Mendocino county sheriff ordered to return hash to patients

(Ukiah Daily Journal) Mendocino County Sheriff Tom Allman has been ordered to give back 32 marijuana hash patties to two Redwood Valley defendants after criminal charges against them were dropped.

Mendocino County Superior Court Judge Ronald Brown signed the order, which was filed Oct. 1, after he dismissed the case against Shelton Rain Sutherland, 29, and John Bennett Henderson, 34, in July. According to court documents, Brown ruled “there would not have been probable cause for a (search) warrant.”

The flat, hard patties are each less than a quarter-inch thick, about as big around as a baseball, and appear to have been made by pouring a concentrated, liquid form of marijuana into a mold.

The patties each weigh about 27 grams, a little less than an ounce. Henderson and Sutherland will receive 32 patties because the legal amount for a marijuana patient to have at the time of the seizure was eight ounces, according to the order, and four doctors’ recommendations were admitted as evidence in the case.

Deputies arrested Sutherland and Henderson after a compliance check on Aug. 7, 2008, that led to a search warrant at Sutherland’s home in the 13000 block of Tomki Road. Authorities seized more than 100 marijuana plants, 12 pounds of dried marijuana, 160 hash patties and $20,000 in cash.

They were charged together, and defense attorney Omar Figueroa defended them, along with renowned attorney J. Tony Serra, both from San Francisco.

Figueroa argued the deputies didn’t reveal evidence in the affidavit used to obtain the search warrant that Sutherland and others in her home had tried to present doctors’ recommendations for the marijuana.

Any day where cops have to give back almost two pounds of hash is a good day.  When will police stop wasting citizens’ time in these cases where there is a clear medical recommendation?  While the defendants did have many plants, much medicine, and lots of hash, don’t forget that it is prohibition that forces this kind of hording of medicine.  Patients are subject to ripoffs and crop failures and if they don’t produce a lot of their own medicine for the bad times, they are subject to ridiculous prices in dispensaries or on the black market.  If police are concerned that the $20,000 in cash and large amounts were thanks to illegal black market operations disguised as medical need, then they should support legalizing that market and removing the prohibition profit that entices people to cheat the system.