WESTERN CAREGIVERS GROUP COLLECTIVE

Americans for Safe Access says City Atty. Carmen Trutanich is misreading California law and court decisions, but he has not budged on his legal assault over sales at dispensaries.
Medical marijuana raid

Federal agents and Los Angeles police officers raid Organica, a Venice-area medical marijuana dispensary, on Feb. 18. Prosecutors have charged the operator with 24 felony counts.

The nation’s main advocacy group for medical marijuana threatened Tuesday to challenge Los Angeles City Atty. Carmen Trutanich’s legal assault on dispensaries, saying it is “unlawful, unconstitutional, and contravenes the spirit and letter of the governing laws.”

The city prosecutor’s office filed three lawsuits last week seeking court injunctions to force Organica in the Venice area and two Holistic Caregivers stores in South Los Angeles to stop all sales. Trutanich maintains that state law authorizes collectives only to grow marijuana and recover their actual costs, not to sell it.

Americans for Safe Access, which advocates for the use of medical marijuana and has defended dispensaries in court, has tried repeatedly to persuade the city prosecutor that he is misreading the law and recent court decisions, but he has not budged.

The organization’s chief counsel, Joseph D. Elford, sent letters to Trutanich and Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley, who shares Trutanich’s view, saying the advocacy group would join the lawsuits unless they are withdrawn.

“We want to let Trutanich and Cooley know we’re not just going to sit this one out,” he said.

The organization’s decision increases the likelihood that Los Angeles, the ground zero of the state’s dizzying dispensary boom, also will become the center of litigation that clarifies murky issues.

Voters passed the state’s medical marijuana initiative in 1996 and the Legislature adopted a law to expand access in 2003, but the courts still have not ruled directly on whether collectives can sell marijuana to their members.

William W. Carter, the chief deputy city attorney, said he had not seen the letter.

“I’ve read their press release, and I am not impressed,” he said. “We obviously don’t agree with their position. We are enforcing the existing local and state laws just as we’ve been doing for a long time.”

Carter said the city attorney’s office had no intention of withdrawing the lawsuits, noting that it has already won an injunction barring one dispensary from selling marijuana in a similar case and is confident in its legal position.

Trutanich and Cooley have pressed cases that could force the courts to weigh in. Trutanich sued Hemp Factory V, an Eagle Rock dispensary, and his lawyers persuaded a Superior Court judge to take their side. Elford said he learned about the case too late to intervene before the decision.

Cooley’s office has filed felony charges against dispensary operators, saying their sales violate state laws.

On Monday, prosecutors charged Jeff Joseph, the operator of Organica, with 24 felonies.

Elford also accused the two prosecutors of taking preemptive action before the city’s medical marijuana ordinance takes effect. “They fought us tooth and nail with the City Council,” he said. “They’re not happy with the result.”

Trutanich and Cooley had pressed the council to explicitly ban sales, but lawmakers rebuffed them.

Pointing out that the city attorney’s office filed its lawsuit against Hemp Factory V months before the council approved the ordinance, Carter dismissed Elford’s contention, saying, “We were fully engaged.”

City sues three collectives and moves to evict 18 others from their stores, saying they have violated state laws. The actions stem from undercover police operations at the dispensaries.
Arrest

Organica operator Jeff Joseph is led from the medical marijuana dispensary by LAPD officers after police and federal agents raided the store that straddles Culver City and L.A. on Thursday.

February 18, 2010 | 10:17 p.m.

Los Angeles city prosecutors Thursday escalated their efforts to shut down medical marijuana dispensaries, suing three collectives and moving to evict 18 others from their stores.

The actions, which stem from undercover police operations at the dispensaries, follow City Atty. Carmen Trutanich’s pledge to take aggressive steps to reverse the rapid spread of pot shops. Hundreds have opened while the City Council debated an ordinance to regulate them. The council passed the law last month, but it has not taken effect.

The lawsuits against Organica, which straddles Culver City and Los Angeles, and two Holistic Caregivers outlets in South Los Angeles allege that they have repeatedly violated state laws and seek injunctions to force them to stop selling marijuana.

