Criminal chemist Casey Hardison has been granted the right to appeal against his 20-year jail sentence.

Hardison, 34, made hallucinogenic drugs in a home-made factory he set up in the bedroom of a rented bungalow in the village of Ovingdean near Brighton.

When detectives raided the detached house in The Vale in February 2004 they discovered he was producing a range of psychoactive drugs, including LSD and other illegal compounds rare on the drugs market.

Hardison, who is American, was convicted at Lewes Crown Court of a string of drugs charges in March last year after a ten-week trial.

He received one of the longest sentences ever passed for drug offences in Sussex.

Judge Anthony Niblett recommended Hardison is deported to the United States when he is released from jail in Britain because his presence in this country is detrimental.

Hardison, who made log cabins in his home town in Idaho before travelling to the UK, was granted the right to appeal at the Court of Appeal in London.

An application to appeal against conviction was refused.

The appeal against sentence will be heard later this year.

During the trial the court heard Hardisons drug factory was one of the most sophisticated and complex illegal labs found in the UK in the past 25 years.

He had manufactured drugs with a potential street value of £5 million.

But Hardison, who is known as Obi Wan by his friends after the wise Jedi in the Star Wars films, maintained taking drugs was an innocent act and he was the victim of the futile war against drugs.