[420 Girl]

Judy Ann Craig, a former realtor with a golden touch for gardening, will try to convince the Supreme Court of Canada on Thursday that being forced to forfeit her North Vancouver home for running a marijuana grow-op is extreme punishment for her crime.

Craig is one of three Canadians -- two from B.C. and one from Quebec - -- challenging the seizure of homes in which they grew pot, a penalty that is increasingly levied following changes six years ago to federal drug laws. The 58-year-old horticulturalist contends that running a small-scale operation, mainly in her basement, should not warrant the same harsh penalties imposed for large, sophisticated businesses controlled by organized crime.

"Forfeiture of a residence of someone at retirement age with no record is severe and destroys hope of rehabilitation," Craig's lawyer, Howard Rubin, argues in a Supreme Court brief that describes her as "a minor cog in a broader sociological problem."

Craig, who says she started growing marijuana at the urging of an HIV-infected friend a decade ago, pleaded guilty in 2003 after police seized 186 marijuana plants.

She received a conditional sentence and a $115,000 fine, but since she had no other assets and owed $250,000 in unpaid taxes from her ill-gotten earnings, the court ordered the forfeiture of her small, two-storey home. It was valued at $460,000 at the time of her 2005 sentencing.

Craig's lawyer will argue that federal forfeiture laws for drug crimes should not apply to Craig, whom he described in court testimony as an "independent" entrepreneur.

The B.C. Court of Appeal, in ruling against Craig, said she was the operator of "a successful commercial operation that grossed over $100,000 a year."

"Although the substance was marijuana and not a more dangerous substance, the ( courts ) in British Columbia have accepted that grow operations in residential neighbourhoods present significant dangers to the community," says a brief from federal lawyers Francois Lacasse and Paul Riley.

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