cannabisnews.com: Hackles Rise Early in Medical Pot Trial 





Hackles Rise Early in Medical Pot Trial 
Posted by CN Staff on January 22, 2003 at 09:07:46 PT
Editorial
Source: Recorder
About 15 minutes into cross-examination of the first witness in a first-of-its-kind marijuana prosecution, the government interrupted and asked for a sidebar. The problem, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney George Bevan Jr., was that the defense was attempting to put a medical marijuana defense in front of the jury, in violation of U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer's pretrial ruling.
Not so, said defense lawyer Robert Eye, of Irigonegaray & Associates in Topeka, Kan. The government opened the door to that line of questioning, and the defense should be allowed to tell the jury why Ed Rosenthal provided marijuana for the Harm Reduction Center in San Francisco. "What the purposes of that place are is irrelevant; it's irrelevant," Breyer told Eye. "I understand your view that it ought to be, but it's not." One sidebar, almost 10 objections and some raised voices later, the closely watched trial took its first recess of the morning. Rosenthal is the first person to be tried in the Northern District federal court who claims he grew marijuana strictly for medical purposes. The case will test a popular theory in Northern California -- that the U.S. government will have a hard time getting a jury to convict anyone connected to medical marijuana, regardless of federal law. Rosenthal is something of a medical marijuana guru, having authored more than a half-dozen how-to books on growing pot. He was arrested in February 2002 by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration in connection with a raid on Harm Reduction Center and was later indicted. During pretrial rulings, Breyer said Rosenthal cannot argue he grew the pot for medical purposes, since federal law supersedes California's Proposition 215, the state's medical marijuana initiative. "You cannot introduce that evidence to the jury," Breyer reminded the parties Tuesday. "I'm going to ask you not to direct any further questions ... on that subject matter." The jurors on the case were culled from dozens, many of whom were excused because they said they favor the use of medical marijuana and could not be impartial. While the government may wish the jury to remain blind to the backdrop of the case, it is clear after initial testimony that jurors know no ordinary drug dealer is in court. Ever since jury selection began Jan. 15, the courtroom has been packed with activists, and Breyer warned the defense Friday to keep any protests outside the courtroom from being directed at jurors. After testimony concluded Tuesday, Breyer excused the jury and kept the audience in court while jurors made their way out of the building. Outside the federal building, a handful of people marched in a circle, chanting, "DEA, go away." The first witness Tuesday was 62-year-old James Halloran, Rosenthal's "dollar-for-dollar" partner in an Oakland, Calif., operation that supplied Harm Reduction Center. Holloran testified about the operation in connection with a plea deal. Bespectacled and soft-spoken, Halloran agreed to cooperate with the government after being charged with crimes that could have led to a triple life sentence. Instead, he will likely face less than five years in prison. Rosenthal faces a minimum of 10 years in prison. Breyer said he was impressed with the professionalism of the lawyers "with all the heat that's been on this case." But he warned the lawyers to keep it civil. "I'm saying that I'd like to keep it on that level." Source: Recorder, The (CA)Published: January 22, 2003Copyright: 2003 NLP IP CompanyContact: bbaraff therecorder.comWebsite: http://www.callaw.com/Related Articles & Web Site:Medicinal Cannabis Research Linkshttp://freedomtoexhale.com/research.htmMarijuana Grower's Trial Under Wayhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread15249.shtmlOakland Authority on Medical Pot Faces Trial http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread15241.shtmlClash on Medical Marijuana Puts a Grower in Courthttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread15236.shtml
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Comment #3 posted by delariand on January 22, 2003 at 15:23:03 PT
Jury selection
They screen jurors who support Ed Rosenthal's side... Tell me, do they screen jurors who support the government? The constitution guarantees a right to a jury of one's peers, and rabid drug warrior sheep are certainly NOT this brave freedom fighter's equals. I don't know personally, but I wouldn't be suprised to find jurors were never asked if they could not be impartial due to support of this country's misguided drug laws.
