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ARTICLE CONTINUED FROM PG. 39
The Jail Interview
J
ust two weeks before Christmas, Williams was facing eight felony charges, including possession with intent to distribute marijuana and seven enhanced weapons charges, which together total a mandatory minimum 92-year sentence. As of print time, his sentencing date has yet to be scheduled. Williams was persecuted for growing medical Cannabis for roughly 400 patients in Montana, but he was obeying Montana’s medical marijuana law at the time federal prosecutors indicted him. His operation had business licenses in every county they operated in and underwent frequent inspection by local law enforcement and department of health officials. As far as he and his partners knew, their operation was legal. In March 2011, federal officers raided Williams’ and his partners’ four businesses, plus a large-scale greenhouse garden and charged them for an activity that’s legal in his home state. On that same day, 25 other raids were carried out against numerous other providers, growers and locall access point owners. Williams’ case, in particular, has re-
prolific montana grower chris williams & his 1,500 plants
“BEST-CASE SCENARIO, I COULD BE OUT IN FIVE YEARS AND GET TO WATCH MY SON GRADUATE FROM COLLEGE.”
1 ounce of usable marijuana. (b) A provider or marijuana-infused products provider may possess 4 mature plants, 12 seedlings, and 1 ounce of usable marijuana for each registered cardholder who has named the person as the registered cardholder’s provider. With their facilities having 370 registered patients, the plant count was legal and justifiable under state law, his attorney said. “We did always worry [about the federal government] but we were in absolute compliance with the mmj law,” he said. “It’s sad now to think that even though we did everything to maintain that compliance, I am now in prison. In hindsight, it will have probably cost me five to 10 years in prison and potentially a life sen“THE TRIAL WAS THE MOST DISAPPOINTING PART,” WILLIAMS SAID. “I’VE LEARNED tence.” THAT THE U.S. CONSTITUTION DOESN’T REALLY EXIST AS YOU READ IT. IT’S BEEN A major aspect of the sentencing WATERED-DOWN BY POLITICS AND POLICY. I GUESS I WAS A LITTLE NAIVE. structures with his case are the weapons charges brought against him. Several hunting rifles and a pistol “The grow started with 30 plants, were found during the raids. All the weapceived national attention, an outcry mainly mothers representing 27 strains ons were legally purchased and possessed, of support and has helped to highof medicine,” Williams said. “When Williams said. The federal sentencing guidelight the disparity between compasthe feds came in, we had 1,500 total lines transformed the legal possession of the sionate state mmj laws and draconian plants. I had just done a count of the guns into felony possession while engaged in federal drug laws. grow, which had roughly 900 plants criminal enterprise. They made up most of When he originally started providsplit between vegetative and flowering, the 92-year sentence, and have been used as a ing Cannabis in 2009, he said he was 37 mothers and around 550 clones.” tool by the prosecution to paint the operation obeying the law. While the plant number might as criminal. There’s one problem with the as“When we first started, our plan sound high, it was within legal limits. sumption: Montana. was to have a statewide delivery, not The law at the time of the raid read, (1) “It’s a part of our culture out here,” Wilto have outlets,” Williams explained. (a) A registered cardholder may possess liams said. “Not a gun culture, but a provid“We didn’t think that the state was up to 4 mature plants, 12 seedlings, and ing for yourself culture. Through the process ready for dispensaries. It turned out
40/JAN. 2013 FACEBOOK.COM/NWLEAF
that we were right. The industry grew fast, and was too much for small communities.” By the time of the federal raids, Montana had dozens of legal dispensaries. Williams and his partners operated dispensaries in Miles City, Billings, Missoula and Helena. The group had three delivery drivers statewide for patients with disabilities. They also had multiple medical gardens producing the medicine, including a massive greenhouse that Williams was explicitly in charge of.
Chris Williams waits Sept. 27, 2012 for the jury to return a verdict in his federal trial involving the cultivation and distribution of marijuana and four related charges regarding possession of a firearm and drug trafficking.