cannabisnews.com: Pot Amount Issue in Trial





Pot Amount Issue in Trial
Posted by FoM on January 26, 2000 at 15:22:36 PT
By Maline Hazle, Record Searchlight
Source: Record Searchlight
Shasta County's second medical marijuana trial in as many months opened Tuesday with allegations that the mother and son defendants were ''sophisticated'' growers who grew far too much pot for personal use.But by day's end the defense was countering that notion, attempting to show that the narcotics detective used faulty assumptions in calculating potential crop yields.
Jim Hall, 28, and his mother Lydia Hall, 62, both of Redding, are accused of cultivation and conspiracy to cultivate marijuana; Jim Hall also is charged with possession for sale. Cultivation convictions could lead to fines and jail time, while possession for sale calls for a prison term.Hearing the case is Superior Court Judge Bradley Boeckman, the same judge who heard the trial of Richard Levin, 49, the Redding man acquitted last month of growing marijuana for sale. Like Levin, the Halls contend that state law permits them to grow marijuana to combat myriad severe physical problems.In his brief opening statement to the 10-woman, two-man jury, Deputy District Attorney Tim Kam acknowledged the Halls have physical problems, but said evidence will show that they were growing too much for personal use at their Tablewood Lane home.Characterizing their two gardens — one in the garage and another in a walk-in closet — as ''covert,'' Kam described lights, fans, fertilizer, insecticides and a hydroponic system that he said are evidence of a sophisticated operation.But Redding defense attorney Eric Berg, who also represented the acquitted Levin, painted a different portrait of the Halls.Until six years ago, he said, the slight and stooped Jim Hall, who walks with a limp, was a robust 250-pounder and ''strong as an ox.'' Hall was moving an ocean container of computer monitors when the load shifted and he tried to save it, rupturing and herniating a disk.Since then Hall has lost 95 pounds and can't sit for more than five minutes, his attorney said, and subsequent surgery and medical procedures only made it worse. Finally, after trying ''about 100 different pills to relieve the pain,'' doctors recommended marijuana and it helped, Berg said.Lydia Hall's family has a history of glaucoma and she received a doctor's recommendation for marijuana after she was diagnosed with the sight-threatening disease, Berg said.Berg also contended that when Hall decided to grow his own marijuana, as allowed under the Compassionate Use Act approved by California voters in 1996, he asked the Shasta County district attorney's office and Redding police for guidelines — to no avail.It wasn't long before Redding police showed up at the Halls' door, Berg said.''The police didn't search. They came, knocked on the door ... Mr. Hall showed them everything he had,'' the defense attorney said.''There's no evidence of traffic in and out. No evidence of a single penny in the home from drug dealing. No evidence that they sold to a single person,'' despite a four-month investigation, Berg told jurors.The prosecution's first witness, Jerry Sherman, a Shasta County sheriff's detective and drug eradication expert, gave jurors a short course on marijuana growing, prices, and the seized plants and growing equipment.He said 188 plants were found in the garage and another 49 in the closet, all of them green and healthy. In addition, six plastic sandwich bags were found, each holding from a half-ounce to 11/2 ounces of marijuana bud. Other bags held ''shake'' and seeds, Sherman said.He contended that the ''shake'' was for the Halls' use and the rest was packaged for sale.Sherman also estimated that the many plants would have matured and if the planting operation continued as it was going it would yield 24 pounds of processed ''green bud'' in a year, an amount he said is far in excess of what even the heaviest users consume.But on cross examination Berg challenged Sherman's calculations, holding up a 3- or 4-inch plant from a boot box-sized carton that contained all the confiscated seedlings.Sherman accused Berg of twisting his statements as the lawyer got him to acknowledge that his calculations of eventual yield were different than those made at the Halls' preliminary hearing in September and that the calculations didn't allow for dead plants and more male plants than average. Male plants are weeded out of marijuana crops because they prevent female plants from budding.''Isn't it possible that all the plants could have died next week?'' Berg asked.''... anything is possible,'' Sherman acknowledged. ''But they're not facts.''Sherman's testimony will continue today. The trial is expected to last up to six weeks, attorneys said.Reporter Maline Hazle can be reached at 225-8266 or at mhazle redding.com.Published: January 26, 2000© 2000 Record Searchlight - The E.W. Scripps Co. Related Articles:Johannessen Seeks Restrictions on Use of MMJ - 1/22/2000http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread4435.shtmlSome Patients Find Pot is an Arresting Experience-1/12/2000http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread4285.shtml
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Comment #2 posted by kaptinenem on January 27, 2000 at 12:55:36 PT
Oh, but they do know 
They do know what they are talking about. They just frame the facts in as good a light they can for themselves. They are hardly going to emphasize for the court, for example, that half of the plants will be practically useless because they are male. They are not going to tell the benighted jury that there is an excellent chance that the all the plants will die from a number of things: improper fertilization, insufficient photosynthesis, insect infestation, fungus, etc. and that to maximize their chances of having viable plants they *had* to grow more. They are quite well aware of what they are doing. Which makes them doubly guilty in my book: they are harming injured, harmless people, not out of ignorance, but out of spite.
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Comment #1 posted by JT420 on January 27, 2000 at 06:01:47 PT
Sophistication is a crime?
I am always taken aback when law enforcement tries to puff up their case by saying that the grow operation was "sophisticated." Is that supposed to make it worse than if someone was using a simple system?The people who make such distinctions obviously have no idea what they are talking about.
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