Vancouver
He is known as the 'Prince of Pot', but millionaire Vancouver businessman Marc Emery will soon have a new moniker - prisoner.
Emery, who gained his notoriety and his money selling hemp seeds and used the proceeds to fund magazines and a political party encouraging the legalisation of marijuana, is heading to a US jail.
In exchange for a guilty plea, Emery, 49, will serve five years in prison, mostly in Canada. If he had been convicted without a guilty plea, he would have been forced to serve a minimum of 10 years to a maximum of life in prison.
He cut the deal, he said, because his lawyers told him he had no hope of winning his case and he sensed that the 'compliant puppet government in Canada' would not back him in avoiding extradition to the United States.
To Vancouverites, Emery, with his intense stare and articulate libertarian views, was the natural leader for potheads, conspiracy theorists and freethinkers.
'I'm being outsourced to the American justice system,' said Emery, who claims that part of the reason why he's agreeing to the plea bargain, which hasn't been formalised yet, is to quell social unrest. 'Millions of people around the world support me. Many have threatened civil disobedience.'