COURT REDUCES PRISON TERM FOR POT GROWER

SAN FRANCISCO -- A federal appeals court Thursday ordered at least a
six-month reduction of B.E. Smith's prison term, ruling that a sentencing
judge should have given credit to the Trinity County marijuana grower for
his willingness to take responsibility for his crime.

The decision could mean freedom soon for the Vietnam veteran who claimed he
grew the drug because of "medical necessity" -- to ease his own
post-traumatic stress disorder and to take care of nine fellow sufferers.
His pot garden was on a friend's property near the town of Denny.

Smith's 1999 Sacramento federal court trial was the first in California
involving a necessity defense in criminal proceedings after passage of the
state medical marijuana initiative in 1996.

The issue currently is before the U.S. Supreme Court in an unrelated civil
case.

Smith, meanwhile, is completing a 27-month sentence at a halfway house.

U.S. District Judge Garland E. Burrell Jr. of Sacramento gave him the
maximum sentence allowed by federal sentencing guidelines, saying he "never
admitted moral wrongdoing." But Smith didn't have to do so, said a
three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, because he
exercised his right to contest being prosecuted under the federal narcotics
law.

The appellate court ruled against Smith on all other grounds, including
medical necessity. The judges agreed with Burrell that Smith could not be
permitted to submit evidence of necessity because he did not first prove
that he had no legal alternative to violating the law.

Smith's only evidence consisted of a chiropractor's letter and a
psychiatrist's affidavit, containing "no individualized assessment" of his
symptoms, the court said.

Unless the 9th Circuit holds up the case for possible further review, it
will be returned to Burrell in a few weeks for a six-to 12-month sentence cut.