cannabisnews.com: Rosenthal Found Guilty on Cultivation Charges





Rosenthal Found Guilty on Cultivation Charges
Posted by CN Staff on February 01, 2003 at 09:24:34 PT
By Josh Richman, Staff Writer
Source: Oakland Tribune 
Renowned pro-marijuana author and activist Ed Rosenthal of Oakland was convicted Friday of all three marijuana cultivation charges he faced, capping a federal trial in which state and local medical marijuana laws afforded him no protection. But the jury, returning its verdict with only a few hours of deliberation after a five-day trial, found him responsible for growing fewer plants than the government had claimed. That affects how much prison time Rosenthal, 58, now faces. 
Had jurors found he conspired to grow 1,000 or more plants, as the federal government alleged, he would have faced 10 years to life on that count. Because they found he conspired to grow only 100 or more plants, he faces five to 40 years instead. They also convicted him of actually cultivating 100 or more plants -- also five to 40 years -- and of maintaining a property for cultivation, punishable by up to 20 years. In scheduling Rosenthal's sentencing for June 4, U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer said he will seek ways to give Rosenthal fewer years than the minimums set by federal sentencing guidelines. And although Assistant U.S. Attorney George Bevan argued federal law requires Rosenthal be held in custody while awaiting sentence, Breyer found this case has "extraordinary circumstances" so Rosenthal can remain free on bail for now. Rosenthal saw the judge's words as sugarcoating on a poison pill. "He was trying to put a positive spin on his work," Rosenthal said later Friday. "My family is upset and I'm very disappointed, but on the other hand, I realize the jury didn't get to hear the full story. The judge restricted so much information that they should've received that it really became a kangaroo court." Rosenthal -- widely known for the "Ask Ed" column he wrote for many years in High Times magazine, as well as for books such as "The Big Book of Buds" and "Ask Ed -- Marijuana Law: Don't Get Busted" -- grew marijuana in a West Oakland building under the auspices of California's medical marijuana law and Oakland's ordinances. But federal law still bans all marijuana cultivation, possession and use for any purpose, and because only federal law applies in federal courts, Breyer barred Rosenthal's attorneys from making any mention or introducing any evidence of Rosenthal's medical motive. Medical marijuana advocates across the nation called the trial and verdict a travesty. "This trial had about as much in common with justice as the Soviet show trials during Stalin's regime," said Bruce Mirken, communications director for the Marijuana Policy Project in Washington, D.C. "The judge's instructions to the jury were perhaps more truthful than he realized when he told them they couldn't consider their sense of justice. Justice clearly had no place in Judge Breyer's courtroom, and that ordained the result." When Breyer told jurors Thursday they could not substitute their "sense of justice for their sense of duty," he was ordering them to remain unswayed by their personal feelings in order to judge the facts and abide by federal law. The case began when Drug Enforcement Administration raided Rosenthal's home, his grow operation, the Harm Reduction Center medical marijuana cooperative in San Francisco and other sites last Feb. 12. "We certainly are pleased that our hard work paid off," Special Agent Richard Meyer, spokesman for the DEA's San Francisco office, said after Friday's verdict. A U.S. Attorney's office spokesperson offered no comment, noting post-trial motions and sentencing are still pending. "We made the right decision, I just hope it's a temporary one," said jury foreman Charles Sackett III of Sebastopol, expressing hope that the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals or, if necessary, the U.S. Supreme Court will overturn the convictions. Sackett -- who said he was surprised to have been chosen as a juror after expressing his views in favor of marijuana's medical use -- said the jury's eight women and four men honored their oath to weigh the facts and apply federal law without bias. "We all realized the significance of our decision, that it would affect not only Mr. Rosenthal but a lot of people as well who use it medically," Sackett said. "I was frustrated because of my beliefs, that this couldn't enter into the case, and yet all along I knew that if we were to follow the judge's instructions to the letter, we would come to the decision that we did. We had no choice but to do that." Mirken said although the verdict is "a tragedy and an outrage, it is one small battle in a very much larger war." The government won only by hiding the issue of medical use, he noted, and California's system of medical marijuana cooperatives -- the sort of entity for which Rosenthal grew the pot -- doesn't exist in most other states with medical marijuana laws. The DEA has raided these California cooperatives, Mirken said, but "these state laws are fundamentally about protecting individual patients and their caregivers, and the feds have been fairly reluctant to go after individual patients. So those state-level protections in eight states do remain intact." Rosenthal said this unjust verdict will rally more people to the medical marijuana cause. "This issue should not be decided in a courtroom -- this was part of a national debate, and the debate is over," he said. "Eighty percent of American voters think medical marijuana should be legal, but we have some recalcitrant politicians who refuse to see that the public wants this and that there's science behind it. We have to take this out of politics and into science, and then we can get some help to people who need it." Donald Withers of Redwood City was one of two alternate jurors who heard the whole case but couldn't take part in deliberations. "There was almost a sense of relief that I didn't have to be part of the decision," he said Friday. "I couldn't help but feel the defense seemed to have their hands tied; it just seemed they had a very narrow path to take. It seems confusing to me that federal law and state law would actually contradict each other. If the state does one thing and the federal government does another, what's a citizen to do?" But had he been part of deliberations, he said, he wouldn't have been able to honor the defense's request to ignore federal law and vote based on his own conscience. "As much as it would've been nice to send a message, I don't think -- having taken a sworn oath as a juror -- that it would be appropriate behavior," Withers said. "I would've felt compelled because of the instructions of the court and my duty to do as (the 12 regular jurors) did. My hope is the judge would show some leniency in the sentencing." Note: Oakland author, 58, denied medicinal marijuana defense, faces 5 to 40 years in jail.Source: Oakland Tribune (CA)Author: Josh Richman, Staff WriterPublished: Saturday, February 01, 2003 Copyright: 2003 MediaNews Group, Inc. Contact: triblet angnewspapers.com Website: http://www.oaklandtribune.com/Related Articles & Web Sites:Marijuana Policy Projecthttp://www.mpp.org/California NORMLhttp://www.canorml.org/Green-Aid.comhttp://www.green-aid.com Americans For Safe Accesshttp://www.safeaccessnow.orgEd Rosenthal's Trial Pictures & Articleshttp://freedomtoexhale.com/trialpics.htmMedical Pot Advocate Found Guilty http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread15348.shtmlEd Rosenthal Convicted -- New Trial Sought http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread15344.shtmlJury Finds California Marijuana Guru Guilty http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread15342.shtmlGuru of Ganja Convicted of Marijuana Cultivationhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread15340.shtml 
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Comment #1 posted by Truth on February 01, 2003 at 10:12:27 PT
hop, hop, hop
Shame on the feds.
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