.c The Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) - A senior policy adviser at the Energy Department and his wife, a well known anti-nuclear activist and lawyer, have been charged with growing and possessing marijuana after their 16-year-old daughter turned them in.
Robert Alvarez and his wife, Kathleen Tucker, turned themselves in to Takoma Park, Md. police on Monday, 11 days after their daughter, Kerry Tucker, told police the couple had drugs in their basement. They were released on their own recognizance.
The couple's lawyer, Steven Kupferberg, told The Washington Post that the charges ``will eventually be lowered to simple possession.''
Kupferberg said Tucker uses the marijuana to treat migraines and chronic muscle pain. He said their daughter was staying with family friends by order of a Montgomery County District Court judge.
Alvarez was fired from his politically appointed job at the Energy Department after their arrest.
Tucker helped bring national attention to the plight of Karen Silkwood, a lab worker at the Kerr-McGee Cimarron Plutonium Plant in Oklahoma who died in a suspicious car crash in 1974 after she went public with alleged safety problems at the plant. Her story was made into a film starring Meryl Streep.
Tucker went on to head the Health and Energy Institute, an advocacy group in Washington that deals with radiation health issues.
AP-NY-09-04-99 0003EDT
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