POT ADVOCATE HELPS FEDS

To the federal government, Bob Martin is a key witness against medical
marijuana advocate Ed Rosenthal: on Thursday, he testified Rosenthal once
carted two boxes of plants into a Sixth Street pot dispensary in the outer
Tenderloin.

But to hundreds of patients who regularly pick up their herbal medicine at
his 10th Street Compassionate Care Center, Martin remains one of The City's
most active distributors of medicinal pot.

The apparent contrast between Martin the government witness and Martin the
proud purveyor of medical marijuana was one of the most interesting things
to emerge Thursday in the trial of Rosenthal, a high-profile marijuana
expert who has been writing about the drug for 30 years.

Rosenthal faces 10 years to life in prison if convicted on charges of
marijuana cultivation and conspiracy. Testimony resumes Wednesday.

While it is common for the government to rely on the testimony of convicted
felons in drug trials, it is unusual for them to subpoena a witness willing
to openly admit to still being involved in something illegal under federal
law -- that is, the dispensing of medical marijuana. Medical pot has been
legal in California since 1996, when voters passed Proposition 215.

After his testimony Thursday, the soft-spoken native of Valdosta, Georgia
- -- in addition to running the 10th Street club, he has been involved in
resurrecting two other pot clubs and is preparing to open another -- said
the government had no businesses prosecuting Rosenthal. He suggested that
though his immunity deal protects him from the feds using his testimony
against him, he has no doubt he will eventually be targeted.

"I'm not afraid to go to jail," said Martin, who served a stint in prison
for stealing a keg of beer. "I'm going to sit right there and feed my
patients medicine until the day they come to lock me up."

In other testimony Thursday, retired Muni bus driver Lesley Wielmer said he
sold an Oakland commercial building to Rosenthal because he no longer
wanted to own a building where marijuana was being cultivated.

"It had come to a point where I didn't want to rent under those
circumstances," said Wielmer. "Either he had to move or buy the building."

Rosenthal choose to buy it, and afterward called the Oakland Fire
Department for advice on bringing it up to code. Firefighter German Sierra
said he went along on the inspection, and that Rosenthal made to effort to
disguise that the purpose of the building was to grow pot.

"He described it as a harvesting operation and said they would distribute
it to different harm-reduction centers in Oakland, San Francisco and
Berkeley," said Sierra. "We were just there to do the inspection -- that
was the priority."

One firefighter on the inspection didn't last long. He was so nauseated by
the pungent bud he had to go outside.