MEDICAL MARIJUANA DISPENSARY OWNER GOES FROM OUTLAW TO BUSINESSMAN

NORTON SHORES -- After living 40 years as an outlaw, Paul Miller has
cultivated his own medical enterprise tucked among pharmacies,
cardiologists and ophthalmologists clustered around Mercy Hospital.

The medication he provides goes by such names as God Bud, Train Wreck
and Silver Diesel. According to the state of Michigan, he is a
certified caregiver and is, for all intents and purposes, a medical provider.

Less than a year ago, the marijuana he grew was considered illegal --
not that that concerned Miller too much. He sometimes doesn't wear
motorcycle helmets either.

But now he is an entrepreneur, turning the expertise he has
cultivated since he was 13 into a growing business. Besides serving
four patients as their caregiver, in other words growing marijuana
for them, Miller sells medical marijuana through his Norton Shores
"dispensary."

He also sells paraphernalia and growing supplies, provides
horticultural advice and patient consultations, and helps arrange for
people to get medical marijuana cards.

Miller started out in the business as a caregiver, growing for others
what he had for years grown for himself to deal with pain he suffers
as the result of a car accident and a motorcycle accident.

"I found out really quickly there was a big need for a dispensary,"
Miller said.

And so he established the Muskegon Medical Marijuana Dispensary at a
home he owns at 1377 E. Sherman, right next door to the more
mainstream medication distributor, Watkins Pharmacy.

His is a for-profit business, unlike the more publicized Greater
Michigan Compassion Club, which is a nonprofit membership
organization on Apple Avenue in Muskegon Township.

Anyone with a medical marijuana card can walk into Miller's
dispensary and browse his stock that includes canning jars filled
with various strains of medical marijuana and such "medibles" as
suckers, fudge and brownies.

Because of a legal dispute he's in with the city of Norton Shores,
sales don't occur inside the dispensary. Rather, Miller's product is
delivered to customers.

Before he opened his business in May, Miller spent four years without
a regular job, making ends meet fixing computers. Knowledgeable and
articulate, Miller has associate's degrees in electrical and computer
engineering.

Lately, business has been good, averaging about 30 patients a day,
and he's looking to expand his sales of hydroponic growing kits to
other medical marijuana caregivers.

"This is the first month that I wasn't late on my house payment," he said.

The way Miller sees it, his Muskegon Medical Marijuana Dispensary
serves two primary purposes: It provides patients a way to get their
medication, and it helps other caregivers stay in business by selling
their excess marijuana.

Marijuana that MMMD customers purchase primarily are "overages" that
Miller buys from other caregivers who, by law, cannot have in their
possession more than 2 1/2 ounces of "usable" marijuana -- which has
been harvested and dried -- for each of up to five patients they care for.

Caregivers also can have up to 12 plants per patient.

Rather than have to destroy their extra marijuana, caregivers bring
it to Miller who carefully monitors the quality of the medication,
even examining marijuana buds under a microscope, before deciding
whether to buy it to resell to his dispensary customers.

"I have better medication, better pricing and I take care of my
patients," Miller said.

Don, who sells overages to MMMD and asked that his last name not be
used, said Miller's dispensary helps him and his wife, who together
have eight patients, defray their $1,600 in monthly business expenses
that primarily are electrical costs. He spent more than $10,000 to
set up grow rooms in his home.

"This is what I do. This is my job," Don said. "It's not like we're
out there to make a million dollars out of it. We're here to help
people too. I have to make a living. You have to make it affordable
too. We've got a few patients on fixed incomes."

Miller tells of one elderly couple in their late 70s who tried to
sell him some of the marijuana they had grown. He wasn't impressed,
but to be nice agreed to sell it on consignment. He couldn't get any takers.

"It wasn't real good," Miller said.

Now he's giving the couple tips on growing and drying the plants.

Miller grows plants for patients for whom he is caregiver in two
basement rooms. One is like a nursery for young shoots, the other a
"bud room" where he restricts light to force mature plants to flower,
creating the "buds" that carry marijuana's active ingredient, THC.

"I'm not unlike any other gardener who wants to grow a big pumpkin or
cucumber," he said. "Once you start, you don't want to stop."