In a preliminary injunction issued on Thursday, state District Judge James Reynolds in Helena ruled those limits would effectively deny access to pot for many patients entitled to use it under the state's 7-year-old medical marijuana statute. In a preliminary injunction issued on Thursday, state District Judge James Reynolds in Helena ruled those limits would effectively deny access to pot for many patients entitled to use it under the state's 7-year-old medical marijuana statute.

Reynolds said in his 15-page ruling that he was refraining from making a judgment about whether marijuana has medical benefits, noting that issue already had been decided by Montana voters and the state Legislature.

Instead, he said provisions of the law passed earlier this year to overhaul the original voter-approved 2004 ballot measure legalizing pot for medicinal purposes went too far.

Reynolds specifically blocked provisions outlawing any profits in the supply of medical marijuana, including a ban on growers charging customers to recoup the cost of cultivation and a ban on advertising and promotion of medicinal pot.

He also barred enforcement of sections of the new law limiting cultivation to no more than three patients per supplier.

"The court is unaware of and has not been shown where any person in any other licensed and lawful industry in Montana -- be he a barber, an accountant, a lawyer or a doctor -- who, providing a legal product or service, is denied the right to charge for that service or is limited in the number of people he or she can serve," Reynolds wrote.