Judge imposes 20-year sentence on ‘evil’ marijuana farmer
Published 7:38 pm Wednesday, April 23, 2008
HILO, Hawaii — Unswayed by nearly 100 letters of support, Circuit Judge Glenn Hara sentenced a 65-year-old commercial marijuana grower to a maximum of 20 years in prison.
Defense attorney Brian De Lima accused his client of “stupidity,” but said first-time drug offender David Finley of Volcano deserved no more than probation.
“I am convinced, Mr. Finley, that you’re not a bad person, that you’re not an evil person,” Hara said Tuesday.
But Hara added, “Any sentence other than prison would undermine the respect for law.”
Hara also said he took public welfare into consideration when he imposed two 20-year sentences to run concurrently.
“Marijuana is fully entrenched in our island way of life,” he said. “Many people start using it before they are teenagers.”
Finley pleaded guilty to two counts of commercial growing of marijuana.
He was arrested in January 2007 after police said they found more than 75 pounds of marijuana on his 29-acre ranch.
Police said they discovered 127 one-ounce bags of marijuana with price tags of $280 to $300 each, 199 marijuana plants in greenhouses, two pounds of hashish, almost 19 grams of illegal mushrooms and 59 illegal methadone pills.
“This was a large-scale commercial enterprise,” Deputy Prosecutor Jason Skier said.
Finley, the father of five and grandfather of more, took responsibility for what he had done.
“For 40 years, my life was my family,” he told Hara. “The day that I was arrested, my life was cut off. I know I’ve done wrong. I have to be responsible for it.”
The Hawaii Paroling Authority will determine how much time Finley must serve behind bars before becoming eligible for parole.
Finley, who has already spent 14 months in custody, had already agreed to pay an $85,000 fine rather than have his house confiscated, which would have left his wife with no place to live, De Lima said.
