Cannabis Club Member Is Guilty on Two Counts

After deliberating nearly three hours, a jury on Wednesday convicted a member of a Garden Grove cannabis club on two felony counts of selling marijuana but acquitted him of two other felony counts.

David L. Herrick’s case drew public attention when his lawyer tried to invoke the 1996 medicinal marijuana initiative, known as Proposition 215, in his defense.

Deputy Public Defender Sharon Petrosino wanted to argue that Herrick accepted cash donations to the club in exchange for providing marijuana out of medical necessity to ill patients. But Orange County Superior Court Judge William Froeberg rejected that defense.

Herrick was accused of selling the drug on four separate occasions from March 8 to May 1, 1997.

With Proposition 215 excluded, the panel of five women and seven men had to treat Herrick’s case as a typical drug case, said Richard Emmons, the jury foreman.

“Money changed hands, marijuana changed hands, therefore it was a sale,” he said.

But the medicinal marijuana initiative came up during deliberations, Emmons said. “There was sympathy expressed, but it was irrelevant, unfortunately.”

When he is sentenced June 26, Herrick, 48, could receive a maximum of five years in prison, Deputy Dist. Atty. Carl Armbrust said.