MARVIN CHAVEZ'S CHOICE

Marvin Chavez, founder of what is now known as the Orange County Patient,
Doctor Nurse Support Group and who is facing 10 counts of selling marijuana
and jail time if found guilty, was offered an attractive deal in court
Tuesday morning. Today he will let the court know if he will accept
probation in return for a single guilty plea or allow the case to go to
trial and let a jury decide.

It won't be an easy decision, given the competing values Mr. Chavez told us
he is weighing.

What Judge Robert Fitzgerald suggested to Mr. Chavez's attorneys was that
if he would plead guilty on one count, he would receive a period of
probation, with no jail time and no fine. He would have to avoid breaking
the law, as anybody on probation does, report to a probation officer
periodically, and be subject to being stopped and searched at any time.
But he would not be forbidden to associate with anybody and he could
continue his work of trying to establish a legitimate means for patients
who have a legal right to marijuana under Proposition 215 to get access to
it in an above-board fashion.

The alternative is to go to trial under rules that would make a conviction
fairly likely. Judge Fitzgerald already has ruled (incorrectly, we
believe) that the defense would not be allowed to mention Prop. 215 or what
the voters had intended when they passed the medical marijuana initiative
in 1996. The trial would be treated as a straightforward marijuana sales
case -- did he or didn't he hand it over to an undercover cop? -- in which
all sides acknowledge that he did.

With attorneys and witnesses possibly subject to a contempt citation if
they so much as breathe a word about medical marijuana rights, it would be
difficult -- not impossible, but difficult -- to predict an outcome other
than a guilty verdict followed by jail time.

So why not take the deal? Well, there is the matter of pleading guilty,
which is an admission that you did something illegal. To busy lawyers who
handle dozens of cases a week, that might not seem like much of a
concession, but to somebody who believes he did nothing illegal, it might
be. Probation also involves supervision by an officer of the state and the
loss of certain privacy rights. Somebody on probation can be stopped and
searched by an officer at any time, or have his house searched, with or
without probable cause, simply because he is on probation after admitting a
crime.

Probation could be seen as a legal victory of sorts -- as a possible
admission that the court wasn't eager to see this trial take place in the
full glare of publicity, as acknowledgment of a reluctance by the court to
be seen as eager to put a disabled patient in jail for handing out what he
believed to be medicine. Nonetheless, a guilty plea could put a wisp of a
cloud over Marvin Chavez and his future activities. Whatever success he
might achieve in establishing a "white market" in medical marijuana for
legitimate patients with true medical needs, it would also be true that he
pled guilty to selling marijuana.

If the Chavez case goes to trial it will probably get a certain amount of
public attention. It could be a forum to introduce the media and the
general public to some of the seriously ill people who have the most direct
stake in getting legal access to medicine that helps them.

It could also mean that Marvin Chavez, who suffers from a rare spinal
condition known as ankylosing spondylitis and must wear a chest and neck
brace, would go to prison and serve time, during which he might not have
access to one particular medicine that he says has given him relief.

When we talked to him late Tuesday afternoon, Marvin Chavez was leaning
toward not taking the deal and permitting the trial go forward. His
decision will be0Aannounced in Judge Fitzgerald's courtroom in Santa Ana
at 1:30 p.m. today.

Checked-by: (Joel W. Johnson)