The Mildura Magistrates’ Court was told that 55-year-old Cheryl Joy Douglas grew the plants in a shed at the rear of her Ontario Avenue house and used the drug to ease pain associated with medical ailments.

Police prosecutor Senior Constable Tansley Hill said police discovered the plants as well as an unopened box of .22 cartridges during a search of the house in August last year.

Sen-Constable Hill said Douglas admitted growing and smoking the drug for her pain and so she wouldn’t have to buy the drug.

Defence counsel Gavan Tellefson said his client was panic-stricken and desperate to clear up any suggestion that she was a drug trafficker and that she had never had any intention of trafficking in the drug.

Mr Tellefson said Douglas had told him that she used to rattle when she moved because of the number of pills she was required to take for various medical conditions and she had decided to follow what she saw on the internet and saw in the media and turn to marijuana instead of medication.

He said the accused was “terrified” when interviewed by police, “gibbering all sorts of things” and which may have given the impression that she would sell the drug to anyone who wanted it, however that was not the case.

Magistrate Richard Wright told Douglas that if anyone told her that marijuana was good for her she ought to have a good think about it. Douglas was convicted and placed on a six-month good behaviour bond.

This article appeared in Saturday’s Sunraysia Daily 04/02/2012.