JUDGE RULES AGAINST MEDICAL NECESSITY DEFENSE

Activists' Illnesses Cannot Be Revealed In Trial Over Pot Growing

LOS ANGELES - Two activists cannot use medical necessity as a defense
against charges that they grew thousands of marijuana plants, a
federal judge has ruled.

They also cannot refer to their medical conditions, the medical uses
of marijuana or California's Proposition 215, which allowed the
personal use of marijuana for medical purposes, U.S. District Judge
George King ruled Friday.

Todd McCormick, who suffers from bone cancer, and Peter McWilliams,
who has AIDS and cancer in remission, are accused of possessing
marijuana with intent to distribute, distribution of marijuana, and
conspiracy to grow marijuana.

Officials arrested them after they found more than 6,000 plants
growing in a Bel-Air mansion and three other leased locations in Los
Angeles County.

McWilliams, a self-help publisher, faces accusations of financing the
operation, while McCormick and others are accused of growing the pot
and trying to sell it to the Los Angeles buyer's Club, which has
dispensed the drug since Californians voted in 1996 to legalize it for
medical use.

They are scheduled to stand trial Nov. 16.

McWilliams said Friday he is devastated by the judge's
decision.

"It's frustrating to be in a state where voters voted that I can have
this medication," he said. "I am needlessly dying at the prime of my
career."

A spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office refused to comment beyond
the judge's ruling.

McWilliams said he has admitted to growing marijuana for his own use.
He says he can only keep down his AIDS medication by smoking it. His
health has suffered since his arrest in July 1998, he said.

At a previous court appearance, officials had to keep a trash can near
him as he suffered bouts of nausea.

King's ruling disallowed a defense based on medical necessity because
it "is not available as a matter of law," since Congress has ruled
marijuana has no medical merit.

In California, Proposition 215 recognizes some medical benefits, but
federal officials say state laws do not apply to federal offenses.

The judge excluded the other information on grounds that it was
irrelevant to the charge of growing marijuana. He also said the
information does not apply to distribution charges because the
government plans to drop charges of intent to distribute.

The ruling was in response to a request from prosecutors to exclude
certain evidence at trial, including information about Proposition
215, the possible medical uses of marijuana, the defendants' medical
conditions, and any reference to the Closed Single Patient
Investigative New Drug Program, a project in which a few people in the
United States have received government permission to use marijuana.

At the time he was arrested, McCormick was conducting a research
project that involved breeding several strains of marijuana and
studying their effects on the human body, McWilliams said.