Ex-Coach Sent To Prison For Growing Marijuana Agents Found 300-Plant Operation In Barn Near Cusick

The former girls basketball coach at Northwest Christian High School in Spokane will serve 10 months in prison for growing marijuana.

After he’s released, Jack M. Clayburn, 46, also must serve five months of home detention during four years of supervised release.

During that time, Clayburn must submit to random searches of himself, his home and car, and take periodic urinanalysis tests for drugs.

Clayburn was sentenced Wednesday by U.S. District Court Judge Fred Van Sickle after earlier pleading guilty to a federal charge of manufacturing a controlled substance.

Drug Enforcement Administration agents raided Clayburn’s barn near Cusick, Wash., in Pend Oreille County last November.

DEA investigators got a judge to sign a search warrant after an inspection of utility records showed Clayburn used more electricity in his barn than in his house.

DEA agents found more than 300 marijuana plants in Clayburn’s barn and said it appeared the pot-growing operation had existed since 1992.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Tom Rice said because of the number of plants involved, Clayburn could have faced a mandatory five years in prison.

But because he was a first-time offender and cooperated with authorities, Rice said federal investigators agreed to recommended that he serve less than a year in prison.

Clayburn’s wife, Margaret, was not charged.

Federal authorities, however, initiated civil forfeiture proceedings against the couple’s 116-acre ranch as a drug-related asset.

In lieu of surrendering the property, Clayburn agreed to give the government $40,000 in cash for his interest in the ranch. The couple subsequently moved from the Cusick area.

Clayburn resigned shortly after the raid occurred just as he was beginning his first season as head coach of the girls basketball team at Northwest Christian. He had been an assistant coach since 1990.

, DataTimes