« Miller’s crusade to make medical marijuana legal | Main | With its (marijuana) broad range of uses, it’s one of the most useful medicines I’ve come across, says doctor »
Records that exonerate them under state law convict them under federal law
By Hempology | October 31, 2007
Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, CA
29 Oct 2007
Dan Abendschein
POT FARMERS’ CASE MAY CLARIFY LAWS
POMONA – The case of three convicted Azusa pot farmers may help clarify laws on how to legally grow medical marijuana, advocates said.
Bryn Anderson, 38, of Los Angeles; Paul Shaw, 35, of Azusa; and Charles Newcomb, 47, of Azusa were convicted last week of cultivation stemming from the seizure of 700 plants from an Azusa pot factory in May.
“The laws on growing medical marijuana are very broad, and a case like this could be very important in setting a precedent for judges,” said Bruce Margolin, a Los Angeles-based medical marijuana advocate and lawyer who represented Newcomb in the early stages of the case.
The appeal in the case would be based on the refusal of Superior Court Judge Charles Horan to allow evidence and witnesses that would allegedly establish the men were growing medical marijuana, according to Antonio Bestard, Newcomb’s attorney.
The witnesses included the owner of a West Hollywood dispensary who was prepared to testify that the group was growing marijuana for his patients, according to court documents.
In addition to the grow house at 844 N. Vernon Ave., Newcomb was also convicted of marijuana cultivation at his own home in Azusa, where he had 14 marijuana plants growing in his backyard.
The court did not permit testimony of a medical marijuana prescription holder who lawyers said would testify that Newcomb was his caregiver, records show.
Horan found the defendants guilty and sentenced Anderson and Shaw to 120 days of county jail and three years of felony probation. He sentenced Newcomb to 120 days in the county jail and three years and eight months of felony probation.
Both Anderson and Newcomb said they were unhappy with their sentences and wanted to make an appeal on principle.
“The judge gave us two choices, and neither one was any good,” said Anderson. “I didn’t do anything wrong.”
Anderson, who has a medical marijuana prescription, would be subject to drug screening while on probation and would not be able to use marijuana during that time.
“I am going to have to go back to Vicodin, and that just messes me up,” said Anderson, who says he uses medical marijuana for an old stabbing injury to his hand suffered when he was working as a bouncer at a club.
According to state law, a person on felony probation would have to appeal to a judge to be allowed medical marijuana during their probation.
According to Margolin, the case would be the first court appeal in large-scale growing operation case since the passage of SB420, a law meant to clarify how medical marijuana prescription holders can legally grow pot.
The law allows for a prescription holder or “primary caregiver” to possess up to “six mature plants or 12 immature plants for each qualified patient.”
Margolin argues that the Anderson, Newcomb and Shaw can show they were growing the marijuana for medical purposes if they were allowed to present evidence linking them to patients at the West Hollywood dispensary. He added Newcomb would be able to use the law to argue that the crops at his house were a legal amount for him and the other prescription holder.
But Horan said during a preliminary hearing in the case that the men did not qualify as caregivers under the law.
“A caregiver would be someone with a good portion of their life spent with a patient, like his mother,” said Horan. “That’s what caregiver means, not somebody who decided to grow marijuana and sell it.”
Horan also said during the hearing that there was evidence in the case that suggested the defendants had profited from selling the pot. He said the law states that it does not authorize “cultivating or distributing marijuana for profit.”
The same law allows for a patient or caregiver a “reasonable compensation” for growing someone else’s marijuana, leaving it unclear whether a person can support themselves by growing medical marijuana, or just cover their expenses.
Other cases involve dispensaries growing marijuana for patients, Margolin said. But they are about distributing marijuana directly to patients, rather than a separate establishment that grows marijuana and distributes it to dispensaries, as defendants in the case say they were doing, he said.
The case for the appeal is strong, said medical marijuana advocate and expert witness Chris Conrad, who was slated to testify in the case. A previous case in which the state appeals court threw out the decision of a San Joaquin County court that refused to allow evidence of a medical marijuana operation to be presented in court.
Conrad said the key to Anderson, Newcomb and Shaw’s case would be records documenting exactly to whom they were providing medical marijuana.
But, he said, medical marijuana providers are often nervous about documentation because it creates a paper trail that could make them subject to prosecution from the federal government, which does not legally recognize any form of marijuana possession as legal.
“Records that exonerate them under state law convict them under federal law,” said Conrad. “It’s a tough position to be in.”
Topics: Articles | Comments Off
Comments are closed.