DeSmet, who moved from California, has "a past" but next to no hope of having the future he came here to try to find. "I don't deny and didn't deny having (the meth) or that it's against the law. I let them in without a warrant, I did what they asked, but things have come completely unglued."

Court documents say that in the home a bag was found containing 12.8 grams, or about a half ounce, of a powder that field-tested as methamphetamine. There were also two glass pipes and a digital scale.

"I've been around this stuff off and on since I'm 15 (he's now 43). I'm not proud of it or saying nothing should happen now," he said. "But it's like meth is the new Godzilla, except it's worse — it's as real as an atomic bomb to people, at least in people's minds who don't realize — and don't want to, apparently — that there are functioning, working people who are their neighbors on the stuff.

"People have given it and all drugs so much power," he said. "I swear it's like a real magic word. Say meth or get caught with it and, poof, your life disappears — not just your stuff, your whole life."

The amount DeSmet handed over is a dealer-size quantity, but he says it was a month's worth of personal use to help boost his energy at work and keep in check the emotional and physical pain of living with Stage 4 melanoma. He has gone through chemotherapy and refuses to go again, saying it ruined his health and didn't keep the cancer in check. He has four sores. One on his upper back is a black and red crater nearly a half-inch deep and as big around as a silver dollar.

"The worst part is I'm losing my hair from all this grief," DeSmet said, in an attempt to lighten the mood after reluctantly showing a visitor the cancer on his back.

DeSmet refuses medical treatment, and he's refusing to plea bargain his case "for the simple fact that I did not do what they said I did. The guy who supposedly bought from me was paying me back 40 bucks. He just threw it on the ground and walked off."

Turns out the money was marked and the buyer was a friend turning on him.

"But no purchase was made. I don't deal," he said. "I picked (the money) up and put it in my pocket, and suddenly undercover cops roll up."

They were on private property, had been let in illegally by a tenant apparently in an attempt to observe a drug deal that didn't happen behind a cinder-block wall they couldn't see through, DeSmet said.

If he can find a lawyer who wants to defend him rather than promote a plea, he plans to present evidence on Monday that he says proves wrong every charge against him. Included in the stack of evidence are court documents, pictures and personal journal entries of calls to the police and courts he made every day since his initial arrest.