Court Support Requested – THURSDAY 3/11/2010 – 10am
Department 55 – 220 W Broadway San Diego CA 92101
Today, Wednesday March 10, 2010 all in limine motions were completed and a jury was selected in the medical marijuana trial of People v Davidovich.
On Thursday opening statement will begin from both the prosecution and the defense. This will be the first day in front of the jury and a critical day for supporters to be in court. If you are able to make it to court tomorrow (Thursday 10am), your presence would be both helpful and very much appreciated. The jury should see that this issue affects all of us.
On Tuesday as well as today Bahar Ansari my attorney argued and defended all the motions in limine filed by the prosecution as well as presented the motions in limine from the defense. If it weren’t for her efforts, superb knowledge of the law, and well formulated arguments, I would have been in a very bad position.
The prosecution came in with 9 (nine) motions in limine all with a clear intent to undermine my defense and chance for a fair trial:
Below is a brief description of the motions the DA filed, as well as a summary of how that motion was ruled on by the Judge.
1. Jury Instructions – (an interpretation of the medical marijuana law presented to the jury)
The instructions that the prosecutor filed were a very narrow interpretation of the law, and essentially professed that unless all members are cultivating together, that no other means of association to cultivate was legal. We were able to finally clarify, correct, and agree on a jury instructions this morning shortly prior to starting jury selection. The final instruction is a more accurate depiction of the law which includes a description of what a collective is. The most disturbing part of this was that even though the San Diego DA has posted on their website the AG Guidelines and is urging people to follow them, they proclaimed to the surprise of everyone including the judge in court today during these arguments that “AG Guidelines are not law, and we can never see a case when we would want them to apply”.
2. Medical Defense
The prosecution fought vehemently for hours to have my medical defense excluded and to not allow us to mention anything with regards to medical marijuana laws to the jury. Exactly at 4:20pm it was decided by the Judge that there is evidence of an affirmative defense and that we would be allowed to discuss medical marijuana in front of the jury during jury selection as well as at all other times.
3. Recommendations of Potential Witnesses
Although the prosecution claimed recommendations written on paper and signed by the doctor were hearsay, they filed a motion to require all potential witnesses claiming to be medical marijuana patients to subpoena the written recommendations from their doctors. We had no objection to this.
4. Exclude testimony of Chris Conrad Expert Witness
The prosecution filed to excluded the testimony of Chris Conrad a well known medical cannabis dosages and yields expert who has testified in hundreds of cases. The after hearing relentless arguments from the DA, the judge denied their motion and will allow Mr. Conrad’s testimony.
5. Members List should be excluded
The DA moved to exclude the mention of the list of members of the collective to the jury. This request was also denied by the judge.
6. Character Witnesses
Again the DA argued to exclude the two character witnesses from testifying at my trial. These two individuals have known me for over fifteen years and are prepared and willing to testify about their opinions of my character. The DA argued that their testimony would create an unnecessary burden on the courts time. The judge denied this request and will allow both my character witnesses to testify.
7. Surveillance Video
A request was made by the DA to show the jury the undercover video of the delivery of medicine to Jamie Conlan (Detective Scott Henderson) who was posing as a legitimate patient. We did not object and were ourselves requesting the video be shown, as it clearly shows me verifying his doctor’s recommendation and drivers license.
8. Exclusion of Navy Background
Without hesitation the judge denied this request. I will be allowed to discuss my navy background.
9. Photos of Cultivation Excluded
The Prosecution attempted to exclude pictures of the collective cultivation effort from being shown to the jury. Again the judge quickly denied this request and the jury will be allowed to see ALL the evidence.
At 10:30 this morning forty eight people were brought into Department 55. Michael McCabe my defense attorney invited his friend Charles Roger Khoury Jr. a very experienced and respected attorney to assist with the jury selection process. I must say, it was a very good feeling to have three attorneys representing me in court today all out of the goodness of their heart and for their passionate belief in justice.
Jury selection began with a huge surprise for all of us. We saw the direct result from the efforts of all the medical marijuana advocacy and activism in San Diego pay off, when at least a dozen potential jurors openly voiced their concerns about the current marijuana laws in court for the entire jury pool to hear. One potential juror went as far as to talk about the current situation in San Diego with the lack of clarity in the law and the zoning issues collectives are having. She as well as most of the others who raised concerns were unfortunately dismissed by the prosecution but not before the rest of the jurors were educated. At the end of the day, the forty eight jurors were narrowed down a panel of twelve jurors and two alternates.
On Thursday opening statements begin, as well as the testimony of the Narcotics Task Force detective Scott Henderson who stars in the surveillance video provided by the DA: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzYMHgGO_84
Come see Mr. Henderson talk about why how he lied to the doctor to obtain his recommendation and then used it to infiltrate local collectives.
For more information about my case visit www.eugenedavidovich.com
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