Pubdate: Wed, 1 Oct 2008
Source: Seattle Weekly (WA)
Copyright: 2008 Seattle Weekly
Contact:  http://www.seattleweekly.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/410
Author: Laura Onstot
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Marijuana - Medicinal)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/people/Timothy+Garon

YOU WOULD SMOKE, TOO, IF IT HAPPENED TO YOU

Timothy Garon Lost Out on a Potential Liver Transplant, in Part 
Because He Was Using Pot to Ease Hepatitis Symptoms. Now His Son Is 
Being Charged for Growing the Weed.

In the downstairs section of Lennon Garon's house, the South 
Snohomish County Narcotics Task Force entered a den draped in black 
plastic. A combination of fluorescent and high-powered grow lights 
hung from the ceiling. Below the lights, 69 marijuana plants 
photosynthesized. The room also contained fans, fertilizer, and a 
carbon-dioxide generator to support the horticulture project.

In another downstairs room, buds dried in a suspended net over 
plastic bags filled with already-processed pot. Officers also found 
two stacks of cash. One contained $860, the other $1,850 and was 
labeled "rent."

Garon, 34, wasn't home at the time, but his roommate Matthew Dir was. 
Dir, 39, told police, as they went through the house around 8 a.m. 
last April 4, that he had hepatitis C and smoked pot with the 
approval of his doctor.

At that same moment, another user of medical marijuana--Garon's 
father, Timothy Garon--was dying from the same disease. And the pot 
from that Mill Creek home had been one of his sources.

The elder Garon had been taking the drug with the approval of his 
doctor, Bradley Roter, for more than a year. Then in the fall of 
2007, according to Roter, Garon was told he would have to stay off 
marijuana for six months in order to qualify for a spot on the 
University of Washington Medical Center's liver-transplant list. UW 
has a policy that anyone getting a transplant must be clean and sober 
for that length of time prior to going on the list, Roter says.

"The transplant committee looks at all drugs the same," he explains. 
"They approach marijuana the same as IV heroin use."

According to Roter, Garon went off marijuana in October 2007. In 
April of this year, as the six months ended, the UW transplant 
committee told Garon he would also need to complete a 60-day program 
of counseling and other treatment to ensure he stayed off pot 
following a transplant, Roter says. Garon didn't last that long. He 
died May 1, and his case received wide media coverage.

Adding insult to injury, his son now may go to prison for the pot he 
supplied his dad.

In November 1998, state voters passed I-692. which legalized 
marijuana for medical use. The law also allows designated care 
providers for ailing patients to possess and grow the drug.

But the law doesn't prevent anyone, including a transplant committee, 
from making decisions based on someone's marijuana use--legal or not. 
The University of Washington declined to comment on Garon's case, but 
released a statement saying that marijuana use is never the sole 
reason for denying someone a transplant. The decision to put someone 
on the list is based on their likely outcome.

I-692 also doesn't change the way law enforcement regards grow 
operations, says Lynnwood Police spokesperson Shannon Sessions. 
"Basically we don't make that decision, if it was medical marijuana 
or not," Sessions explains. "We process the case the same way." All 
evidence is turned over to the county prosecutor, who makes the call 
on whether or not the grow was medical and therefore legal.

The elder Garon himself was busted while sick. In July 2007, the 
South Snohomish County Narcotics Task Force tracked a Mountlake 
Terrace marijuana-growing operation that led to his home. Last 
December a Snohomish judge issued a search warrant for the home, 
turning up 100 marijuana plants. Timothy Garon was charged with 
felony manufacture of a controlled substance. The court set bail at 
$10,000. Five months later, he died.

Douglas Hiatt, Tim Garon's attorney and a medical-marijuana advocate, 
says Lennon Garon began growing marijuana as his father became sicker 
and unable to grow it himself--something allowed under state law. 
Lennon also began providing pot to Dir, who was seeing the same 
doctor as the elder Garon.

On August 12 of this year, four months after police searched the 
house, Dir was charged with a felony controlled substance violation 
for the manufacture of marijuana. The same charge was filed against 
Garon on September 8.

Sessions says police determined that the amount of marijuana in Dir 
and Garon's home went beyond the limits allowed under state law--a 
60-day supply. But the law doesn't include any specifics on what 
constitutes two months' worth of pot.

Of the 12 states that allow medical marijuana use, Washington is the 
only one that doesn't specify how much pot--in either processed or 
plant form--a patient can have. Allowable amounts in other states 
range from one ounce of usable pot, three immature plants, and three 
mature (Alaska), to 24 ounces, 18 immature plants, and six mature 
(Oregon). Washington Department of Health spokesperson Tim Church 
says his agency recently closed public comment on a proposal that 
mimics the Oregon rules; the agency may or may not adopt the proposal.

According to a state courts database, the grow bust was the first 
time Lennon Garon has been in serious legal trouble in the state. But 
since then, things haven't gone so well. On Sept. 14, Garon was 
arrested again in Chelan County and charged with possession of 
marijuana, use of drug paraphernalia, and driving under the influence. 
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake