The city of Riverside's medical marijuana initiative will enrich shady criminal pot peddlers at the expense of public safety and kids. Or the June 2 ballot measure will bring much-needed regulation to some businesses that have been operating in a legal gray area for years. It really just depends on whom you ask. Language is everything. Turns out, Riverside residents don't object to legalization in theory. But when confronted with specific policy proposals, voters start getting a bit skittish. [continues 660 words]
Public opinion is rich with ironies and contradictions. We're a people who detest Congress, but love our congressman. We think public education is a catastrophe, but our kids' elementary school is pretty darn good. And depending on how a pollster frames a question, a voter could disapprove of a policy proposal, but approve of the same idea with a different word or two in the very same poll. So it appears to be the case with a Riverside ballot measure to legalize a limited number of medical marijuana dispensaries within city limits. The Riverside Medical Marijuana Restriction and Limitation Act a clever name for an initiative that would in fact loosen restrictions and limitations would allow up to 10 dispensaries to open in certain locations around the city, away from residential neighborhoods, parks and schools. It would also permit home deliveries. [continues 627 words]
The city of San Bernardino needs to reevaluate its priorities. On the agenda for Monday's council meeting were two items that tell the story: discussion over whether to take action against fireworks and allocating $50,000 to a private law firm to tackle marijuana dispensaries. Action on fireworks has been on the council's agenda twice this year and is likely to return in the future. The city currently permits the sale and use of fireworks south of the 210 Freeway. Proponents of a ban, including the Fire Department and Council members Jim Mulvihill, Virginia Marquez and Rikke Van Johnson, argued that fireworks are a dangerous nuisance. [continues 296 words]
In 1996, California voters approved Proposition 215, which authorized the use of marijuana for medical purposes. While the initiative permits the prescribing and use of marijuana, it allows local governments to implement aspects of the law in ways they see fit. For the most part, Inland cities have been quite slow in permitting the establishment of medical marijuana dispensaries. This trend has seen cracks in recent years, with cities like Palm Springs, Desert Hot Springs and Cathedral City authorizing the establishment of medical marijuana dispensaries. [continues 306 words]
San Bernardino city officials late last year seemed set to consider permitting medical marijuana dispensaries. The city spends tens of thousands of dollars a year in legal action against several dispensaries, to date a failed effort more akin to high-cost whack-a-mole than sensible policy. At any given time, the city has about 30 medical marijuana dispensaries operating without permission, with new dispensaries popping up whenever one is shut down. In July, City Attorney Gary Saenz told the City Council of his intention to present a plan "which essentially acknowledges the futility and high cost of attempting to completely eradicate marijuana dispensaries with our current system." [continues 266 words]
The Press-Enterprise continues its relentless push to open up Riverside County to the blessings of the kind of fallout from the cannabis clouds now forming over of Washington and Colorado. In "Poised to legalize pot?" [Editorial, Jan. 7], it declares positively that "the legalization of marijuana is a matter of when not if" in the Inland Empire. The P-E's curious position is that elected representatives' reluctance in San Bernardino and Riverside to approve medical marijuana dispensaries has been a failure to respond to the demands of the people who sent them to the councils to make such decisions. [continues 292 words]
The legalization of marijuana is a matter of when - not if. Four decades of prohibition have been a remarkable display of poorly conceived and badly implemented policy. It seems as though lawmakers in the Inland Empire are starting to awaken to this reality. "I think marijuana dispensaries will be coming to Riverside," says city councilman Mike Gardner. "It also won't surprise me when California follows Washington and Oregon." His fellow councilman Mike Soubirous, who recognizes the medicinal value of marijuana, anticipates a time when marijuana is "regulated like alcohol." [continues 425 words]
