MEDICAL-MARIJUANA GROUP ASSAILS DRUG BUST

DILLON - The large-scale marijuana bust that law officers here touted
as a major success this month was instead the persecution of a
terminally ill man who needed the drug to help ease his suffering, a
pro-medical-marijuana group said Friday.

Patients and Families United, based in Helena, blasted the bust and
said it would not stand up in court thanks to Montana's Medical
Marijuana Law, which was passed three years ago. The group criticized
law officers for making a terminally ill man's last days miserable
because of the worry that he would end up in prison.

"It amounts to persecution of somebody who's already so overburdened
with a medical condition that no one should have," said Tom Daubert,
founder and director of PFU. "That's the purpose of our law, to have
some relief for somebody who wants to be left alone."

Daubert said his group will help with the legal defense for the man,
whose name has not been released by officials.

Law officers from Beaverhead County and the Southwest Montana Drug
Task Force last week were trumpeting the seizure of 96 marijuana
plants from a mobile home north of Dillon. They said the
sophisticated growing operation was meant to keep a steady supply of
marijuana coming, with plants at all stages of development.

They said the marijuana's street value could be up to $153,000.

Blair Martenson, regional director for the task force, refused to
comment specifically on PFU's contention, saying only that officials
were pushing ahead with prosecution.

"What we have to say will come out in court," he said.

But Daubert said the man targeted in the investigation, who along
with a woman have yet to be arrested and charged, is suffering from a
horrific disease. He would not specify what it was to protect the man
but said it is a rare degenerative disease that is always fatal.

Daubert said if the man is taken into custody, Beaverhead County
taxpayers will be on the hook for medical care that costs a
staggering $136,000 a month to keep him alive.

"Beaverhead County can have some fun with this: pay to keep a guy
alive for a trial that probably won't happen quickly," he said.

And Daubert lambasted law officers for conducting a three-month
investigation without knowledge of Montana's medical marijuana law.
He said assertions that the operation was too large to be for one
patient's use are bogus, because each individual patient in need of
medical marijuana requires different quantities.

For some patients, ingesting the marijuana rather than smoking it is
the most effective way to ease pain, maintain appetite or gain the
other benefits people garner from pot.

"It is not possible on the basis of the number of plants involved to
categorically claim that the growing was for anything other than
personal use," he said.

Daubert promised a "vigorous" legal defense of the man. He said
although the quantity of marijuana seized far exceeds the one ounce
allowed under state law, the group will use an affirmative defense to
prove that he needed the quantity for his medical needs.

The man is not a registered medical marijuana user, Daubert said. But
his medical records will provide more than enough evidence that he
has a qualifying condition and needs the drug to help ease his
suffering in his final months of life.

"We will bring in experts on dosage, horticulture and quantity
issues," Daubert said. "This will be potentially a major
precedent-setting case in Montana."