Kangaroo Court Judge In The News

In an earlier post we reported or re-reported news about the farce of a medical marijuana trial that occurred in the Long Beach Superior Court this past December.

Now comes word that the Honorable Judge Charles Sheldon who presided over the trial sent a complimentary letter to the prosecutor after the trial was concluded.  However the end of the trial does not mark the end of a case.  Technically this matter is still pending since sentencing and other post-conviction motions still have to be adjudicated.  Sound messy?? So how to fix this mess?  What any honorable jurist would do-punt.

Yes Judge Sheldon has now recused himself from the rest of this case admitting a huge mistake. As you can expect this will not be the last we hear about this matter and it will be ripe for Appeal.

One cautionary note for the defense the new judge is Judge Comparet-Cassani.  She came into fame for electric wanding a criminal defendant in her courtroom.

For the rest of the story from the Press Telegram:

http://www.presstelegram.com/breakingnews/ci_19720457

Long Beach Update

As many of you are aware of by now the up and down legality of collectives in Long Beach is now on life support.  There is a slight reprieve until January 17, 2012.  So for now the patient that is safe access to medical marijuana in Long Beach breaths is alive- for now.

As their are some fine collectives in Long Beach, here is for hoping that they continue to live.  They are calling for your support at the city council meeting on January 17, 2012.

Stay tuned.

Garden Grove Sends Out Notices

According to a few collective owners, the city of Garden Grove has begun issuing cease and desist notices to those stores who were not approved during the so called "licensing" procedure.  Garden Grove began their licensing procedure last fall.  It called for a retroactive application to June 30, 2011 for stores that were in operation prior to that point.

Fomrer Collective Owners Convicted

Surprise, surprise, surprise.  Joe Grumbine and Joe Byron former collective owners and verified caregivers if there ever were caregivers have been convicted in Long Beach Superior Court.

Personally being very familiar with both Long Beach Courts and the Judge involved here, Judge Shelton, this conviction is hardly a surprise.  Neither was the one sided nature of things which according to the OC Weekly included shielding the jury from the audience, limiting defense witnesses etc.

An appeal is expected.

Here is the full story:

http://www.ocweekly.com/2011-12-22/news/judge-charles-d-sheldon-joe-byron-grumbine-medical-marijuana/

Long Beach Seeks Ban

  The Long Beach City Council will discuss a potential complete ban on medical marijuana collectives during next week’s council meeting.
  Ordinance 5.89, if approved by the City Council, would prohibit “medical marijuana dispensaries and cultivation sites from locating in the city of Long Beach.”

    Earlier this year, the appellate court judge who presided over the Pack v. City of Long Beach trial ruled that Long Beach’s 5.87 ordinance was at least partially against federal law — specifically, its permitting process that created a lottery system was ruled illegal.
       Here is a quote from city officials.

      “Protecting citizens from the secondary impacts and effects associated with medical marijuana and related activities, including, but not limited to, loitering, increased pedestrian and vehicular traffic, increased noise, fraud in obtaining or using medical marijuana identification cards, sales of medical marijuana to minors, drug sales, robbery, burglaries, assaults or other violent crimes.”

Lake Forrest Dispensaries Voluntarily Close

Patients in Lake Forrest

Score another one for the bad guys as attorneys for medical mariuana dispensaries have advised their clients to shut down while the this federal crackdown issue is being address.

Full story from OC Register: http://www.ocregister.com/news/marijuana-321612-federal-medical.html

Long Beach Shutting Down?!

More bad news on the medical marijuana news front as word from the dispensaries is that the city of Long Beach has sent out notices to all dispensaries in Long Beach to close within 21 days. 1 Love one of the coolest collectives in the LBC has sent out emails to their patients notifying them of this latest development. Those email notices apparantly went out on October 13, 2011.

The possibility that Long Beach will shutting down or atempting to shut down its dispensaries is an epic event.  Long Beach had enacted a controversal lottery system that allowed dispensaries to operate in a quasi-legal way. That lottery system was over thrown by a the Appeals court earlier this month.

Feds Go After Media

Wow the feds showing no respect for the 1st Amendment have now announced a coordinated policy of targeting media outlets that sell ads to medical marijuana dispensaries.

See Toke of The Town article:

http://www.tokeofthetown.com/2011/10/feds_to_go_after_newspapers_radio_for_medical_mari.php#more

Fed Crackdown Begins

Last week the fedeal crackdown on California medical marijuna dispensaries was announced.  Over the weekend it began in ernest.

NoHo Caregivers has been shut down. According to reports this was a for profit enterprise that was engaging in illegal marijuana distrubution.

http://www.dailynews.com/news/ci_19068188

Canna Clinics in Torrance and Garden Grove was shut down temporaraily over the weekend.

Garden Grove Update

Despite the upcoming federal crackdown on medical marijuana dispensaries in California, Garden Grove will still press on with its upcoming plan to regulate and allow medical marijuaa dispensaries in Garden Grove.

There was some initial puzzlement over just what Garden Grove would do in light of this federal crackdown. We now have at least an intiial answer.  Full story in OC Registger:

http://articles.ocregister.com/2011-10-08/news/30261483_1_dispensaries-medical-marijuana-susan-emery

The Feds Are Coming

The federal government, yes our federal goverment has announced a crackdown on California's Medical Marijuana dispensaries.  This results in an about face from Presdient Obama's initial hands off policy for medical marijuana dispensaries that are in compliance with their states law's and regulations.