The Drive to Legalize Marijuana legalization advocates have submitted at least 18 ballot measures to the California secretary of state in an effort to let voters decide whether to allow recreation use of the drug next year. The Control, Regulate and Tax Adult Use of Marijuana Act -- Activists are trying to unify around this measure, which has the support of Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom and billionaire entrepreneur Sean Parker. The act would allow marijuana use by those 21 and older and would impose a 15 percent tax on retail sales. [continues 1192 words]
Several Inland Cities Have Spent Hundreds of Thousands Fighting Pot Shops, While State Polls Showing Growing Voter Support Polls show California voters back medical and even recreational marijuana. And they may get the chance to legalize it in 2016. But a handful of Inland cities are moving in the opposite direction, spending at least $1.85 million in legal battles to shut down dispensaries. Moreno Valley, Riverside, Jurupa Valley, Upland and Riverside County each reported spending between tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars to enforce their dispensary bans. [continues 1391 words]
For four decades, the "war on drugs" has yielded more harm than good. With a trillion dollars spent, a million drug-related arrests a year and international interdiction efforts to stop people from intoxicating themselves, it is clear that drug prohibition has been a failure. Drug prohibition, as with alcohol prohibition, is yet another showcase of the failure to suppress desires through decree. Inevitably, unintended consequences arise as markets adjust and adapt to legal prohibition, and the market goes underground. The Press-Enterprise recently reported on a few such unintended consequences of drug prohibition. There have been multiple cases of drug lab explosions, a proliferation of unauthorized marijuana growing operations and a need by local governments to ban synthetic analogues of illegal drugs. [continues 425 words]
The Proliferation of Backyard Fields - and Fear Among Residents - Has Officials Raising the Alarm. A boom in illegal backyard marijuana grows rumored to be driven by Mexican drug cartels has sown fear among residents in the unincorporated areas of Riverside County. In Mead Valley, near Perris, a marijuana garden was growing in plain sight less than 50 yards from a playground. High-powered weapons, such as AK-47s, have been found at some of the grows. And there was a marijuana grow at the scene of a fatal shooting in August. [continues 1305 words]
I was amazed to learn that if anything is not specifically permitted by our county ordinances, it is illegal. And since Riverside County hasn't graciously given its residents the right to grow medical marijuana (a right allowed by state law), anyone doing so in their own backyard is a criminal. I hope the county had the foresight to legalize roses, citrus and turf grass, too. Otherwise, there are an awful lot of criminals in Riverside County. The reason Californians voted to decriminalize people growing medical marijuana is because medical marijuana works when prescription drugs don't work as well, or at all. For example, marijuana has kept my multiple sclerosis in remission, without side-effect-laden prescription drugs, for seven years now, after 14 years of problems with prescription drugs. The supervisors should be very certain that they don't hurt their constituents before they adopt such a law. For example, they could regulate large-scale commercial production by setting certain standards, while not regulating patients' backyards and personal cultivation. RIVERSIDE, Letitia E. Pepper [end]
For several months, Riverside County Supervisor Kevin Jeffries has developed an ordinance that would impose criminal penalties for growing marijuana in the unincorporated areas of the county. While Mr. Jeffries and Supervisor Jeff Stone work to revise the ordinance to create exemptions for medical marijuana card holders, one has to wonder if such an ordinance is necessary at all. According to a document outlining the purpose and rationale of the ordinance, "the cultivation of marijuana is currently not a permitted use in any one classification in the county. Section 3.3 of Ordinance No. 348 provides that when a use is not specifically listed as permitted or conditionally permitted in a zone classification, the use is prohibited." [continues 409 words]
Supervisor Kevin Jeffries' ordinance could get a Sept. 9 public hearing, after which it could be enacted Growers of indoor and outdoor marijuana crops in unincorporated parts of Riverside County could be fined $10 to $1,000 under an ordinance before the county Board of Supervisors Tuesday. Those who cultivate 12 or more plants also would face up to six months in jail if the ordinance offered by Supervisor Kevin Jeffries passes as written. Supervisors this week could set a Sept. 9 public hearing on the ordinance, after which they could vote on the proposed law. [continues 450 words]