And, opening a new front, the city attorney’s office sent letters to 18 landlords saying that dispensaries on their property are breaking the law and should be evicted.

“Law enforcement targeted them and then brought the evidence to us,” said Assistant City Atty. Asha Greenberg, who has spearheaded the legal action against dispensaries.

On Thursday, police and federal agents raided Organica. The dispensary’s operator, Jeff Joseph, was arrested, but no charges have been filed.

The three lawsuits are similar to one the city attorney’s office filed against an Eagle Rock dispensary called Hemp Factory V. Last month, a Superior Court judge sided with Trutanich and agreed that state law does not allow collectives to sell marijuana, a decision believed to be the first in the state to question a practice that is now widespread.

The judge ordered Hemp Factory to stop selling marijuana. Greenberg declined to say whether it has complied. “We’ll deal with them as soon as I get a little time,” she said.

Organica and Holistic Caregivers have been targets of law enforcement for several years.

The Holistic Caregivers stores, on Crenshaw Boulevard and South Vermont Avenue, are among a number owned by Virgil Grant. One in Compton was identified as the dispensary that sold marijuana to a driver allegedly under the influence in 2007 when his truck hit a vehicle that a California Highway Patrol officer had pulled over. The accident killed the stopped vehicle’s driver and paralyzed the officer.

Federal, state and local officials conducted undercover buys and raids at Grant’s stores. Grant pleaded guilty last year to possession with the intent to distribute a controlled substance.

The Drug Enforcement Administration launched an investigation of Organica, which is on Washington Boulevard, in March 2008 and raided the dispensary four months later. The store was raided again in August.

In October, when he threatened to prosecute dispensaries for selling marijuana, Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley singled out Organica.

Joseph closed his dispensary after the second raid, saying that he wanted to wait for the city’s ordinance so he would know how to operate legally. He reopened in December, he said, to try to comply with that ordinance.

Under that law, dispensaries registered with the city in 2007 and still in business will be allowed to stay open. Organica was one of the 186 registered stores.

In a call from jail, Joseph sounded despondent. “This is stupid. This should not be happening,” he said. “I have no idea what to do. I really was in a situation where I had to stay in compliance.”

In addition to the lawsuits, the city attorney’s office also notified 18 landlords and dispensary owners that state law allows it to evict the stores, if the landlords do not do so. “It allows us to step into the landlord’s shoes,” Greenberg said.

She declined to identify the locations or release a copy of the letter, but said all the stores were the target of police operations. “These are all cases investigated by LAPD based on community complaints,” she said.

The letters give the property owners 30 days to tell the city attorney’s office what action they have taken.

L.A. City Council OKs pot ordinance requiring 1,000-foot buffer zones
January 19, 2010 | 1:07 pm

The Los Angeles City Council settled the remaining controversial issue and voted today to adopt a medical marijuana ordinance requiring dispensaries to be at least 1,000 feet from places where children congregate, such as schools, parks and libraries.

The council will have to vote again in a week because the 11-3 tally fell short of the 12-0 result that an ordinance needs to pass on the first reading, but members were relieved to end the excruciatingly meandering debate over the city’s fast-spreading pot outlets.

“Our moment is now, our moment is today. We’ve been discussing it for two-plus years,” Councilman Herb Wesson said in urging the council to vote.

The ordinance sets new rules for dispensaries that council members hope will curtail the anything-goes environment that made Los Angeles the vivid epicenter of the money-fueled Green Rush that erupted when the Obama administration announced last year that it would no longer prosecute dispensaries adhering to California’s medical marijuana laws.

Hundreds of dispensaries have opened despite the city’s 2007 moratorium, angering neighborhoods that have seen store after store pop up on main commercial boulevards.

The City Council began to consider the issue four and a half years ago when it asked the police department to make recommendations. The department found just four dispensaries, but called for rules to keep them from schools and recreational areas. Two years later, when the council imposed its moratorium on new stores, 186 registered with the city to operate under the ban.

The ordinance caps the number of dispensaries at 70, but allows exceptions for those that registered under the moratorium and are still in business. All other dispensaries will have to close, though some are making plans to challenge the city’s ordinance in court.

