Critics at a Helena hearing denounced a proposed Department of Corrections rule that would bar anyone on parole or probation from obtaining medical marijuana as a prescription drug, despite a state law that makes it legal.

“This proposed rule is illegal,” Tom Daubert of Patients and Families United, a medical marijuana advocacy group, told a hearings officer. “It completely defies Montana’s medical marijuana law.”

Cannabis is medicine it should be treated like all medication, and should be allowed to all people who need it.

Daubert helped lead the 2004 campaign for the ballot initiative, which 62 percent of Montanans approved, that legalized the use of medical marijuana prescribed by physicians. He said 600-700 Montanans overall have received such prescriptions from about 150 physicians.

“These are decisions up to patients and the doctors and perhaps God,” but not a Corrections Department probation officer, he said at Wednesday’s hearing.

Scott Day, a terminally ill Dillon resident who suffers from a rare degenerative disease, said, “We need it for people on probation. It’s vitally necessary for someone to get their medication.

“I can’t imagine how a probation officer should have control over medicine,” he added. “It’s a doctor’s decision.”

The people have shown consistent support for marijuana as medicine. “62 percent of Montanans agreed.”