I was very upset with the column "Time to lead on marijuana legalization" (Opinion, July 5). The column was full of misleading information and pipe dreams of entertainment venues, hotels and resorts that allow unlimited marijuana consumption. The co-author, Justin Hartfield, is listed as the "principal" of the Ghost Group. This "Ghost Group" is a for-profit organization that is promoting mail-order marijuana for you and your children? How about an article from a qualified doctor or toxicologist on the side effects of this mind-altering drug? We need to know the real effects of marijuana before allowing unlimited legalization. James Bronowski Riverside [end]
Sacramento, and cities like Palm Springs and Los Angeles have tax bases that include well-managed medical marijuana dispensaries, but the city of Riverside does not. Why haven't the city of Riverside and its police chief ever tried to work together to regulate medical marijuana dispensaries? They regulate adult businesses, pawn shops, pharmacies (the repositories of lots of valuable, illegal-without-a-prescription drugs) gun stores, smoke shops filled with deadly and valuable tobacco and more - but claim they are unable to regulate medical marijuana dispensaries. [continues 80 words]
Initiative would legalize and regulate a handful of pot dispensaries; city argues it would violate state, federal law Less than a month after medical-marijuana supporters learned they had collected enough signatures to get their measure on Riverside's ballot in 2015, the city has filed a lawsuit to stop the county registrar from putting the issue before voters. Riverside currently bans all marijuana dispensaries through its zoning code. Last year, the state Supreme Court sided with the city in a legal challenge to the ban. [continues 571 words]
A medical marijuana advocate, however, sees the progression of federal legislation as a ray of hope. A longtime Inland activist was hopeful Friday that a House vote on a bill related to medical marijuana would be a step toward overturning local bans on dispensaries, but city leaders said they doubted that the bill, even if it became law, would affect those bans. An amendment to an appropriations bill blocks the federal government from spending money to prohibit the implementation of state laws authorizing medical marijuana. If the Senate passes the bill and the president signs it into law, states like California would be able to continue their medical marijuana programs, without threats from the federal government. [continues 585 words]
What a bittersweet moment to see Riverside having to place the medical marijuana issue on the 2015 ballot. What a waste of money! The entire state of California already passed it several years ago and now two states have made recreational use legal. Why can't those who ban it enforce the state laws we have in place? By allowing legal medical pot to be sold in selective areas, such as commercial warehouse areas that already have surveillance cameras in place, the medical pot businesses can hire extra security with the millions of dollars they will take in via taxation. [continues 91 words]
The national debate over marijuana continues to waft through the city of Riverside. A city initiative allowing medical-marijuana dispensaries has qualified for the ballot in June 2015. Reported the Press-Enterprise, "Riverside, which now bans dispensaries through the zoning code, could prove a battleground for medical marijuana supporters and opponents." The city already was ground zero in earlier skirmishes involving Proposition 215, which 56 percent of voters passed in 1996. It legalized medical marijuana with a doctor's permission. The initiative's language specifically said approval would encourage federal and state governments "to implement a plan to provide for the safe and affordable distribution of marijuana to all patients in medical need of marijuana." [continues 447 words]
The Temecula Valley School District has sued Riverside County and the Sheriff's Department in connection with an ongoing lawsuit by a student who was arrested in an undercover school drug bust. The teen, who is autistic, sued the district in October, almost a year after he was accused of selling a small amount of marijuana to a deputy posing as a student at Chaparral High School. His lawsuit accuses officials of negligence, alleging district officials authorized a drug sting targeting the teen even though they knew he suffers from disabilities and was in special education. [continues 620 words]
