SACRAMENTO, CA -- In front of a courtroom packed with spectators, a federal judge yesterday denied all of the motions filed on behalf of a medical marijuana doctor and her husband.
Dr. Marion "Mollie" Fry and Dale Schafer, who both suffer severe health problems, were allowed to take a seat halfway through the reading of the ruling. As they sat attentively at the defense table, the pair watched the case continue its slow, inevitable slide towards trial.
Dale Schafer and Mollie Fry, medical marijuana defendants in federal court
Fry and Schafer have been fighting this legal battle since a dramatic 2001 raid, in which federal agents ransacked the couple's home and the office where Fry examines medical marijuana patients. She does this in compliance with California's voter-enacted Proposition 215, which allows the use and cultivation of marijuana as approved by a licensed physician.
However, marijuana's continued illegality under federal law creates a conflict that has gotten many medical patients and providers into tricky situations. In fact, Fry and Schafer claim that local law enforcement condoned their practices as legal under state law, only to later assist in the federal investigation and raid.
After all, marijuana is not just illegal under federal law -- it's very illegal. The Drug Enforcement Administration has classified it as a Schedule I controlled substance, a category for drugs that have no currently accepted medical use as well as a high potential for abuse.
Fry, who has been practicing medicine since 1985, scoffs at the idea that marijuana has no medicinal value. She credits it enthusiastically for her survival of the rigors of chemotherapy and, eventually, a double mastectomy.
But on his bench yesterday, Judge Frank C. Damrell Jr. was not moved by arguments of medical efficacy.
"The defense has submitted a wealth of literature and data against the government's Schedule I prohibition," the judge read dryly from his pre-written ruling, "but the court cannot ignore the weight of legal authority on this point."
"These arguments would be more appropriately directed to Congress," the judge continued, before making his conclusive statement. "This matter is subject to a rational basis review, not strict scrutiny, and there is a rational basis for the inclusion of marijuana in the Controlled Substances Act. Motion denied."
Another motion before the judge yesterday was an attempt to quash the search warrant. Through this motion, the defense requested an evidentiary hearing to reveal crucial facts about the citizen informant whose disclosures were used to procure the search warrant.
At issue were details about the informant that officers left out of the warrant. According to the defense, it was omitted that the informant blamed Fry and Schafer for divulging his capture information while he was a fugitive. Also omitted was the claim that Fry and Schafer had previously fired the informant due to accusations of theft. The defense described the basis for a deep-seated grudge held by the informant, suggesting that he was motivated by vengeance in providing information for the search warrant.
The defense's argument proposed the essential question -- might the magistrate judge have refused to sign the warrant had he known about the details that were omitted?
Judge Damrell sustained his skepticism.
"The defense's showing was inadequate to warrant a Franks hearing," the judge declared as he neared the end of his ruling.
Then, demonstrating the elegance of killing two motions with one stone, he concluded neatly, "And because the court denies the Franks hearing, the motion for disclosure of the informant is moot, and it is also denied."
All motions now dead, prosecuting attorney Anne Pings maintained a tightly complacent smile at her stand. When the judge asked defense counsel Laurence Lichter for comment, Pings turned her gaze pertly towards him to gauge his response.
Laurence Lichter, defense attorney for Mollie Fry
"I'm not going to quibble with your honor's ruling," Lichter said with characteristic self-assurance.
Outside the courtroom, the reason for Lichter's confidence was evident. When asked if the information in the motions could still be presented to the jury, the defense attorney responded with a flash of zeal. "Let them try to stop us!"
Fry and Schafer's case proceeds with a readiness conference at 2pm on July 13th, 2007, on the 15th floor of 501 I Street in Sacramento, CA. Their trial is set to begin on July 31st, 2007, and it is expected to be a lengthy one. Six years in the making, it will feature myriad witnesses and last an estimated two months.
With so much hanging in the balance, Fry's concern is her minor children. "I just don't want my kids to be orphans," she said outside court yesterday. "That's what will happen if they send us to jail -- they'll be making orphans."
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