See Los Angeles Times article detailing this policy change:

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-obama-medical-marijuana-20111008,0,5209592.story

Rancho Santa Margarita Bans Dispensaries

Seems like every week another city is misinformed and chooses to deny medical marijuna patitients acess to medical cannabis.  This time the misguided city is Rancho Santa Margarita.  The city council while not enacting an outright ban has chosen to enact a 45 day temporary ban.

While a 45 day ban on medical marijuana dispensaries may not seem so serious on its face the issue is that these 45 day bans usually result in much longer bans which are de facto permanent bans.

So we'll see how this plays out in Rancho Santa Margarita and we wish the medical marijuana community all the luck down there.

Crime Rates Decline Near Dispensaries

Say what! The Rand Corporation in a study just released has found that crime rates near dispensaries are actually less when the dispensaries are open as opposed to when they were forced to shut down.  Naturally law enforcement officials are now playing down these findings.

It should be noted that the Rand Corporation's mission is to improve policy and decision making through research and anyalysis. So far be it for some actual facts to get in the way of opponents to medical marijuana.

Full story: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-0928-marijuana-dispensaries-20110921,0,7776989.story

Drug Deaths Rise

Drug deaths now outnumber car fatalities as a cause of death in the United States.  This rise is fueled by a rise in prescription narcotic overdoses according to recent report by the Los Angeles Times. This increase is of no surprise to the medical marijuana advocates who laud medical marijuana as a safer alternative to many of the same symptoms prescription narcotics aim to cure. Such ailments such as pain, insomnia and stress are just a few of the ailments medical marijuana has arguably been found to be just as effective without the side effects.

Full text of the article: http://articles.latimes.com/2011/sep/17/local/la-me-drugs-epidemic-20110918 

San Diego Collectives Must Close!!

San Diego City Attorney Jan Goldsmith

Hear Ye, Hear Ye the king has spoken. San Diego City Attorney Jan Goldsmith has issued the edict that all medical marijuna collectives operating in the city of San Diego must now close.

This is a curious turn of events as this edict follows the city repealing its own procedures for allowing collectives within the city.   In response to those prosed regulations which  medical marijuana advocates deemed to harsh and restrictive they collected enough votes force the issue to a vote.  Rather than have a public vote on the issue the city withdrew its regulations.

It appears that the city of  is now pushing back against the expansion of medical marijuana collectives in its city limits.  The number of collectives in San Diego is now estimated at 187.

Full story in San Diego Union click here:

http://web.signonsandiego.com/news/2011/sep/03/city-attorney-marijuana-collectives-must-close-imm/?ap

Anaheim Ban Back On

By far the most publicized and significant case in Southern California has been the case of Qualifed Patients Association vs. The City of Anaheim.  Last fall the California Appellate Court sent this case back to the Superior Court for a trial on the legality of Anaheim's ban of medical marijuana.

Well now Judge Chaffee has now spoken.  Judge Chaffee is essentially saying that proposition 215 passed by Califonria voters in 1996 nor the the state law that came seven years later (SB 420)  preempt the autority of cities to regulate medical marijuana business in their respective cites. For the full story  from the Los Angeles Times click on the link below.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-dispensaries-20110820,0,7595286.story?obref=obnetwork

Brea Shuts Down Dispensary

All eyes will now turn to the city of Brea in the latest battle over the regulation of medical marijuana by muncipalites.  The city has prevailed in the first round as Judge Chaffe Chafee who issued injunctions in March orderied all three dispensaries in Brea to close their doors. So far, one other dispensary has closed while the third clinic – which had its injunction stayed – remains open.


The next step in this battle for patients to get safe access to their medicene will be the California Court of Appeal.


So stay tuned.

Brea Shuts Down Dispensary

 Brea Medical Network a medical marijuana dispensary was ordered shut down by Orange County Superior Judge David Chaffey for violating a Premliminary Injunction that he had previously issued on June 27, 2011. http://www.ocregister.com/news/brea-306084-city-dispensary.html

The City of Brea has appointed a receiver to take over  a medical marijuana dispensary and effectively shutting down all but one of the medical marijuana dispensaries operating in the city.

Note Judge Chaffey is the judge who currently is presiding over Costa Mesa's battle to shut down its medical marijuana dispensaries.  Just what standards he is applying in shutting down the Brea dispensaries is something worth watching and paying attention to.  On the surface the Brea ruling seems to in violation of the Quality Patients ruling vs. the city of Anaheim in which he was overruled.  http://login.findlaw.com/scripts/callaw?dest=ca/caapp4th/187/734.html

Here is to hoping the attorneys for Brea Medical Network continue to put up the good fight and and appeal the ruling.

DOJ NO HELP

Such persons who are in the business of cultivating, selling distributing are in violation of the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) ...

Should I have expected anything else from our president?  As usual the Obama administration chooses the most politically expedient position it can find.  And I really don't know what I was thinking or feeling in the last few weeks when I actually thought that the Department of Justice would actually clarify its polices in such a way to help Americans get safe access to medical cannabis.

This new position was supposed to provide some guidance and assistance to patients and those who are in the business of providing medical cannabis. Instead we get a new memo that says that the prosecution of truly sick patients is not a priority but at the same time says those that provide the medicine for the truly sick are still subject to prosecution.

What's left is for Congress to pass real Marijuana legislation that ends federal prohibition of medical marijuana.  In fact and what has been reported by NORML and Toke of The Town, HR 2306 The Ending Federal Prohibition Marijuana Act of 2011 is now pending in Congress.

Whatever happened to states rights?? Stay Tuned...

San Diego County Licenses 1st Dispensary

San Diego County has issued its first license for a medical marijuana dispensary in unincorporated San Diego County today.

The full article can be found at http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2011/jun/27/medical-marijuana-co-op-poised-get-first-county-pe/