Pubdate: Wed, 13 May 2015
Source: Los Angeles Times (CA)
Copyright: 2015 Los Angeles Times
Contact:  http://www.latimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/248
Author: Joel Rubin

HE HAS BACKERS IN HIGH PLACES

Two Congressmen Support Convicted Pot Seller's Appeal

For years, Charles Lynch has waged a lonely battle against federal 
prosecutors intent on putting him in prison for selling medical marijuana.

But last week he received help from unexpected - and influential - allies.

In a strongly worded brief filed with the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of 
Appeals, U.S. Reps. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Costa Mesa), and Sam Farr 
(D-Carmel), accused prosecutors of flouting federal law as they go 
after Lynch and called on the court to end the case against him.

The congressmen entered the fray over Lynch by chance. The pair were 
the authors late last year of a small but significant amendment to 
federal law that was meant to prevent the Department of Justice from 
interfering with states where medical marijuana is legal.

The amendment, which won unusual broad bipartisan support when it 
passed in December, was written into a government spending bill. It 
forbids the Justice Department from using funds in a way that hinders 
states "from implementing their own state laws that authorize the 
use, distribution, possession or cultivation of medical marijuana."

The measure was viewed by many as a turning point after years of 
conflict between federal authorities intent on upholding the nation's 
drug laws and states where medical marijuana had been made legal. In 
light of the ban on spending, it was assumed federal prosecutors 
would have no choice but to abandon cases such as the one against Lynch.

Justice Department officials, however, have resisted such a sweeping 
interpretation of the amendment. In general, they have argued the 
spending ban forbids them from meddling in the affairs of state 
officials but does nothing to stop them from going after sellers.

In court filings, prosecutors in Lynch's case indicated they believe 
Lynch is particularly fair game for federal prosecution because he 
was accused of violating California's own marijuana laws when he ran 
his Morro Bay dispensary.

Rohrabacher and Farr, in their brief to the court, called the Justice 
Department's more narrow take on the spending ban "patently absurd" 
and "emphatically wrong."

"Permitting the DOJ to spend more federal funds to prosecute one of 
the very cases Congress intended for the DOJ to cease prosecuting 
defeats the purpose of the Rohrabacher-Farr amendment entirely," the 
lawmakers wrote.

The legal skirmishing over what the ban does - and does not - 
prohibit underscores irreconcilable conflicts between state laws that 
permit marijuana and federal law, which bans it outright. It comes as 
the nation's pot landscape continues to shift and Americans move 
toward greater acceptance of the drug.

Currently, about two dozen states and Washington, D.C., allow 
marijuana sales to patients with documented illnesses, and several 
other states are considering it. Last year, a large national survey 
showed for the first time that a majority of Americans favored 
legalizing marijuana use.

President Obama and others in his administration have said in recent 
years that marijuana prosecutions in states that allow the drug 
should not be a priority. In California, however, Justice Department 
officials have persisted in targeting several dispensaries.

Lynch's attorney, deputy federal public defender Alexandra Yates, 
tried unsuccessfully this year to convince a panel of justices from 
the 9th Circuit that the congressmen's amendment prohibited the 
Justice Department from continuing its case against Lynch. The panel 
deferred the question until the court takes up Lynch's appeal several 
months from now.

In their brief, Rohrabacher and Farr criticized the court's 
indecision, saying it sent a message that the Justice Department is 
"entitled to ignore Congress' explicit prohibition on the use of 
federal funds to continue prosecuting this case."

Douglas Berman, a law professor at Ohio State University and editor 
of the Marijuana Law, Policy and Reform blog, said that although he 
believes prosecutions such as the one of Lynch are out of sync with 
the broad acceptance in the U.S. of medical marijuana, the wording of 
the amendment left its intent "pregnant with uncertainty."

Although defendants in a handful of other cases in California and 
Washington have also used the spending ban to challenge their 
prosecutions, there has been no clear ruling on the issue, Berman said.

Lynch, 52, was convicted in 2008 of violating federal drug laws after 
a closely watched trial. In starkly contrasting portrayals, his 
defense team sought to present him as an aboveboard businessman who 
had the blessing of the town's mayor and city attorney, while 
prosecutors depicted him as a common drug dealer who sold to 
teenagers. They focused on the volume of Lynch's sales, which they 
said amounted to about $2 million in the 11 months the dispensary was open.

Lynch's attorneys said they were hamstrung by the judge in the case, 
who decided Lynch's reliance on state laws that permitted the sales 
was irrelevant. The judge went so far as to bar the lawyers from 
mentioning the phrase "medical marijuana" during trial.

Lynch was sentenced to a year and a day in prison. He was allowed to 
remain free on bond, pending his appeal. Unemployed and broke, Lynch 
lost his home to foreclosure and now lives in a trailer in the 
backyard of his mother's home in New Mexico, Yates said.

Rohrabacher and Farr, along with Yates, have petitioned the 9th 
Circuit to reconsider the question of the spending ban quickly. The 
rush is necessary, they said, because the issue could become moot 
when the current spending bill that contains the spending ban 
amendment expires at the end of September. In an interview, Farr said 
he was hopeful he and Rohrabacher would be able to muster the votes 
to include the ban again in the next fiscal year's spending bill.

State Sens. Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) and Mike McGuire 
(D-Healdsburg), and former state Sen. Darrell Steinberg followed the 
representatives last week with a similar brief to the court.

"One would hope that our federal government has more important 
matters to address than shattering the lives of law-abiding citizens 
like Charles Lynch," Leno said in a statement to The Times. "To quote 
President Obama in reference to states which allow for the legal use 
of marijuana, 'We've got bigger fish to fry.' These unwarranted 
raids, seizures and prosecutions must stop."
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