Dispensaries will have to comply with numerous restrictions. The law aims to shut down the late-night pot club scene, banning on-site consumption and requiring dispensaries to close at 8 p.m. Collectives will have to keep extensive records on their operations and cannot make a profit, a restriction that is likely to be enforced by special units in the police department.

The ordinance will not take effect until the council sets the registration fee that collectives will have to pay, a decision city officials said could be made in the next few weeks.

– John Hoeffel

L.A. City Council OKs cap on medical marijuana dispensaries
December 8, 2009 | 3:09 pm

Seeking to bring the city’s medical marijuana dispensary boom under tight control, the Los Angeles City Council decided today to cap the total number at 70, but to allow those that originally registered with the city to remain open.

Under the city’s 2007 moratorium on new dispensaries, 186 registered with the city. Officials believe at least 137 of those remain open in their original locations. Under the motion adopted this afternoon, those dispensaries could stay open but could be required to move to comply with the ordinance’s restrictions on where they may locate.

Councilman Jose Huizar proposed a cap to ensure that dispensaries would not be concentrated in any one neighborhood. Currently, with no ordinance in place to control their location, dispensaries have clustered in some neighborhoods, such as Eagle Rock, Hollywood and Woodland Hills, drawn by empty storefronts or by proximity to night life.

Urging the city to adopt a low number that it could control, Huizar said that “it is always easier to roll up than to ramp down.”

Councilman Dennis Zine argued strongly to give preference to the dispensaries that registered with the city. “I think we should hold true to those that followed the rules,” he said

After adopting the cap, the council turned to other aspects of the proposed ordinance. It remained unclear when the entire package might come to a final vote.

City officials say between 800 and 1,000 dispensaries are operating. Most opened in violation of a moratorium that the city failed to enforce and that a judge has recently decided was invalid because the City Council illegally extended it.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa had also urged the council to send him an ordinance that would put a firm limit on the number of dispensaries in Los Angeles.

With no data on the number of medical marijuana patients in Los Angeles, council members took the same approach as other cities that have adopted caps: picking a number that sounded reasonable to them. Council members acknowledged that they may have to revisit the issue.

The only other city among the state’s 10 largest to impose a cap is Oakland, which has less than one-tenth the population of Los Angeles and allows four dispensaries. Those operations have become extremely successful, splitting about $20 million a year in sales. Berkeley, with a population of 107,000, allows three shops; Palm Springs, population 47,600, two; West Hollywood, population 37,000, four; and Sebastopol, population 7,700, two.

Several of these cities, which set their caps arbitrarily, are now considering raising them.

– John Hoeffel at Los Angeles City Hall

Britain is ‘designer drugs’ capital of Europe, says EU agency

Potent synthetic drugs proving hard to control as chemists produce alternatives quicker than authorities can ban them
Spice Gold, a legal herbal drug

Spice Gold, a herbal drug soon to be banned in the UK. Photograph: Alicia Canter

Britain has become the online “designer drugs” capital of Europe with more than a third of all internet retailers that sell “legal highs” based in the UK, according to a report from the European Union’s drug agency.

This new generation of online “head shops” is at the centre of a rapidly growing market in highly potent synthetic drugs, such as Spice, that mimic the effects of illegal substances such as cannabis and ecstasy.

European drug agency officials are also alarmed by the way the online retailers are reacting to moves to ban individual “legal highs” by rapidly marketing alternatives. Officials say it is like trying to hit a moving target.

Britain is poised to ban Spice, a cannabis substitute that can be more potent than skunk, which is sold as a “herbal smoking mixture” , but already the online head shops are selling 27 alternative “herbal smoking blends” based on the active ingredient in cannabis synthesised by chemists in Asia.

Wolfgang Gotz, the director of the European monitoring centre for drugs and drug addiction, said the use of the legal highs market to circumvent controls on illicit drugs was the most challenging development over the past year.

“While this practice itself is not new, what is new is the wide range of substances now on offer, the growing use of the internet, the aggressive and sophisticated marketing of products and the very speed with which the market reacts to controls.”

