| NORML |
| Bryan Epis has been silenced by the federal government as a condition of his sentencing agreement |
Editor’s note: Recently, a remarkable resolution was reached on a federal medical marijuana case involving Bryan Epis, a California cannabis club operator, under which Epis had to agree not to be involved in marijuana activism. Epis’s attorney, John Balazs, has contributed his thoughts about the case below in a guest post which is reprinted here with his permission.
By John Balazs
Attorney
Bryan James Epis is a well-known medical marijuana activist who is believed to be the first person to be tried in federal court for cultivating marijuana for medical purposes after the 1996 ballot initiative that legalized medical marijuana in California. Although only 458 plants were found at his residence, the government extrapolated from a disputed spreadsheet to project that his “conspiracy” to grow marijuana was for at least 1,000 plants, the threshold to trigger a mandatory minimum 10-year sentence.