Author Steve Elliott ~alapoet~
| WeedMaps |
| Online dispensary locator WeedMaps shows a plethora of medical marijuana delivery services available in Los Angeles |
A growing trend in California’s billion-dollar medical marijuana industry — which has recently come under attack from the federal government — is the presence of delivery-only dispensaries to deal with an legal environment that is increasingly precarious for storefronts.
Threats of property forfeiture against landlords, lawsuits and raids have made brick-and-mortor locations less attractive to the collectives, reports David Downs at the San Francisco Chronicle.
“When you have a storefront, you’re on the map,” said Oakland defense attorney William G. Panzer, who represents recently raided Northstone Organics, a delivery service based in Ukiah, Mendocino County in the heart of the Emerald Triangle. “You don’t have those issues with a delivery service. No one’s going to know about it.”
| Cafe Press |
| Why, thank you, officer, and Merry Christmas. |
Deputies returned two pounds of seized cannabis to a California dispensary on Friday after a court ruled that the marijuana had been improperly confiscated.
The Sacramento County Sheriff’s Department confiscated two pounds of marijuana from Common Roots Collective during a shakedown, I mean “inspection, on December 1. But the dispensary’s lawyer argued that the deputies violated federal law, since authorities, including code enforcement officers, had entered the property on an inspection order and not a search warrant, reports CBS 13.
The court ruled in favor of the dispensary three weeks later.
“The police are being kind enough to return it to us before Christmas,” said attorney John Fuery.
| Sarah Rice/SFGate |
| Lynnette Shaw ran Marin Alliance for Medical Marijuana — the first in the state to be licensed, back in 1997. Now the Feds have shut it down. |
By Jack Rikess
Toke of the Town
Northern California Correspondent
It’s really easy these days to be negative about cannabis. The Feds are waving their guns around like old-time Western town bullies. Playing with the tin-horns and the dandy Easterners alike, making them dance to a tune that we thought was long gone.
They sit outside protecting the saloon, leaning back in their chairs, keeping the weak and poor in the sight of their weapons, not necessarily to shoot them, just scare ’em a little.
In the Golden State, where it must seem that progress burns bright, I mean, how can you complain when you can have your medicine, including edibles and anything else that’s on the menu delivered right to your door? What in the world could those spoiled Californians have to gripe about?
How about the closing of Lynnette Shaw’s Marin Alliance for Medical Marijuana dispensary in Fairfax? As most know by now, Lynnette’s dispensary was the first to be licensed in California back in ’97. The closure of this landmark is incredibly distressing.
| CowHen.net |
| California Attorney General Kamala Harris: “Without a substantive change to existing law, these irreconcilable interpretations of the law, and the resulting uncertainty for law enforcement and seriously ill patients, will persist” |
California Attorney General Kamala Harris on Wednesday urged state lawmakers to get serious about clarifying the state’s 15-year-old medical marijuana law. According to Harris, gray areas have left law enforcement and patients in a state of perpetual uncertainty.
The attorney general, who was elected with widespread backing from the state’s medical marijuana industry (OK, it wasn’t exactly a ringing endorsement, it was more a case of “Anybody But Cooley“), has been under pressure to defend the state’s medicinal cannabis law since October, when the state’s four U.S. Attorneys announced a statewide crackdown on dispensaries.
Dozens of the shops — which the federal prosecutors claimed were fronts for public drug dealing — have since closed, reports Lisa Leff at the Associated Press.
| The Weedly News |
| Joe Grumbine, above, and Joe Byron were found guilty of all counts Wednesday by a jury in Long Beach, California |
Long Beach Kangaroo Court Yields Insane Jury Verdict
After what was reportedly one of the worst, most farcical and biased trials in history, led by an octogenarian judge who openly and repeatedly expressed his bias against medical marijuana — at one point even ordering a screen to be erected between the jurors and courtroom visitors — Joe Grumbine and Joe Byron, who operated Long Beach dispensaries, were found guilty Wednesday of all 13 counts.
The two are scheduled to return to Long Beach Superior Court on January 11 for sentencing. Superior Court Judge Charles Sheldon allowed the men to remain out on bail over the holidays.
Grumbine and Byron were raided and arrested two years ago this month, reports Nick Schou at OC Weekly, resulting in a long legal nightmare which culminated in today’s convictions. The jury found both men guilty of selling marijuana, tax evasion, and electricity theft.
The charges, according to supporters of the two Joes, are nothing more than an attack by overzealous police and prosecutors in violation of California’s medical marijuana law, reports Tracy Manzer at the Long Beach Press Telegram.
| NL Coffeeshop & Cannabis Nieuws |
In a maddening show of spineless backsliding after 35 years of tolerance, the conservative government of the Netherlands seems hellbent on turning the clock back to a darker time in Dutch history — a time when the cannabis trade was driven underground and people had to access the black market for marijuana.
And, of course, in our interconnected world, such a failure of leadership would reverberate internationally, according to expert observers.
“If tolerance ends or gets limited in the Netherlands, then politicians all over the world will say things like ‘Tolerance failed in Holland,’ and use that as an excuse to enforce their anti-cannabis propaganda, opinions and laws,” well-known Dutch cannabis blogger Peter Lunk told Toke of the Town.
| Safe Access YouTube Channel |
| Here’s the iPad version. The ASA Advocacy App is available for iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. Soon to come will be the Android version. |
Medical marijuana patient advocates now have better access to tools for getting educated and taking action. Grassroots advocacy group Americans for Safe Access (ASA) on Wednesday launched a first-of-its-kind, free iPhone application that serves the medical marijuana community.
According to ASA, the app will make it easier for advocates to get educated and take political action. The ASA Advocate App gives users access to all the organization’s projects and programs.
| From Our Corner |
| With 241,153 valid signatures required, it appears very likely marijuana legalization measure I-502 will make the ballot with 355,000 signatures reportedly in the can. |
Sponsors of a ballot initiative which would legalize marijuana in Washington state say they have enough signatures — more than 355,000 — to make the ballot in November 2012.
New Approach Washington, sponsors of Initiative 502, said they have made plans to bring in petitions on 10 a.m. on December 29 at the state Elections Division office at 520 Union Sreet near the State Capitol in Olympia, reports David Ammons at From Our Corner, the Washington Secretary of State’s website.
I-502 would authorize the state Liquor Control Board to regulate and tax cannabis for those 21 and older. Licensed production, limited possession, delivery, distribution and sale of marijuana in accordance with the provisions of the law would be allowed.