He said that Spice was an example of the global nature of the drugs problem with a product designed and marketed in Europe but produced in Asia and targeted at the potentially large group of consumers who were interested in cannabis.

“If Spice is a taste of things to come, both our monitoring systems and our drug control mechanisms will have to evolve in order to meet the new challenges that this kind of market innovation is presenting us with.”

The annual report from the European drugs agency cites the case of BZP, a “designer stimulant” that was banned across Europe earlier this year, as an example of how rapidly this new British-based market reacts to attempts to ban legal highs.

A whole range of alternative “energy party pills” is already being marketed and advertised as BZP-free and sold under names such as Charged, Turbo III – The Next Generation and Cranked. They promise to make you feel “energetic, alert, and lively for five to six hours”. Charged is promoted as “the perfect power source to fuel your long days and big nights”. Snuff products or herbal powders, claiming to contain caffeine and a range of other plant-based ingredients, are also being sold as a legal alternatives to cocaine and amphetamines.

The 2009 survey of online shops selling these “psychoactive” drugs found 115 retailers operating from 17 European countries, but the majority were based in the UK (37%) and Germany (15%). Nearly half the sites selling Spice were located in Britain. Germany, France and Austria made selling Spice illegal in March this year and Britain is poised to follow suit as soon as the measure is approved by parliament.

Paul Griffiths, of the European drugs agency, said that Spice contained a new compound, JWH-018, which was the first synthetic cannabinoid – the active ingredient in marijuana – and which was very potent even at low doses. In the face of the growing crackdown on Spice, research chemists have already developed a range of nine other cannabis-like drugs that would not be covered by the ban.

“Detecting these compounds is very difficult. Sometimes they are masked by spraying with other substances. We have no knowledge of their toxicity and overdoses are possible,” he said.

The difficulties for the law enforcement authorities in dealing with these new drugs was highlighted earlier this week when a British “transporter”, Steve Marsden, 50, was freed from a Maltese jail after serving only three years of a 25-year prison sentence for importing 50,000 “ecstasy” tablets into the island. His appeal succeeded when it was proved that the active ingredient in his tablets was not the illegal chemical MDMA, but a new legal synthetic drug mCPP, or Piperazine, which has similar effects.

The annual report confirms that Britain and Spain remain at the top of the Euro-league table for cocaine consumption and also shows that the decline in cannabis consumption among British schoolchildren has continued despite the downgrading of its legal status. In the mid-1990s, 42% of British teenagers aged 15-16 reported to have used cannabis but this has now fallen to 29% of the age group.

Breaking News: Wolf Blitzer Knows What Pot Smells Like!

CNN’s Wolf Blitzer and Jessica Yellin talk about Rep. Barney Frank’s saying he wouldn’t know what a marijuana plant looks like because he’s not an outdoorsy-type. Then Blitzer and Yellin proceed to chat about what marijuana smell like, then hand it over to Lou Dobbs, who tells the pair: “You… got out of that just in time to save both of your careers…”

L.A. council says pot shops could accept cash
Members also signal that they may cap dispensaries to between 70 and 200. The council plows through 50 proposed changes to its medical marijuana ordinance.
By John Hoeffel

November 25, 2009

Dispensaries in Los Angeles could continue to accept cash for medical marijuana under a provision approved by the City Council on Tuesday, after it adopted language carefully crafted to maneuver past the city attorney’s adamant position that state law bars the sale of the drug.

Plowing through more than 50 proposed changes to its draft medical marijuana ordinance, the council also signaled that it would probably cap the total number of dispensaries at between 70 and 200. The council asked city officials to return next Wednesday with studies on caps and on restrictions that would keep dispensaries either 500 feet or 1,000 feet from places such as schools and parks. The council also added new restrictions on dispensaries and rejected efforts to loosen requirements.

By the close of the daylong session, the council had made substantial headway on an issue that has bedeviled it for years.

With a judge’s recent ruling that the city’s moratorium on dispensaries was invalid, the city has almost no control over the hundreds that have opened.

The council, which avoided the word “sales” on the advice of its lawyers, decided that Los Angeles would allow “cash contributions, reimbursements and compensations” as long as they comply with state law.

