Robert Redden and Torey Clark look at their front door, which was damaged when police broke it down and took some marijuana plants from their home. (Charles V. Tines The Detroit News)
Madison Heights --A legal test of Michigan's new medical marijuana law is brewing in Oakland County, where a man and woman vow to fight felony charges of manufacturing plants in their home.
Robert Lee Redden and Torey Allison Clark appeared before a Madison Heights magistrate Tuesday afternoon to be arraigned on charges that could send them to prison for up to 14 years and cost them up to $1 million.
Both suffer from chronic illnesses and claim to be physician-certified to have the plants under the state's medical marijuana law.
On March 30, Madison Heights police broke down the door of the couple's home with a battering ram and confiscated 21 marijuana plants, $531 in cash and some notebooks, authorities said.
They were not arrested but were ordered to appear in court Tuesday on the charges.
Redden, who suffers from bone disease and deteriorating hips, said he was told by doctors that medical marijuana would ease his pain.
He said he showed police officers documents obtained from the nonprofit Hemp and Cannabis Foundation, which opened its first clinic in Michigan in December in Southfield.
A doctor there qualified Redden and gave him a document showing he could use medical marijuana, and he started plants from seeds in early March. Clark, who suffers from cancer, said she also has her doctor's recommendation, which qualifies her to use the drug for pain.
On April 6, the state began accepting applications from residents to join the Michigan Medical Marijuana Registry. Both Redden and Clark applied for an ID card, but only after the offense occurred. Madison Heights Deputy Police Chief Anthony Roberts said that meant they were in violation of the law. Under the law, a registered user can possess up to 2.5 ounces of pot and 12 plants.
In November, nearly two-thirds of voters decided Michigan should join a dozen other states to allow medical marijuana use.
Attorney Robert S. Mullen said Redden and Clark were within their rights to have the plants and that charging them with a crime amounts to interfering with the patient-physician relationship.
The pair plan to use an affirmative defense -- an explanation for their actions that excuses or justifies their behavior -- which has been successful in other courts around the state, according to medical marijuana advocates.
"Based on the actions of law enforcement and prosecutors, it's almost as if the medical marijuana law doesn't exist and the will of the people means nothing," Mullen said outside 43rd District Court.
Redden, a Vietnam veteran and 30-year resident of Madison Heights, said he owned some of the plants and his girlfriend, Clark, owned some.
"Sick people shouldn't be in jail," he said after the hearing. Clark was equally anxious: "Fourteen years? I have cancer. I can't go to jail for 14 years." Redden and Clark are both charged with manufacturing 20 but less than 200 marijuana plants. Redden is also charged with being a repeat offender for having a marijuana conviction in March 2006.
Magistrate Kimberly S. Wilson set a $50,000 personal bond for each. A preliminary exam is set for April 22.
Oakland County Deputy Chief Prosecutor Paul Walton said any affirmative defense will have to be raised in a court of law and argued in a hearing.
Walton said his office had no "philosophy" regarding medical marijuana cases and each would be reviewed on its own merits.
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