.App. 263, 469 S.E.2d 394 (1996) (habitual violator couldn’t claim his driving was necessitated by the fact that the only other occupants of the car were underage to drive when “Odum's own actions had put him in the situation where the choice arose.”). Bracewell v. State , 243 Ga.App. 792, 534 S.E.2d 494 (May 3, 2000). Voluntary manslaughter conviction reversed; trial court erred in charge on justification. As part of charge on justification and no duty to retreat, court instructed jury that “[w]hen the slayer is at fault, then to justify the homicide, he must show that there was an absolute necessity to kill to save his own life and that the person killed was the assailant…” This charge, taken from Glover v. State, 105 Ga. 597, 598, 31 S.E. 584 (1898), was statutorily superseded in 1968 by new Ga. Code Ann. § 26-902(b), which “provided that the justification in subsection (a) was available to a mutual combatant only if he withdrew from the encounter and communicated his withdrawal to his opponent. The ‘absolute necessity’ standard no longer appears in the Criminal Code.” Citing Murray v. State, 254 Ga. 351, 352(2), 329 S.E.2d 485 (1985); Gerald v. State, 189 Ga.App. 155, 156(1), 375 S.E.2d 134 (1988). Green v. State, 240 Ga.App. 774, 525 S.E.2d 154 (November 12, 1999). Defendant’s conviction for obstruction, based on resisting arrest, affirmed. 1. T rial court was not required to charge jury that “[e]very person has the right to resist an illegal arrest, and may use, in resisting that arrest, such force as is necessary for the purpose of resisting such an arrest.” “The trial court correctly instructed the jury on the essential elements of the offense, charging that ‘a person commits the offense of obstruction of an officer when that person knowingly and willfully obstructs or hinders a law enforcement officer in the lawful discharge of his official duties.’” 2. Defendant’s “ characterization of her challenge to the legality of the arrest as an affirmative defense is erroneous.” “In raising the ‘defense’ that the arrest was unlawful, Green is not admitting the essential elements of the crime of obstruction, but is asserting that the State failed to prove an essential element – that the officers were acting in the lawful discharge of their official duties by attempting to arrest her. If the arrest was unlawful, then Green's resistance would not constitute obstruction, and there would be no need for her to rely on a ‘defense’ of justification. Thus, under the facts of this case, the alleged unlawfulness of the arrest is not an affirmative defense to the charge as suggested by Green,” distinguished from cases where resisting arrest was affirmative defense to other offenses, like assault, e.g., Smith v. State, 84 Ga.App. 79, 65 S.E.2d 709 (1951). McMurray dissents. Carlson v. State, 240 Ga.App. 589, 524 S.E.2d 283 (November 1, 1999). Conviction for misdemeanor marijuana possession affirmed; defendant couldn’t claim justification to use marijuana for medicinal purposes without proper medical approval. “Although the legislature has authorized certain qualified physicians under the supervision of the State Board of Medical Examiners to provide marijuana on a compassionate basis to ‘[c]ancer patients involved in a life- threatening situation in which treatment by chemotherapy or radiology has produced severe side effects,’ or to ‘[g]laucoma patients who are not responding to conventional controlled substances,’ Carlson did not assert that his drug use fit within either exception. OCGA § 43-34-123(b)(1), (2); see also OCGA § 43-34-121(e). Nor did Carlson claim he was a patient participant in a designated program and thereby entitled to immunity from prosecution under OCGA § 43- 34-126. In seeking this charge, Carlson was effectively attempting to supplant the legislature's decision not to establish an exception to the crime of possession of marijuana when the marijuana is purportedly being used for medicinal purposes but has not been prescribed by an authorized physician for one of the permitted therapeutic uses. See Blincoe v. State, 231