The recent raids on medical marijuana dispensaries throughout the county used 21 search warrants to simultaneously shut down eight storefronts, including five in Ocean Beach, Midway, Pacific Beach and La Jolla.
The nondescript buildings offered no indication of what took place behind closed doors, located inconspicuously between residences and businesses.
While supporters of medical marijuana say dispensaries are a safe link from medicine to patient, law enforcement argues that they are a guise for drug deals and an abuse of Proposition 215.
THE RAIDS
Various agencies handed down charges on Thursday, July 6, following a federal grand jury indictment of six individuals. Both federal and local officials cooperated to carry out the effort, including District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis, U.S. Attorney Carol Lam, the Drug Enforcement Administration, San Diego Sheriff’s Office and the San Diego Police Department.
Reports on the number of arrests vary by source, with as many as 19 and as few as 14 coming from the D.A.’s office and police department, respectively. Police said on July 7 that additional suspects are still at large.
Six men were arraigned on Monday, July 10 on felony charges of possessing marijuana for sale and the sale of marijuana, including John Sullivan, the only suspect to face both county and federal charges. All pleaded not guilty. No arraignment dates were disclosed for the other men arrested.
During the raids, detectives seized marijuana plants and food products, a stolen .38 caliber Smith & Wesson handgun, an M-16 assault rifle, cash, and undisclosed amounts of cocaine, mushrooms, hashish and ecstasy, according to an SDPD statement. According to Deputy District Attorney Damon Mosler, some of those items were found at the suspects’ homes.
While not the first attempt at shutting down dispensaries in the county, it appears to be the most significant effort to date. Previous raids in December did not produce any arrests.
However, Mosler cautioned that the tactic will continue if illegal dispensaries remain open.
“I think next week if they are still in business they better watch out,” he said.
Contrasting their hard-line position on dispensaries, local officials were careful not to insinuate that legitimate medical marijuana patients contributed to the criminal activity.
“Our office has no intention of stopping those who are chronically ill with AIDS, glaucoma and cancer from obtaining any legally prescribed drug, including medical marijuana, to help them ease their pain,” Dumanis said in a public statement.
THE DISPENSARIES
Neither the state, county nor city offers suggestions to patients on where to purchase medical marijuana, how to find a qualified doctor, information about growing plants, or how to ingest the drug if a medical condition precludes smoking it.
For this reason, Margaret Dooley, San Diego coordinator for the Drug Policy Alliance, said the message the raids have sent to patients is “hypocritical” and “worrisome.”
“When [District Attorney] Bonnie Dumanis goes on television and says that they don’t want to go after legitimate medical marijuana patients, but that all dispensaries are illegal, well, I would really like her to explain how medical marijuana patients are supposed to get their medicine,” Dooley said.
Though California law does not prohibit medical marijuana dispensaries, the legislation to date has not set out guidelines for them either, creating a void that counties have interpreted differently.
Dion Markgraaff, San Diego Coordinator for Americans for Safe Access (ASA), referenced Los Angeles County as an example of how local politicians have accepted the marketplace model. On May 9, the county’s supervisors voted to regulate dispensing collectives and impose guidelines for their operation and existence, including location, safety protocols and on-site consumption of medication.
“Really, the role of local government is in the zoning laws and the facility itself and to help establish where in the community is proper for these places,” Markgraaff said.
THE LAWS
In 1996, California voters passed Proposition 215 to exempt individuals with serious illnesses from state laws prohibiting possession of marijuana and grant them immunity from arrest. The proposition envisioned eligible patients growing and consuming pot in the privacy of their own homes and did little else in the way of regulations.
Recognizing the need for more uniform state legislation, Senate Bill 420 (SB 420) was passed in 2003 to fill in some of the gaps. The law took effect in 2004 and instituted the Medical Marijuana Program with a statewide voluntary identification card registry to provide law enforcement and doctors with the means of establishing who was a legitimate patient. Counties were given the authority to issue the state cards over cities because the former usually have jurisdiction in matters of public health issues.
The state ID card program was opened to all counties in 2005, but San Diego has yet to join. In a 3-2 vote last November, the San Diego County Board of Supervisors refused to implement the state program. The board followed that decision with a unanimous vote to sue the state on the grounds that federal law trumps the state proposition.
THE LAWSUIT
Since filing in January, San Bernardino and Merced counties have joined San Diego in protesting the program.
One day after the raids on San Diego dispensaries, the Drug Policy Alliance, American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and ASA moved to add patients, providers and doctors to the list of defendants for the suit, which included the state’s health agency and its director. California Attorney General Bill Lockyer, who has previously sided with the state’s ID card program, is representing the defendants.
According to Dooley, the July 7 action is a way of acknowledging that the lawsuit is more than a black and white legal question between county and state. She said she expects medical marijuana patients to bear the brunt of the consequences until the suit is settled.
As for Mosler, he said that faults in the current legislation do not change the county’s current position that dispensaries are illegal.
“It’s not our responsibility to solve [the legal problems],” he said, adding that patients with serious medical illnesses can still go to a physician “rendering real medical care” and buy marijuana plants or get seeds and grow marijuana plants.
He could not, however, be more specific than that.