If there is a stereotype of someone advocating marijuana legalization, it's not Lanny Swerdlow. The Whitewater resident, who has been an activist for 15 years in both Riverside and Palm Springs talks fast, quotes numbers and studies about cannabis, writes for several publications, and shows absolutely no signs of being laid-back during an interview in his Hemp and Cannabis Foundation office in Riverside. Opened in 2008, it was set up to help provide medical marijuana physician recommendations. When in comes to the green, there is no grey for Swerdlow, 68 . Obtuse, he is not. Police, he said, "are afraid medical marijuana's gonna lead to marijuana legalization - which it will. Colorado and Washington are perfect examples." [continues 1095 words]
President Barack Obama recently remarked that smoking marijuana isn't worse than drinking alcohol, and that he had smoked marijuana as a young man. Having worked in law enforcement for 35 years, I disagree with the president. Many people may deny that there is a link between smoking marijuana and taking harder drugs, but my professional experience convinces me they're wrong. The euphoria produced by marijuana has led legions of young people on to a life of drug abuse. Advocates have achieved incredible success pushing for marijuana's acceptance, and states looking to cash in have jumped on the bandwagon. [continues 79 words]
Reading about the cities lacking tax revenue, I feel like a stranger in a strange land. Growing up in this conservative hotbed, I cannot fathom forbidding businesses - which generate tax revenue - from engaging in legal endeavors. People spent thousands of dollars to place an initiative on the ballot to legalize medical marijuana in California. Voters approved this measure. Despite the initiative's approval, cities are spending lots of money to push out medical marijuana dispensaries. Why don't people look at the millions of dollars in tax revenue this state and others are losing? [continues 54 words]
Media attention this week turned to Colorado, where the nation's first recreational pot shops opened for business. Could it happen here? It's possible some day, but complicated. In California, lawful marijuana use is restricted to authorized medical patients, and signatures are being gathered now for the latest effort to ask state voters to consider Colorado-style access to pot. And while medical marijuana is legal, more than 200 local governments across California and in the Inland area have banned medical marijuana dispensaries, based on a law created in Riverside and upheld in May by the California Supreme Court. [continues 454 words]
DENVER (AP) -The second day of the nation's first fully legal marijuana industry was just a bit less frenzied than the first. Rather than hundred-deep lines outside the limited number of licensed retail shops, the queues held several dozen. Still, there were so many pot shoppers that one retailer asked customers to come back today. Here's a look at the new normal in Colorado: HOW MUCH FOR AN EIGHTH?: Colorado has no statewide pricing structure, and by midafternoon on the first day, one dispensary was charging $70 for one-eighth of an ounce of high-quality pot. Medical marijuana patients, who worried about being priced out of the market, just a day earlier paid as little as $25 for the same amount. [continues 287 words]
Law Enforcement Says It Would Be Naive to Think Colorado Marijuana Users Won't Cross State Lines CHEYENNE - Law enforcement officials in Wyoming counties that border Colorado are preparing for an increase in marijuana arrests given that recreational use of the drug became legal Wednesday in the neighboring state. Carbon County Sheriff Jerry Colson said he will host a training session in February for all law enforcement officers in the county to help them recognize impaired driving from use of marijuana and other drugs, as well as from alcohol. [continues 262 words]
PALM SPRINGS - The three legal medical marijuana dispensaries will now be required to pay the city 10 percent of their proceeds starting Jan. 1 while the illegal operations will be required to pay 15 percent. The Palm Springs City Council on Wednesday approved 4-1 the pot tax rates and a series of other changes including the issuance of a fourth dispensary license. Palm Springs voters on Nov. 5 overwhelmingly approved Measure B - a tax of up to 15 percent on the proceeds of medical marijuana dispensaries. [continues 369 words]
Medical-marijuana supporters trying to qualify a ballot measure allowing a limited number of dispensaries in Riverside have about 180 days to collect signatures. About 12,000 voters must sign their petitions to put it on the ballot in June 2015 the city's next regular election or about 18,000 voters to get a special election called sooner. Proponents are training volunteers and may begin circulating petitions as soon as this weekend, said Jason Thompson, an attorney representing Riverside Safe Access, the group backing the measure. [continues 228 words]
