32,500-PLANT POT RAID RULED ILLEGAL

A 32,500-plant medical marijuana garden grown in plain sight along a
Lake County highway in 2004 cannot be used as evidence in a federal
case against high-profile marijuana activist Charles "Eddy" Lepp, a
federal judge has ruled.

"The biggest bust in the history of the DEA (U.S. Drug Enforcement
Administration) just did go up in smoke," Lepp said.

U.S. District Judge Marilyn Hall Patel has ruled that evidence seized
in 2004 must be disallowed because the warrant used in the police
raid failed to identify the evidence to be seized, said U.S.
Attorney's Office spokesman Luke Macaulay.

But the charges against Lepp - which were combined with a 2005 case -
have not been dropped, and the U.S. Attorney's Office could appeal
the ruling on the 2004 warrant, he said.

"It's a small victory," Lepp conceded.

The related case against Lepp involving more than 6,000 plants seized
from his Lake County property in 2005 remains intact.

Charges against Lepp include marijuana cultivation, conspiracy to
cultivate marijuana and maintaining drug-involved premises.

"It's still very serious. I'm still looking at two life sentences and
$8.5 million in fines," Lepp said.

He's hoping a judge will suppress the search warrant for the 2005
case at an evidentiary hearing next month.

The garden, raided in 2004, just east of Upper Lake along Highway 20,
was the largest single crop of medical pot to be seized by
authorities in the United States, according to Lepp and High Times
magazine, a publication about marijuana production and laws.

Federal authorities estimated the crop, had it been allowed to
mature, would have been worth more than $80 million. Lepp said he was
growing the plants for shareholders who were legitimate medical
marijuana patients.

Lepp has a penchant for pushing the legal boundaries of medical
marijuana laws. He has lobbied Lake County supervisors to set medical
marijuana standards, and he smoked pot openly outside the Federal
Building in Santa Rosa during a 2002 demonstration in support of
medical marijuana.

His legal battle over the 32,500-plant garden earned him High Times'
2004 Freedom Fighter of the Year Award.

He had been raided for pot at least twice before the 2004 arrest, and
he made no attempt to hide the large crop.

The plants, ranging from knee-high to 8 feet tall, were growing in
neatly tilled rows with drip irrigation in a field next to a strawberry farm.

Lepp claims the government had no right to seize the plants.

A minister of the Universal Life Church and founder of Eddy's
Medicinal Gardens, Lepp said he has a right to grow marijuana under
the Religious Freedoms Restoration Act as well as California's law
allowing marijuana for medicinal use.

"I haven't broken any laws," he said.