Pubdate: Tue, 21 Feb 2017
Source: Toronto Sun (CN ON)
Copyright: 2017 Canoe Limited Partnership
Contact: http://www.torontosun.com/letter-to-editor
Website: http://torontosun.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/457
Author: Chris Doucette
Page: 5

EMPLOYEE 'TREATED LIKE A WANTED FUGITIVE'

Sean McNabb claims he wasn't working when his employer's illegal pot
shop - Weed the North - was raided last month, yet he still faces charges.

The 32-year-old accused Toronto Police of overstepping their bounds by
searching his girlfriend's home following a Jan. 18 dispensary raid.
Investigators also put out a warrant for his arrest and nabbed him at
Pearson airport as he returned from a brief trip to the U.S.

"I was treated like a wanted fugitive over a minor possession charge,
even though I had nothing on me," McNabb said recently, adding he also
has a medical marijuana licence.

After executing a search warrant at Weed the North, McNabb claims
police raided his girlfriend's home while she was there with their two
young children - a four-year-old son and two-month-old daughter.

"They violated my family," he said.

McNabb alleged cops seized about $2,000 in cash, Weed the North
apparel, drug paraphernalia and possibly a small amount of weed. He
was charged with pot possession, trafficking and proceeds of crime and
spent a night in jail before being released on bail.

Police dispute McNabb's account of his arrest but refused to discuss
the case because it's before the courts.

Paralegal Raymond Lee Hathaway, who was at McNabb's bail hearing,
believes the charges will eventually be withdrawn.

"He didn't have actual possession of anything at the time of his
arrest and yet he's charged with charges that go hand-in-hand with
having possession," Hathaway said, adding he suspects cops believed
McNabb was the shop's owner.

Hathaway also maintained shutting down dispensaries only serves to
benefit the former politicians and others tied to some of Canada's 38
licensed providers of medical marijuana that stand to make a lot of
money when pot legalized for recreational use.
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