One member of the jury said afterward that jurors believed the defendant had a legal right to grow and smoke pot under Proposition 215, the state's 1996 medical-marijuana law.

But because the law does not specify how much patients can possess at one time and jurors were given "no guidelines," one juror said they found Kelly guilty of the misdemeanor because he was found with more than the 28.5 grams of marijuana needed to convict him of the simple possession count.

Had the jury known that Butte County authorities allow up to one pound of marijuana with a doctor's recommendation, a Gridley juror said, "I don't think we would have convicted him" of the misdemeanor charge.

Kelly's attorney, Jodea Foster, said he had tried to introduce the district attorney's own Prop. 215 guidelines during the trial, but that Superior Court Judge Robert Glusman denied the request after the prosecutor argued they were irrelevant because those law enforcement limits were not in effect when Kelly's property was raided in February 2001.

Though "I'm very pleased that I'm not a drug felon," Kelly said he was nonetheless "disappointed with the verdict."

At one time facing up to nearly four years in prison if convicted of the felony counts, Kelly now is looking at a maximum of six months in jail when he is sentenced Monday on the misdemeanor.

In the county's only other medical marijuana trial, Michael Rogers was acquitted last year of pot cultivation charges in connection with 21 marijuana plants at his Cohasset residence.

During this week's jury trial, several members of the Butte Alliance for Medical Marijuana demonstrated outside the courthouse in Oroville with signs protesting the prosecution of Kelly and all other Prop. 215 patients.

Chico resident Dinah Coffman said they were careful to stage the protest on the sidewalk opposite the court entrance to avoid the appearance of "trying to influence" Kelly's jury.

In court, deputies from the sheriff's Special Enforcement Unit testified finding processed marijuana in an indoor grow room behind a "false wall" in an outer storage shed on Kelly's property near Cherokee in February 2001.

A Berkeley psychiatrist, Dr. Ted Mikurya, testified he prescribed pot for Kelly to alleviate an "obsessive compulsion disorder."

In her closing arguments to the jury Thursday, deputy district attorney Kristen Lucena called the medical-marijuana recommendation "a sham" and "a cover" by Kelly to illegally sell the drug to others.

The prosecution based much of its case on a purported confession to one deputy - denied by Kelly on the witness stand - that he had "sold marijuana to buy more marijuana and to make money."

In a strongly-worded response, Foster charged the prosecution had trumped up the drug sales charge because "it doesn't like" the 1996 state initiative that legalized smoking pot with a doctor's recommendation.

"Michael Kelly has been made a sacrificial lamb just because they disagree with this law and they want to decide who is sick and which doctor should recommend it (pot)," the defense attorney charged.

"If my client was found with Vicodine, we wouldn't be here," argued Foster, calling the prosecution's entire case against Kelly "an attack on Prop. 215."

Lucena disputed the assertion. "We're not here because we hate Prop. 215," the prosecutor told the jury. "The purpose of Prop. 215 is to help seriously ill patients in California ... People who sell marijuana do not get the legal protection of 215," Lucena replied.

The prosecution estimated the processed pot taken from Kelly's home at about 1.2 pounds, which the deputies testified was more than would be needed for personal use.

But a defense expert contended much of the seized pot was in the form of "stalks and stems," and that the actual amount of "legal" marijuana was closer to a half-pound.

The jurors were not advised that amount fell within the permissible limits allowed by authorities in Butte County under Prop. 215.

On the witness stand, Kelly denied telling a sheriff's officer that he had sold marijuana to others.

He claimed only to have picked up some of the drug in Arcata for medical marijuana patients in Chico "as a courtesy."

Outside of court, the Cherokee man said he strongly resented being ordered in front of the jury to identify those to whom he gave the pot, claiming it violated "patient confidentiality" rights.

Kelly was also critical of the "jury being put in the position of deciding whether I have an illness; that's the physician's job," the defendant objected.

"I was within the DA's own guidelines in this county. I still don't know what I did wrong," the Cherokee man said following Thursday's verdict.