About two dozen students were arrested Thursday morning, Dec. 12, at high schools in Menifee and Perris as part of a semester-long undercover drug investigation in which deputies posed as students, authorities said. Deputies descended on the campuses of Paloma Valley High School and Perris High School during second period to make the arrests, Riverside County sheriff's officials said. Lt. Paul Bennett said deputies identified a total of 25 students, two of whom are adults, suspected of selling drugs. Officers served 22 drug-related arrest warrants on campus Thursday. Three suspects weren't in school Thursday and are still at large, he said. [continues 681 words]
In a first for California, a majority of voters now favors legalization of marijuana, and most want pot regulated like alcohol, according to Field Poll results released Tuesday, Dec. 10. The poll began asking about marijuana decriminalization in 1969. A clear majority of respondents never favored it until now. In 1969, 75 percent of Californians wanted the state's marijuana laws strictly enforced, or even toughened. The nonpartisan poll conducted last week for The Press-Enterprise and other California media subscribers showed 55 percent now favor legalization. The split among those was 47 percent for legalizing it with age and other controls similar to alcohol laws, while 8 percent said it should be legalized so anyone could purchase it. [continues 690 words]
Temecula Valley School District Is Again Named a Defendant After Officials Use a Special Needs Child to Help Nab a Student Dealer The mother of a Temecula middle school student has sued the school district, alleging her 14-year-old son was recruited by an assistant principal to pose as "bait" in an on-campus drug sting, despite her objections. The incident was in December 2012 and the allegations came to light after the mother filed a claim against the district in May. [continues 563 words]
A Proposal From Riverside Safe Access Would Set Rules to Allow Handful of Dispensaries to Legally Open in Riverside A group of medical marijuana supporters is planning a ballot measure that would legalize, regulate and tax a small number of dispensaries in Riverside, which led the fight to ban such facilities. On Wednesday, Oct. 16, Riverside attorney Jason Thompson filed paperwork seeking permission to gather signatures to place the initiative before voters. Thompson represents Riverside Safe Access, a local group of about a dozen authorized users and proponents of medical marijuana. [continues 697 words]
Murrieta officials decided Tuesday, Sept. 17, to keep intact an eight-year ban on medical marijuana dispensaries everywhere in the city, while moving the prohibition to a different section of city law that attorneys say can withstand a legal challenge. The Murrieta City Council's 3-1 vote, with Councilman Harry Ramos dissenting, also extends the prohibition to mobile dispensaries that make deliveries to Murrieta residents who order marijuana. Councilman Randon Lane was absent. The action follows a history of controversy since passage of a statewide initiative in 1996 permitting marijuana to be used for medicinal purposes only. And it comes a few months after a California Supreme Court ruling that said cities didn't have to provide dispensaries within their borders. [continues 364 words]
City leaders in Eastvale, one of the most affluent cities in the Inland area, want to light a fire under landlords whose renters set up pot-growing operations in residential neighborhoods. At least 18 grow houses had been discovered in the city since the beginning of the year, and police officials say other houses are still under investigation. The city already tracks foreclosed homes to make sure they don't become eyesores. One of the ideas now is to keep track of rental properties to make sure landlords are doing appropriate background checks on potential tenants and monitor the homes to make sure they aren't converted into indoor pot farms. [continues 813 words]
With Storefront-Style Dispensaries Shuttered, Riverside Seeks to Stop Pot Delivery Services Arranging home delivery of medical marijuana may have been as easy as phoning for pizza up to now, but Riverside officials want to put a stop to those special deliveries. Last month the California Supreme Court upheld cities' rights to ban storefront marijuana dispensaries, and last week Riverside officials announced that all dispensaries they knew of had shut their doors. But the ban in the city zoning code didn't address mobile dispensaries, and that's where Riverside attorneys say operators of some now-closed brick and mortar locations have put their efforts following the court ruling. [continues 643 words]
