POT PUNDIT DISPUTES COP CLAIMS AT MARIJUANA TRIAL

Medicinal marijuana defendant Jim Hall wound up his testimony Friday
in Shasta County Superior Court, quickly followed to the stand by a
hemp expert who testified that Hall and his mother weren't growing
enough pot to be selling it.

That expert, Chris Conroy [sic] of El Cerrito, later was challenged by
prosecutor Tim Kam with a cross-examination intended to show that he
supports not only medicinal marijuana use, legalized four years ago by
state Proposition 215, but wants to see marijuana legalized for adult
recreational use.

Still later, Dr. Frank Fisher made a three-minute appearance during
which he got no further than the third question from defense lawyer
Eric Berg before ''reluctantly'' asserting his Fifth Amendment right
to avoid incriminating himself.

In a hearing while the 10-woman, two-man jury waited in the third
floor hallway outside, Redding attorney Jeffrey C. Stotter told
Superior Court Judge Bradley Boeckman that Fisher could not afford to
be questioned about any of the details of his practice or patient treatment.

That's because portions of that testimony could be used in the triple
manslaughter case pending against Fisher, 46, for allegedly
contributing to the overdose deaths of three patients for whom he
prescribed an opium-based painkiller.

The doctor, who lives in Redding, recommended medicinal marijuana use
for Lydia Hall, 62, for glaucoma, said attorney Berg. Lydia Hall is
the mother of 38-year-old Jim Hall.

The mother and son, both of Redding, are accused of cultivation and
conspiracy to cultivate marijuana. Jim Hall also is charged with
possession of marijuana for sale.

In the hearing before Fisher's brief court testimony, Berg told Judge
Boeckman he wanted to question Fisher about how he examined Lydia Hall
and how his office checked with her eye doctor about her symptoms and
diagnosis.

''Although Dr. Fisher would like to help his patient,'' attorney
Stotter said, answering Berg's questions would allow cross-examination
by Kam that would reveal information that could be used against Fisher
in his own trial.

The judge agreed.

Friday's session opened with Jim Hall's second day on the stand and
questions from Kam about whether the defendant learned to grow pot by
reading ''High Times,'' a marijuana-oriented magazine.

Kam has introduced two issues of ''High Times'' as evidence and
frequently notes in his questioning that they contain articles on
hydroponic growing and commercial growing.

Hall admits that one of two gardens at his house was hydroponic and
that insecticides and plant foods photographed by sheriff's deputies
were to help grow the plants.

Conroy [sic], the marijuana expert who spent mid-day on the stand, flatly
contradicted testimony of the prosecution's first witness, Shasta
County sheriff's Detective Jerry Shearman, who said the marijuana
gardens found at the Halls' house eventually would have yielded 24
pounds of ''smokable green bud'' a year -- far more than Hall needed
for his injured back.

The ponytailed Conroy [sic], who has published two books, worked with hemp
growers in Europe and interviewed about 1,000 medicinal marijuana
patients, is qualified as a hemp expert in 14 counties in California.

He characterized Jim Hall's gardens as ''sea of green'' operations
where ''large numbers of plants are grown with a small yield.''

He estimated that Hall's small indoor garden would yield only about 18
ounces of marijuana a year, if that, because Hall had made a
''significant mistake'' in the way he cloned the plants and used
lights hot enough to dwarf and kill the plants.

Conroy [sic] said Hall made another mistake when he surrounded 191 seedlings
in his garage with black plastic, which absorbs light and absorbs and
traps heat. The garage garden was likely to produce only about 2
pounds a year, Conroy estimated.

The expert went on to testify that a heavy medical marijuana user
would need 6 to 12 pounds of pot a year.

Kam attempted to discredit Conroy's [sic] credentials, repeatedly asking
questions about whether he had ever worked with law enforcement,
asking about Conroy's [sic] writings on the Internet and about slogans
repeated at pro-medicinal marijuana rallies.

Kam contends that studies Conroy [sic] used to estimate how much pot a
patient smokes are based on studies of patients who were smoking far
less potent pot than Hall was attempting to grow.

Berg questioned Kam [sic] again and asked ''what kind of things would you
look for to indicate sales'' of marijuana?

''First and foremost, a sale,'' Conroy [sic] replied. ''A sale, pay sheets,
evidence of wealth.'' He added to the list: quality scales, coin bags
(for packaging) and evidence of traffic in and out of the house,
police responses, a confession, ''something going on of a suspicious
nature, which doesn't seem to be in this case.''

Testimony in the trial resumes Monday.