GROUP QUESTIONS SEIZURE OF MARIJUANA

As Michael Bartelmo moved forward to address the San Diego City Council
yesterday, all that could be heard in the hushed chamber was the whir of
his electric wheelchair.

Left a quadriplegic by an auto accident when he was 17, Bartelmo, 35, spoke
"on behalf of sick people who belong to Shelter From The Storm," an
agricultural cooperative in Hillcrest.

"Our garden was raided by police officers," Bartelmo said. "What we want to
know is, why this happened. We were following the law. I don't understand
why we're being singled out."

The garden consisted of marijuana plants. The law in question is
Proposition 215, the medical-marijuana initiative passed overwhelmingly by
California voters in 1996 and the source of great confusion ever since.

Bartelmo, backed by a dozen other "Shelter People" who use marijuana daily
to help cope with pain, contended that while his group was following
guidelines set by the state Attorney General's Office, San Diego police
were not.

Acting on "a complaint from a citizen," police visited the Fifth Avenue
cooperative July 6 and encountered its founder, Steve McWilliams, who is on
probation after entering a plea bargain earlier this year on a marijuana
cultivation charge. He is allowed to use marijuana for chronic pain, but
not distribute it.

McWilliams said he invited the officers to inspect the marijuana plants,
which were tagged with the names of about a dozen shelter members. Each
member had a doctor's letter on file authorizing use of marijuana for
medicinal purposes, McWilliams said.

Those letters are now in police possession, along with about 300 pot plants
- -- more than half of which were not viable -- and a variety of
high-intensity lights and other growing equipment, McWilliams said.

"Another member and I were arrested, taken downtown, strip-searched and
forced to spend a night in jail until we made $3,000 bail," he said. "It's
like we had no doctors' letters, like Prop. 215 didn't exist."

Group members are "trying our darndest to follow the law," Bartelmo told
the council.

"But we can't if police officers, the City Council or others in authority
won't tell us what the law is," Bartelmo said.

McWilliams said that officers went against the Proposition 215 guidelines
by confiscating the plants instead of merely photographing them and taking
a sample. No charges have been filed against McWilliams or other shelter
members.

Lt. Carl Black of the San Diego Police Street Narcotics Team said in an
interview that he could not comment specifically on McWilliams' case, but
said the murky nature of Proposition 215 "puts us between a rock and a hard
place."

"We have to make a judgment call on how many people are involved and how
many plants they're growing," Black said.

Particularly galling to the shelter members is that a few blocks away in
Hillcrest, the California Alternative Medical Center is buying marijuana in
bulk and selling it in small quantities to patients with a doctor's letter
on file.

While insisting he does not want to see California Alternative Medical
Center shut down, McWilliams questioned how the it is allowed to profit by
selling marijuana while shelter members are prevented from growing it for
their own use.

Black said he could not comment on that issue other than to say his
officers are aware of the center's storefront operation.

Deputy District Attorney Michael Running Sr. said in an interview that he
had heard of California Alternative Medical Center, "but I haven't been
there, haven't talked to those people."

As for McWilliams, Running said he will study the facts and circumstances
before deciding if charges will be filed. He said he may wait for new
Proposition 215 guidelines that the state Legislature soon could issue.

City Councilman George Stevens described confiscation of the group's plants
as "an urgent situation," and asked the city manager and city attorney to
report back with a clarification from San Diego police regarding medical
marijuana within 30 days.