The issue of medical marijuana will come up again Tuesday, June 11, when Riverside takes on mobile dispensaries. One of the last remaining medical marijuana storefronts operating in Riverside since the Supreme Court last month upheld the city's zoning ordinance banning them was shut down and boarded up on Friday, June. 7. The Riverside County Patients Association at 11759 Magnolia Ave. had refused until Friday to comply with a temporary restraining order to close its doors, even after the California Supreme Court ruled May 6 in a case that originated in Riverside that local governments could ban dispensaries, said City Attorney Greg Priamos. [continues 256 words]
Court Overrules People It's a sad day for people like me when the state's highest court overrules the will of the people to obtain lawful medical marijuana ("Local governments can ban dispensaries, court rules," May 6). I have a terminal case of liposarcoma. Thank God, I can still go to the drugstore and get my morphine and Xanax. I can't get medical marijuana to help ease my pain and suffering, but I can get hard narcotics. How wrong is that? The court's ruling is an insult to Prop. 215 and SB 420, which made legal having access to medical marijuana in adequate quantities. [continues 65 words]
Without parental permission, an assistant principal recruited the 8th-grader to help catch a fellow student suspected of selling pot, a claim says A Temecula middle school assistant principal recruited a special education student to pose as "bait" in an on-campus drug sting despite his parents' objections, according to a claim for damages filed against the school district this week. "My husband and I were just dumbfounded. How is this OK?" the boy's mother said. "My son has been labeled a snitch." [continues 689 words]
SACRAMENTO - Legislation to impose statewide regulation on the storefront sale of medical marijuana advanced this week, but it's unclear how it would affect local ordinances in Inland Southern California and elsewhere that seek to ban the dispensaries. The California Supreme Court is expected to rule within days in a Riverside case that centers on whether local governments can use zoning and land-use authority to block marijuana dispensaries. Commercial marijuana sales continue to be illegal in the view of the federal government. [continues 599 words]
SAN FRANCISCO The California Supreme Court took issue Tuesday with critics of Riverside's ban on medical marijuana dispensaries, with several justices openly skeptical of claims that local governments lack authority to prohibit the storefront sale of pot. Yet some justices also noted that the state's medical marijuana laws, while never explicitly overriding local ordinances, nevertheless call for consistent and uniform application throughout the state. The Riverside case, coming more than 16 years after California voters decriminalized marijuana for medical purposes, could finally settle a thicket of conflicting court opinions about some local governments' attempts to use zoning and land-use authority to prohibit the storefront sale of medical marijuana. [continues 723 words]
A Riverside medical marijuana collective's status as a suspended corporation will be fixed before the state Supreme Court hears arguments next month over the clinic's lawsuit that local governments overstepped their constitutional bounds by banning storefront dispensaries, its lawyer said. J. David Nick, the attorney for Inland Empire Patient's Health and Wellness Center said Thursday, Jan. 10 that the suspended corporate status was the result of an error on a state tax return, and the center was working "feverishly" with another lawyer to put it back in good standing with the California Secretary of State's office. [continues 144 words]
The California Supreme Court has set Feb. 5 as the date to hear arguments in a Riverside-generated case over whether local governments can ban medical marijuana dispensaries, but a development on Wednesday, Jan. 9 has called into question the legal status of the clinic in the case. City of Riverside v Inland Empire Patient's Health and Wellness Center came to the court from a November 2011 ruling from the Riverside-based Fourth District Court of Appeal, Division Two. [continues 502 words]
