Personal use possession questioned

Here's how the authorities, aided & abetted by the press, deceive the non-consuming public about cannabis. The headline of this piece trumpets 97 plants grown for own use making it sound like 26 year old Richard Hinchcliffe is some kind of major supplier who got away with something. They total the potential value of the plants at around 2,000 UKP which if the exchange rate is still the same would equal about $4000 US dollars.

In reality, Richard had 17 mature plants. Being grown indoors those only reached 3 1/2 feet tall and he had 80 seedlings. As memory serves, once this herb is dried, the mature plants may yield about 8 ounces of useable buds at best, (probably less). The seedlings should not even be counted since they are worthless until they mature and not all of them are likely to do so. Even if he matured them all, at least half or probably more would be male plants, (also useless). Not to mention that by the time the seedlings matured, he could easily have consumed the mature buds particularly since he is using the herb medicinally to overcome a drinking addiction.

Richard should not have been arrested at all for growing a plant. Nonetheless, the sentence of community service he received for violating the current ill-conceived laws was appropriately mild considering the harmlessness of the so-called crime.