POT GROWER TELLS COURT HE'S BROKE

Marijuana advocate Tim Felger says he's broke after he pleaded guilty
in B.C. Supreme Court to three counts of cultivating pot for the
purpose of trafficking.

He was sentenced to six months in jail, a 10-year ban on firearms and
a $210,000 fine.

The charges related to police raids on his former farm on Jan. 3,
2002, May 2003, and Jan. 6, 2005.

In the last raid, Abbotsford police found 2,090 plants in various
stages of maturity. Twenty-five of the plants, the equipment and dry
marijuana found at the property were claimed by Brian Carlisle, a
medical marijuana user who had an exemption through Health Canada to
grow pot and was using Felger's barns for that purpose. Abbotsford
police officers helped Carlisle through the storm to gain access to
his medical marijuana.

But since he had breached bail orders handed down by judges from the
two earlier busts, and because he could not pay a $150,000 bail,
Felger was held in custody for 100 days at the Fraser Regional
Correctional Centre in Maple Ridge.

As Felger faced seizure of his eight-hectare farm by his mortgage
holder, he was forced to sell in 2005. He claimed the land sold for
$849,000, but a net profit of around $600,000 was ordered to be held
in trust by a prosecutor's order.

Felger had purchased the property several years earlier, after
selling a pizza chain business.

"I have nothing left," said Felger, who leases a building at 33772
Essendene Avenue in downtown Abbotsford, which he uses as a venue for
his marijuana and anti-prohibition advocacy.