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Comment #2 posted by Ron Bennett on January 22, 2003 at 09:36:21 PT
Jury Nullification...about the only hope now :(
The U.S. government is out to take Rosenthal down and likely nothing other than jury nullification will save him now...Sadly, the government is well aware of this and thus has gone out of its way to shield the jury from protesters...only hope is that at least one or more of the folks on the jury, despite the extensive screening, is aware of jury nullification and more importantly convinces the other members to exercise their rights and acquit Rosenthal.Ron
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Comment #1 posted by FoM on January 22, 2003 at 09:33:10 PT
Important E-Mail News Update
DPFCA: Ed Rosenthal Trial Update for Tuesday, Jan 21, 2003 
    Ed Rosenthal's Federal Trial BeginsFeds Falter on Pot Plant CountTuesday, January 21 -- In the midst of a minor media blitz, the cultivation trial of marijuana activist and noted author Ed Rosenthal got underway in San Francisco federal court today. Assistant U.S. Attorney George Beven outlined the case against the man known as the foremost expert on marijuana growing, without actually discussing what Mr. Rosenthal was doing -- providing small starter clones of high-potency female plants to local marijuana dispensaries for distribution to qualified patients. The result was a disjointed opening argument. After a preliminary discussion with judge about whether the purpose of Mr. Rosenthal’s activities could be mentioned -- it couldn’t -- the defense elected to reserve its opening argument for after the prosecution completed presenting its case.First on the stand was the ailing James Halloran, 61, one of Mr. Rosenthal’s indicted co-conspirators and a former racquetball partner, who testified about the marijuana-growing activities he began immediately after California passed the Compassionate Use Act, otherwise known as Prop 215, in 1996. According to Mr. Halloran, he entered into a partnership with Mr. Rosenthal in late 1997 or early 1998 to produce marijuana for the local medical clubs, before going their separate growing ways about a year later, though he continued to buy small clones and cuttings from Mr. Rosenthal until the time of their arrest.Mr. Halloran also told the court that he was testifying in exchange for a more lenient sentence in his guilty plea to cultivation and money-laundering charges, charges he told the jury would otherwise have resulted in a 50-year mandatory minimum with the possibility of a triple life sentence upon conviction. While this appears to be an overstatement designed to cast his decision to rat out a friend and former partner in a more favorable light, it nonetheless introduced to the jury the seriousness of the consequences facing Mr. Rosenthal, should they choose to convict.Defense attorney Robert Eye also elicited testimony from Mr. Halloran concerning an extraordinary provision of his plea agreement with the government, allowing him to seek dismissal of the conviction at such time as the federal law on marijuana is either determined to be unconstitutional or repealed by Congress.Next on the stand was an electrician who detailed work he’d done at Mr. Rosenthal’s direction to ensure safety and bring the marijuana cultivation facility into compliance with city of Oakland building codes, at a cost of roughly $7,500. Under questioning from the defense, he described the inspection of the facility by the Oakland Fire Department, emphasizing the complete lack of interest on the part of officials in the small marijuana plants that filled the building.The last witness of the day was DEA Special Agent Daniel Tuey, who had supervised the February 2002 raid on the cultivation facility. As part of his testimony, the prosecution played a videotape the agent made and narrated during the raid, showing several small rooms containing “mother” plants, young clones and fresh cuttings, as well as various items tacked to the walls, including a bumpersticker that read “Thank you for pot smoking” and a newspaper article that appeared to be about the 6th Street Harm Reduction Center providing medical marijuana for the most seriously ill patients. The prosecution also introduced into evidence one grow light and ballast, one large corroded fan, and a few medium-sized bags of dead marijuana cuttings. The rest of the evidence seized, the agent conceded under defense questioning, had been destroyed.The defense had, in fact, only begun its cross-examination of Agent Tuey when the court day drew to a close, but defense attorney Robert Eye nonetheless extracted testimony highlighting the fact that no local law enforcement had either participated in the raid itself or delivered any information to the DEA about Mr. Rosenthal’s operation. But perhaps the best moment came as Mr. Eye questioned the agent about the Oakland Fire Department’s building-inspection report, which the DEA had seized in the raid. With the report projected on a screen for the court to see, Mr. Eye asked Agent Tuey about a three-word note scrawled across the top of the form, apparently written by the inspecting Oakland Fire Department officer. “Can you tell us what that note says?” Mr. Eye asked. “Doesn’t it say ‘Don’t get caught’?”After the jury had been dismissed for the day, presiding judge Charles Breyer vented his displeasure with the defense’s line of questioning regarding the attitude of local officials, as well as the time spent by both prosecution and defense counsels on the matter of how many of the plants seized were either rooted or not. He asked the attorneys to come to an agreement about a range of numbers -- more than x but less than y -- rather than take up too much time arguing over a precise count. Yet the number of viable plants is germane to the specific charge of cultivating more than 100 marijuana plants. The defense believes the prosecution will be unable to produce any such number of plants.Then came what may prove to be the day’s most momentous moment, in which Judge Breyer quashed the defense subpoena of one of the DEA agents who had participated in the raid. Mike Heald, the former supervising agent from Sonoma County was being called to testify, outside the presence of the jury, about comments he’d made to a colleague of Mr. Rosenthal’s regarding the DEA’s policy on prosecutions in California. The colleague, Mary Pat Jacobs, who runs the Sonoma Alliance for Medical Marijuana, claimed in a declaration provided to the court that Agent Heald had told her that it was policy to follow the lead of local authorities in determining whether or not to prosecute those cultivating medical marijuana under Prop 215 guidelines. Ms. Jacobs had relayed that conversation to Mr. Rosenthal, who had relied upon it, in addition to the numerous assurances of local officials, in concluding that his cultivation of marijuana plants on behalf of medical patients would be immune from federal prosecution.The quashing of the subpoena of Agent Heald is of particular significance to the defense argument that the prosecution of Mr. Rosenthal is a case of “entrapment by estoppel” in which officials tell an individual that their conduct is legal and then try to prosecute them for it. In rejecting this argument, Judge Breyer made much of the fact that, while Mr. Rosenthal could reasonably have believed he was immune, the defense had not produced a key element in that defense: any federal government official or agent who’s said as much. Now the federal agent who might have testified to exactly that will not be permitted to appear. Trial continues at 8:30 a.m., Wednesday, January 22, in U.S. District Court, with trial commencing on Tuesday, January 21, 2003.FOR MORE INFORMATION: Updates and background information on Ed Rosenthal’s case are available on the web at: http://www.green-aid.com or http://www.safeaccessnow.org. -- ---- Dale Gieringer (415) 563-5858 // canorml igc.org 2215-R Market St. #278, San Francisco CA 94114 
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