California, 17 other states and the District of Columbia have placed their residents in legal jeopardy over the sale and possession of marijuana for medical purposes. Now two of those states - Washington and Colorado - have done the same for recreational use. It's time for Congress to either adopt a more federalist approach to marijuana laws, or to reiterate that the plant is an illegal controlled substance. Washington and Colorado voters approved pot-possession initiatives in last month's elections. But the marijuana story that created the most election buzz this year was the endorsement of Mitt Romney by the creator of the comic strip "Dilbert," Scott Adams. It was a "firing offense," Adams wrote, for President Obama to put "an American citizen in jail for 10 years to life for operating medical marijuana dispensaries in California where it is legal under state law." [continues 462 words]
The Murrieta City Council on Tuesday, Dec. 18, granted its attorney power to move to shut down any medical marijuana dispensaries that open in the city. The new rule would allow the city attorney, after consulting with the police chief and city manager, to seek injunctions to close dispensaries without asking for permission from the council beforehand. The vote was 4-1, with Harry Ramos opposed. The city has barred dispensaries since 2005. Last year, the council passed a temporary moratorium on dispensaries to keep new ones from opening in the event the California Supreme Court rules citywide bans illegal. The moratorium, which has been extended until next September, would allow the city time to draft regulations before any dispensaries could open. [continues 245 words]
Local cities think they can use zoning to ban medical marijuana dispensaries ("Medical marijuana dispensary ban upheld again," Dec.3). But the majority of Californians voted to approve Prop. 215, legalizing medicinal pot, and local politicians should not have the after-the-fact power to ban it. The California Supreme Court also has ruled that medical marijuana patients have the same right to obtain their legal medicine as other patients do to obtain their prescription medication. The same legal principle should hold true of San Bernardino County's indoor-only cultivation policy ("Pot dispensaries banned," March 22, 2011). It should be an unconstitutional amendment of Prop. 215 because the people didn't approve it. The power of the people is stronger than the people in power. Steven Ruddick Angelus Oaks [end]
A Riverside nurse is afraid that if it gets out that she sells medicinal marijuana it will jeopardize her license to practice. She is disabled, and has found that cannabis is the only treatment that has allowed her to continue working and supporting a family. She sold her home-grown cannabis at the Inland Empire Patients Health and Wellness Center's (IEPHWC) farmer's market on Saturday, Dec. 15. The market allows the medicinal cannabis collective's customers to sell their home-grown cannabis directly to each other, and occurs twice per month. [continues 465 words]
To say our state is confused and divided regarding the use of marijuana is certainly an understatement. It may be an exaggeration but appears to me each time I pick up the newspaper the government is deciding to either shut down or allow medical marijuana dispensaries. Each county has its own policy and regardless of state or federal law San Diego, Riverside or Monterey to name but a few have radically different stances on this issue. Thank God I'm not a cancer patient using medical marijuana for the nausea related to chemotherapy; I wouldn't know whether to continue or get a criminal lawyer. [continues 476 words]
Riverside County's Medical Marijuana Ban Is Upheld Regarding Two Dispensaries, and a Colton Storefront Operator Is Found in Contempt In the dispensary-by-dispensary court battles over local government bans on medical marijuana storefronts, an appellate court has ruled that Riverside County can close two outlets. In addition, a San Bernardino County judge has upheld Colton's dispensary ban by finding an owner-operator in contempt for staying open in the face of an order to shut down.. The Tuesday appellate order does not affect cases under consideration by the state Supreme Court over whether local ordinances banning medical marijuana storefronts bans are valid. [continues 538 words]
A judge dissolved a Riverside injunction to shut down a medical marijuana dispensary in the city, agreeing that current law makes local government closures of the clinics unconstitutional. Attorneys representing the city said they will immediately appeal, and the ruling got it wrong on the law. One called the ruling "mind boggling." The decision by Riverside County Superior Court Judge John Vineyard on Wednesday, Aug, 22, affects only The Closet Patient Care dispensary on Elizabeth Street in Riverside. James De Aguilera, who filed the original court action for the clinic, said Vineyard's ruling sets a precedent for other dispensaries in the city that also face an injunction to close them. [continues 551 words]
