Strong pleas for leniency for medical pot advocate

Suzanne Herle, Chronicle Staff

May 28, 2003 - Attorneys for convicted medical marijuana advocate Ed Rosenthal are asking a federal judge to sentence their client to probation and community service instead of the five-year minimum prison term his charges would bring.

The matter will come before Judge Charles Breyer next Wednesday.

Rosenthal, 58, of Oakland was convicted Jan. 31 of federal cultivation charges.

At the heart of the motion is a portrayal of Rosenthal as an atypical marijuana cultivator who grew the substance out of humanitarian concern for suffering patients, did not financially profit from the activity, and believed his actions were legal, based on state law and advice from public officials.

His lawyers, who filed their motion Tuesday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, aren't the only ones requesting that the judge be lenient.

Included in the motion are two supporting letters: one from eight of the 12 jurors who convicted Rosenthal and another from California Attorney General Bill Lockyer.

After the trial, some of the jurors came out against their own verdict when they discovered that Oakland had deputized Rosenthal as an official supplier of a city-approved pot dispensary.

"We feel strongly that Mr. Rosenthal deserves uninterrupted freedom because we convicted him without having all the evidence," the jurors' letter reads.

Lockyer wrote that considering "the conflict between California and federal law governing the legality of possessing marijuana for medicinal purposes, I urge you to impose the minimum sentence allowed under the federal sentencing guidelines."

Rosenthal attorney Dennis Riordan said the motion asks the judge to employ a legal "safety valve" provision to escape the five-year mandatory minimum set by the federal sentencing guidelines.