Council President Eric Garcetti stepped in to negotiate the provision after an extended discussion. “We have some very elegant and flexible language that will adjust as state law is defined,” he said.

City Atty. Carmen Trutanich and Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley had urged the council to explicitly ban the sale of marijuana.

William Carter, the chief deputy city attorney, said his office was following state law and recent court decisions, which led to the conclusion that collectives could only cultivate marijuana, not sell it. “Until they change the law, what we’re stuck with is this collective model, not the drive-through Starbucks model,” he said.

Several members harshly criticized the city attorney’s office. Councilman Ed Reyes, who oversaw the effort to write an ordinance, accused the office of pressing “a political point of view that has nothing to do with objective advice,” while Councilman Paul Koretz, who helped write the state law as an assemblyman, said: “I think we’re getting advice from one direction.”

Council members expressed a clear interest in caps, most likely distributed among the city’s 21 police divisions.

The council, though, remains unsure whether to give preference to the 186 dispensaries that registered with the city when the moratorium was adopted in 2007. Councilman Richard Alarcon said he saw nothing “magic” in the number, while Councilwoman Janice Hahn said it would be “fair and reasonable” to favor those who had followed the law.

The council rejected an amendment from Koretz and Reyes that would have required the police to get a court order to review the records kept by dispensaries.

Councilman Jose Huizar and several other members objected vociferously to the proposal, saying that they feared it would undermine efforts to try to cull bad dispensaries.

The city attorney’s office and the Police Department, noting that other cities have similar requirements, argued that ready access to the records was essential to determine whether the collectives were following the law. “An inspection is problematic if you create too many limits on it,” LAPD Cmdr. Pat Gannon said.

The council asked city officials to draft language to ensure that police have no access to patient medical records. The council also had a heated discussion about whether to eliminate the ordinance’s requirement that collectives possess no more than five pounds of marijuana and grow it on-site.

Huizar argued against the change. “We are encouraging a black market,” he said. “This is a dangerous path.”

Exasperated, Reyes shot back that the current restriction would not work. “I’m not advocating for the black market, gangs, cartels to take advantage of this,” he said, “But we can’t choke it to the point where it does not function.”

Reyes then withdrew his amendment and asked Huizar to come up with an alternative.

The council also approved an amendment to limit operators to one dispensary and an amendment to limit patients and caregivers to membership in one collective, but allow for emergency purchases.

The restriction on membership drew protests from medical marijuana advocates. “If you go to your favorite dispensary, and they’re out of what you need, you have to go someplace else,” said Degé Coutee, the head of a patient group.

The council readily adopted a series of amendments, most of them offered by Koretz and borrowed from West Hollywood, that added more protections for neighborhoods. Dispensaries would be required to have unarmed security guards who would patrol a two-block area, to provide a contact name to police and residents who live within 500 feet, and to deposit cash once a day.

The council also called on the state attorney general to clear up the confusion over whether state law allows the sale of marijuana. Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown issued guidelines on medical marijuana last year, but several court decisions since then have raised questions about his conclusion that properly operated nonprofit dispensaries may be legal.

Brown’s interpretation came up several times as the city attorney’s office, council members and some speakers cited a local radio announcer’s report that the attorney general had said all sales were illegal. A spokesman for Brown said the report was inaccurate and Brown has not changed his position.

The council also tangled over an amendment to put a $100,000 cap on salaries at dispensaries. It was offered by Alarcon, who said the dispensary downstairs from his office was making $12,000 a day.

“That’s a lot of money,” he said. “That’s too much money.”

The council decided to try to find another way to limit salaries, such as applying standards set by United Way.

john.hoeffel@latimes.com

Villaraigosa urges limit on medical marijuana dispensaries
The Los Angeles mayor declines to say what the cap should be, but says it should be a level that can be adequately monitored by city officials and the Police Department.

By John Hoeffel

November 26, 2009

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa urged the City Council on Wednesday to adopt a medical marijuana ordinance that would put a limit on the number of dispensaries.

“We have a right as a city to cap the number,” he said, saying that a cap was “without question” needed to reduce the number to a level that the Police Department and city officials can adequately monitor. “Communities have a right to protect the character of those communities and the security of those neighborhoods.”

