PUNA
Charges in marijuana bust
Advertiser Staff
Big Island police charged longtime anti-geothermal activist Robert Petricci with four counts of commercial promotion of marijuana after a raid on a 10-acre Pohoiki Road property Tuesday.
Vice officers who executed a search warrant on the property found indoor marijuana growing operations in a greenhouse, two shipping containers and a barn, police said. Police said they seized 630 marijuana plants, more than eight pounds of dried marijuana and two rifles.
Petricci, 51, was active in the 1980s and 1990s in efforts to block geothermal development in Puna. Sara Steiner, 45, was also charged with four counts of commercial promotion of marijuana.