California’s Biggest Medical Marijuana Dispensary Could be Closed – Despite Breaking No Laws
On July 10th, under the direction of Northern California US Attorney Melinda Haag, DEA agents taped a notice to the doors of Harborside Health Center’s facilities in San Jose and Oakland alleging the dispensaries were “operating in violation of federal law” and announcing the state had filed an action for civil forfeiture against them. A copy of Haag’s defense for the raid was obtained by the San Francisco Chronicle and as far as I can make out from the statement, Harborside’s only crime is its size and proximity to schools. Basically, because Harborside’s so large, Haag believes it’s only a matter of time before they must do something illegal.
Seriously? What kind of backward logic is that exactly? On June 7th, Attorney General Eric Holder told Congress he would only enforce federal action against dispensaries that were in direct violation of state law. Meaning – a dispensary had to be actually breaking the law to get raided. In Haag’s own statement she admits this isn’t the case at Harborside – she only believes that due to their size and the high number of patients in their care, a violation is somehow inevitable.
Am I the only one pissed off about this? How about we all take a stand and demand that AG Holder keep his promises? Either that – or what works against one works against all. Let’s arrest every person that buys a hand gun legally because some day they may decide to use it in a moment of passion and murder someone. Let’s arrest every person infected with HIV because someday they may have unprotected sex with a partner and put them at risk for contracting the virus. Or how about this – let’s arrest every person that gets drunk in a bar, because who knows – one day they may decide to get drunk and get behind the wheel.
Does all of that sound crazy? It should – because none of that would ever happen. So why is it happening to innocent people running a legally operated dispensary?
Harborside’s vowed to fight these illegal federal actions, and the good news is that there’s a couple ways you can take action and voice your support. Visit the Courage Campaign and sign the petition urging AG Holder to keep his word and end illegal raids. Or even better – take your concerns to the President himself: call President Obama’s Bay Area campaign headquarters at 510-863-9632 and respectfully (we’re potheads here, not angry alcoholics) request that he reprimand Haag for her blatant overreach of the law.
Either that, or it’s time to start locking up everyone who owns a dog because hey, one day they just might start operating a dog fighting ring in their backyards, because that makes perfect sense.