Finally, Common sense prevails,
wake up Australia, we are
becoming the laughing stock of
the world.
For a first world country, we are a
very backward nation.
The most over regulated country
in the world…………………
Stephen Taylor of Winmalee
given bond in Penrith Local Court
By B.C. Lewis, Blue Mountain Gazette 20.7.18
A Winmalee dad facing police charges after
juicing home grown cannabis to treat his
seriously ill daughters, was put on a six month
good behaviour bond in Penrith Local Court
today. Stephen Taylor, 64, was charged with
cultivating a commercial quantity of a
prohibited drug and two counts of possessing
a prohibited drug, after police removed 107
cannabis plants from his rented home on
December 8 last year.
The charges were found proven but dismissed
and no conviction was recorded.
On March 23 this year, Mr Taylor, a coffee
technician trainer, announced an intention to
plead not guilty “on the grounds of medical
necessity” but he reversed those pleas to
guilty on June 12 when police also removed a
charge of possessing a commercial quantity of
a prohibited drug.
One of Australia’s leading barristers, the
former chair of the Australian Republican
Movement and adviser to Julian Assange and
Wikileaks, Greg Barns, and solicitor Sally
McPherson have been representing Mr Taylor
for free during the court case.
Mr Barns provided extensive medical
evidence from two doctors to confirm
Mr Taylor’s seriously ill daughters had
benefited from the juiced cannabis, a non-
psychoactive form of cannabis.
Mr Taylor spent more than five years
watching daughters Morgan, 21, and Ariel,
25, suffer from the chronic auto-immune
condition Crohn's Disease before, after
thorough research by his wife Karen, he
decided to grow cannabis in his backyard to
help them.
Mr Taylor said his daughters were repeatedly
hospitalised with their condition and had
serious side effects from pharmaceutical
drugs.
One of the daughters Morgan is now on a free
three month trial of medicinal cannabis – the
drug normally costs $1000 monthly.
Penrith Local Court Magistrate Stephen Corry
took into consideration the substantive
medical evidence on the beneficial effects of
the juiced cannabis on the daughters’
condition, including from the police’s own
consultant forensic pharmacologist, John
Andrew Farrar.
Mr Taylor’s daughters hugged the police
prosecutor outside the court.
The court heard, had the case gone to the
district court, Mr Taylor could have faced 10
years in jail.
Solicitor Sally McPherson said outside the
court “the law can’t continue to operate in a
vacuum to what the community wants and
needs which is lawful access to cannabis”.
Mr Taylor said they were relieved the case
was over.
“I couldn’t put my girls through any more.”
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