A small group of protesters staged a sit-in at Rolla City Hall on Wednesday afternoon denouncing what they view as unfair treatment by Rolla police toward a medical marijuana patient.

They remained overnight in tents.

Rolla medical marijuana activist and former city council member Daniel Jones told the News-Leader late Wednesday that a patient's marijuana was confiscated by police inside Rolla city limits. He said the demonstration was a peaceful one put on by a half-dozen patients holding qualifying medical marijuana cards.

By Jones' account, Rolla police contacted a patient in the patient's vehicle, forced the person to "stomp out their marijuana" and "made them take a joint out of their car and rub it into the dirt."

Jones said he did not know if the joint was lit. Public consumption of marijuana is forbidden under Missouri's constitutional amendment on medical marijuana, formally known as Article XIV.

At some point after contacting the patient in the vehicle, Jones said, police visited the patient at home, citing the smell of marijuana as a reason to enter the home, and confiscated the patient's marijuana.

Jones would not identify the patient when asked by the News-Leader, saying the person is "terrified." It is not clear when the events took place.

"It was the most demeaning thing I can imagine," Jones said Wednesday.

He characterized the police search of the patient's home as highly irregular.

"When the police left, they left no documentation, they did not give name or badge numbers," Jones said.

A video posted to social media Wednesday evening by one of the pro-cannabis activists portrays Jones confronting Rolla City Administrator John Butz at city hall.

Butz appears to tell Jones, "We're looking into it."

"Why can't you fix it now, John?" Jones appears to ask.

"I don't know what I have to fix at this point," Butz replies.

In the video, Jones appears to say "There's no case, there’s no badge number, there’s — the only person who committed a crime was the person ... in the Rolla police department that went into their home and who burglarized them with their guns on their waist."

Jones said Wednesday that his group demands that Rolla city government return the patient's cannabis and apologize to the patient in a public press release.

Mayor accused of assault

Late Thursday morning, Jones contacted the News-Leader and accused Rolla Mayor Louis Magdits of shoving him and a fellow protester near city hall around 11:30 a.m.

"He assaulted both of us," Jones said. "He came to have a discussion, he didn't like what we had to say, he decided to assault people."

Jones said his group was "very peaceful" during the altercation with the mayor and that the mayor tried to take one protester's mobile phone.

The News-Leader has left messages with Rolla city administration and the Rolla police department seeking their account of the events.

Rolla Police Capt. Jason Smith, reached Thursday afternoon, said, "We have no official comment right now."

Can police take weed from a home?

The newspaper also reached out to the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services, which administers Missouri's medical marijuana program, for comment on issues surrounding patient possession of marijuana at a time when the state is still implementing its legal medical marijuana system. Licenses for legal marijuana dispensaries are to be awarded by Dec. 31, and the shops are expected to be up and running sometime in 2020.

DHSS spokeswoman Lisa Cox said Thursday morning, "I don’t know the specifics of this case, but only those patients and caregivers with a valid department-issued identification card may legally possess marijuana in accordance with 19 CSR 30-95.030. The Constitution does not address how to obtain the product prior to having operating, licensed dispensaries."

Dan Viets, a Columbia-based attorney who served as president of New Approach Missouri, the organization that promoted medical marijuana Amendment 2 during the 2018 election cycle, said that Missouri law clearly allows qualifying patients to possess cannabis at this time if they comply with Article XIV.

"The law says a patient is protected in his or her possession of cannabis within certain limits," he told the News-Leader Thursday. "It doesn’t say anything about where it comes from."

He added, "I think that the law is clear that if police have seized a patient's cannabis and the patient was complying with the law, then that cannabis should be returned."

He noted that under the U.S. Constitution, law enforcement officers must obtain a warrant from a judge in order to legally search and seize items from a person's home.

Vehicle searches require "probable cause," rather than a signed warrant, according to longstanding U.S. Supreme Court precedent.

Viets said that whether the aroma of cannabis constitutes probable cause for a vehicle search remains an "open question" for Missouri courts to decide in light of the relatively new state constitutional amendment.

According to a Wednesday night report by Phelps County Focus, medical marijuana advocate Jones resigned from Rolla's city council in August after a court filing challenged his status as an elected official. Jones previously pleaded guilty to a felony marijuana distribution charge.

This is a developing story and will be updated as more information becomes available.

More on Missouri medical marijuana:

Missouri Highway Patrol investigating 'Cannabus' traveling marijuana clinic

Nolan Sousley, man whose Bolivar hospital room was searched for marijuana, dies at 52

Everything you need to know about medical marijuana in Missouri