The mayor declined to say what he thought the cap should be. “I can tell you that the current number of 800, or whatever, 900, is way beyond what any city should be able to accept,” he said.

The council, which debated its draft ordinance Tuesday, instructed city officials to study a citywide cap between 70 and 200 dispensaries, and separate caps, set by population, for each of the city’s 35 community plan areas or 21 police divisions. A number of cities have caps, but most of them are much smaller than Los Angeles. Oakland, the largest city to impose a cap, allows four.

Villaraigosa, who has to approve the ordinance, said the council needs to write one that does not allow dispensaries to sell marijuana in a way that violates state law.

Council members decided Tuesday not to ban medical marijuana sales, disregarding the advice of the city attorney and the Los Angeles County district attorney, who believe the law makes any sales illegal.

Instead, the council adopted a provision that allows cash contributions for marijuana, which was a compromise that members believe will allow sales to continue and the city attorney’s top aides said would not run counter to state law.

Villaraigosa said he had not reviewed the provision.

Although there is debate about whether the law allows sales, the law is clear that dispensaries cannot make a profit. Villaraigosa said he believed many in the city were violating the requirement. “People are trying to drive a truck through loopholes, and when you have that number it makes it very difficult for us,” he said.

john.hoeffel@latimes.com

Council backs medical marijuana sales, might adopt cap on dispensaries
November 24, 2009 | 6:07 pm

Dispensaries will be allowed to continue selling medical marijuana, the Los Angeles City Council decided today as it considered a draft ordinance that may also cap the number of shops in the city between 70 and 200.

City Atty. Carmen Trutanich and L.A. County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley had pressed the council to explicitly ban the sale of marijuana, saying that the state’s medical marijuana laws do not allow it and citing several recent court decisions to back up their argument.

The contentious issue snarled the council’s efforts to develop an ordinance, with members caught for months between their desire to provide access to marijuana for patients who need it and their reluctance to reject the advice of their own attorney.

But the council stripped out language that would bar sales and replaced it with a provision that would allow “cash contributions, reimbursements and compensations” for actual expenses, as long as they comply with state law. The law has been interpreted differently by medical marijuana advocates and law enforcement officials.

“We have some very elegant and flexible language that will adjust as state law is defined,” council President Eric Garcetti said, explaining how the council decided to finesse the complicated legal issue.

Dispensaries throughout the state sell marijuana, though law enforcement officials, particularly in Southern California, have stepped up their efforts to ban sales. Dispensary operators said a ban would have made it difficult to run their stores, requiring them to find a different, and probably more difficult, way to recover their costs for buying marijuana and maintaining stores.

The council had an extensive discussion on Councilman Jose Huizar’s proposal for a cap and asked city officials to report back on details of how that might work.

Garcetti said he believed the council would adopt a cap, calling it the right approach.

The council is scheduled to take up the ordinance again Dec. 2.

– John Hoeffel at Los Angeles City Hall

L.A. City Council puts off consideration of marijuana ordinance until next week
December 1, 2009 | 4:01 pm

The Los Angeles City Council has pushed off until next Tuesday its continued consideration of a medical marijuana ordinance so that council members can review the latest draft, a 14-page document that the city attorney’s office finished Monday.

The council, under pressure from neighborhood activists and some medical marijuana advocates, has been pressing to adopt an ordinance before the end of the year. It had intended to try to complete work on the ordinance Wednesday.

“I want to make sure the council digests what has been said. To have that discussion tomorrow, I think, would have been a waste of time,” said Ed Reyes, chairman of the council committee that worked on the draft ordinance. He said he hoped the council would complete the draft next week but added, “But I said that the last time.”

The council pushed through numerous contentious issues last week but put off some major decisions, including whether to cap the number of dispensaries in the city and whether to require on-site cultivation.

When the council first started to look into what to do about dispensaries, 4 1/2 years ago, the city had just four. A year later, it had at least 98. Now there are hundreds, despite a moratorium on new dispensaries that was adopted in 2007. Under that ban, 186 registered with the city to be allowed to continue to operate.

– John Hoeffel