Pubdate: Sat, 22 Apr 2017
Source: Globe and Mail (Canada)
Copyright: 2017 The Globe and Mail Company
Contact:  http://www.theglobeandmail.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/168
Author: Mike Hager
Page: S1

DISPENSARIES COUNT DOWN TO LEGALIZATION

A siege-like atmosphere pervades cannabis shops still in operation as
they contend with threats from armed thieves, and the city

After the battering ram smashed through the front door, the officers
quickly rounded up everyone and handcuffed them inside the small shop
at Yonge and Wellesley.

The customers were soon let go, but Neev Tapiero, the owner of
Cannabis As Living Medicine (CALM), Toronto's oldest dispensary, was
held under arrest for three hours and charged with drug trafficking as
part of a one-day crackdown on 43 marijuana dispensaries last May.
Federal drug prosecutors have since stayed or withdrawn charges on 36
of the people nabbed in the citywide sweep while another 10 still face
trial for selling marijuana outside Ottawa's mail-order system for
registered medica lcannabis patients.

It was the third time Mr. Tapiero had been arrested and charged with
trafficking since opening CALM in 1995, which the Ryerson arts
undergrad and two friends began as a tiny operation offering cannabis
to people suffering from HIV, multiple sclerosis, arthritis and
spinal-cord injuries.

In order to avoid further police scrutiny, CALM now operates from a
secret downtown location. New members must be referred by current
clients and forward their medical documents before entering the
premises, as well as agree to a list of 18 rules that include: not
using their cellphone on site, not smoking cannabis within a two-block
radius of the dispensary and visiting only once a day.

"It's in the rules not to tell people where the address is," said Mr.
Tapiero, his bare feet clad in Birkenstocks, when The Globe and Mail
visited CALM on a near-freezing afternoon late last month.

A siege-like atmosphere pervades dispensaries still in operation as
they contend with security threats from groups of armed thieves, as
well as the city's arsenal of tactics, which include sending
threatening letters to the landlords of the shops and restricting the
activities of dispensary owners through bail conditions imposed after
raids.

In and around Kensington Market, the largest dispensary hub in
Toronto, visitors to the handful of remaining shops are buzzed in
through frosted doors and greeted by imposing security guards. Staff
and management deny requests for an interview.

While their counterparts in Vancouver say targeting all illegal pot
shops is a waste of taxpayer money, Toronto police are vowing to
continue enforcing existing federal drug laws on the city's several
dozen remaining dispensaries in the lead-up to legalization, which
could happen as early as next summer.

The federal cannabis legislation unveiled last week left the question
of where cannabis may be sold entirely up to provinces and
municipalities. This could mean, similar to alcohol sales, consumers
across Canada could have vastly different ways of buying recreational
marijuana.

A federal task-force report informing the government's legalization
push recommended against selling the drug in liquor stores, noting
concerns that mixing alcohol and marijuana leads to higher levels of
intoxication. But politicians in British Columbia, Manitoba and
Ontario floated the idea of selling cannabis at such government-run
outlets, and have voiced their displeasure with the scofflaws running
dispensaries in their provinces.

Canada's several hundred dispensaries all operate outside the federal
government's medical marijuana program, which permits about 40
industrial-scale growers to sell dried flowers and bottles of cannabis
oil directly to patients through the mail.

Long-time operators such as Mr. Tapiero say that if Ottawa truly wants
to eliminate as much of the black market as possible through
legalization, dispensaries should be given a "fair kick at the can" to
become legal retailers.

"I want to make a legitimate wholehearted effort to be part of a
legitimate system," he says.

Some dispensary operators aren't taking their chances in case those
currently running afoul of the law are prohibited from joining any
eventual licensed distribution network.

Christine Duhaime, a lawyer and expert on money laundering, said five
Canadian dispensary owners have contacted her since the bill was
unveiled last week asking for help undergoing a "corporate
reinvention," whereby directors and officers in their company would be
replaced by others without criminal records or histories likely to
draw the attention of regulators.

"If there is an issue with your people, you can preserve the assets of
your company, then you reincorporate, take the asset, sell it with new
directors and officers," Ms. Duhaime said, adding that online gambling
companies completed similar overhauls as provinces moved to regulate
that industry. "So you are, in effect, a new group with different
people with the same stores and the same assets.

"You're doing a culture change at the same time - I don't view that as
shady at all - that's in fact a good way to go."

Dana Larsen, an activist who has spent the past two decades
criss-crossing the country campaigning for legalization, says as long
as storefront sales remain illegal for independent entrepreneurs these
dispensary operators will find a way to sell their products.

Mr. Larsen, whose two longstanding dispensaries are trying to become
licensed under the City of Vancouver's new bylaw, said many
dispensaries already offer online shopping - a much cheaper, less
risky option than a bricks-and-mortar location. He said he helped
create Bud Buddy, one of Canada's most prominent online retailers,
more than a decade ago, but no longer has any affiliation to the site
despite Web registration details linking to his family.

The only way to eliminate the majority of the black market, he
contends, is to sell legal cannabis for as little as $3 a gram,
roughly a third of what people are paying now on the illegal market
and many of the licensed medical-marijuana growers.

Don Briere, who runs Weeds Glass and Gifts, one of Canada's biggest
chains of illegal dispensaries, said he is close to reopening seven of
his franchises shut down in Toronto after either raids or pressure on
landlords. He said he is intent on filing a Charter challenge
protesting the police action against his stores, which he figures will
give him an injunction to operate Weeds freely in the city while the
case winds its way through the courts.

Kirk Tousaw, a B.C.-based lawyer who won a Federal Court case last
year that overhauled Ottawa's medical-marijuana rules, said one of his
Toronto dispensary clients - Phytos Apothecary and Wellness Centre -
has already filed a Charter challenge and, if it wants to, could
likely receive a court injunction allowing it to stay open because
Canada's current mail-order medical-marijuana system does not provide
reasonable access to pot.

Mr. Tousaw predicts that the more restrictive a province's approach to
selling alcohol, the more restrictive the eventual legal sale of
cannabis will be.

"The alcohol industry is still battling stupid rules 100 years after
their prohibition ended," he said.

"So I'd imagine we'll be battling stupid rules for some time to come
in the cannabis sector, but we should learn from some of these mistakes.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Matt