MEDICAL MARIJUANA INJUNCTION HEARING STARTS TODAY

HELENA -- A hearing begins in District Court here today on a
request by the Montana Cannabis Industry Association and others
seeking a preliminary injunction to stop implementation of the state's
new medical marijuana law.

The hearing begins at 8:30 a.m. today (Monday) before state District
Court Judge James Reynolds of Helena and is scheduled to last two days.

A law passed by the 2011 Legislature and allowed to become law without
Gov. Brian Schweitzer's signature repealed Montana's 2004 voter-passed
law legalizing the use of marijuana for certain medical reasons.

The new law imposes new restrictions to make it much harder for people
to qualify to legally use medical marijuana and adds tougher
regulations.

It bans large medical pot growing operations and instead sets up a
system where cardholders can grow their own medical pot, or obtain it
from providers, but at no charge. Providers can grow for up to three
people, including themselves.

In addition, the law adds new stiffer requirements for people claiming
"severe, chronic pain" to obtain medical marijuana cards. Some
lawmakers believed that category was the major loophole used to get
cards.

As of May 31, Montana has about 30,500 people with medical marijuana
cards, up from about 4,000 in September 2009. More than 80 percent of
the cardholders claimed "chronic pain" or "severe or chronic pain or
muscle spasms."

However, a number of people testified at hearings that medical
marijuana had helped them treat a variety of diseases, including
chronic pain, epilepsy, glaucoma and others where prescription drugs
failed.

Those seeking the injunction contend the new law violates the
plaintiffs' constitutional rights to equal protection, privacy,
dignity, freedom of speech and due process, said the complaint filed
last month by Bozeman attorneys James Goetz, J. Devlan Geddes and Jim
Barr Coleman.

In response, Attorney General Steve Bullock and some assistant
attorneys general argued that the new law is not unconstitutional. A
preliminary injunction prohibiting enforcement of the law in its
entirety would create significant problems and confusion, according to
the memorandum by Bullock, James Molloy, his chief deputy of consumer
protection, and Mark Mattioli and Stuart Segrest, assistant attorneys
general.