Beverly Hills woman carrying suitcases full of marijuana faces federal charges
Jun 21, 2010 Online Issue
Lisette Lee, 28, is charged by the Drug Enforcement Administration after agents find more than 506 pounds of pot in 13 suitcases being offloaded from a chartered plane at an Ohio airport.
June 17, 2010|By My-Thuan Tran, Los Angeles Times
For a woman who claimed to be a Beverly Hills socialite with connections to multimillion-dollar businesses, perhaps traveling with 13 suitcases would not have attracted much attention. She was accompanied with a small entourage, traveled on a charter plane and wore false eyelashes.
But this was her fourth trip from Van Nuys to Columbus, Ohio, and agents from the Drug Enforcement Administration became suspicious that there was something more to 28-year-old Lisette Lee’s trips than an extensive wardrobe.
Source : Los Angeles Times
Tags: LA, Los angeles, marijuana, marijuana bust
The Pot Economy: No One Seems To Know If It Exists
Apr 27, 2010 Online Issue
By Tiffany Revelle, The Daily Journal
Source: Ukiah Daily Journal
California — How much of Mendocino County’s economy marijuana represents was one of the biggest questions at a Saturday forum on “Life After Legalization” at the Saturday Afternoon Club in Ukiah – and no one has any real answers.
The forum, brought south by Humboldt County’s KMUD radio host Anna Hamilton from where it started last month, aimed to answer the myriad questions about what should happen if the voters pass the Tax Cannabis 2010 California ballot initiative.
Tags: LA, legalize marijuana, Los angeles, marijuana, marijuana laws, marijuana legalization
Slowly, States are Lessening Limits on Marijuana
Mar 15, 2010 Online Issue
By William M. Welchand and Donna Leinwand
Source: USA Today
Los Angeles — James Gray once saw himself as a drug warrior, a former federal prosecutor and county judge who sent people to prison for dealing pot and other drug offenses. Gradually, though, he became convinced that the ban on marijuana was making it more accessible to young people, not less.”I ask kids all the time, and they’ll tell you it is easier to get marijuana than a six-pack of beer because that is controlled by the government,” he said, noting that drug dealers don’t ask for IDs or honor minimum age requirements.
So Gray — who spent two decades as a superior court judge in Orange County, Calif., and once ran for Congress as a Republican— switched sides in the war on drugs, becoming an advocate for legalizing marijuana.”Let’s face reality,” he says. “Taxing and regulating marijuana will make it less available to children than it is today.”
Tags: LA, marijuana, marijuana laws
Medical Marijuana Advocates Sue Los Angeles
Mar 8, 2010 Online Issue
By Tony Barboza
Source: Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles, CA — Medical marijuana advocates upped the ante in the legal battle over Los Angeles’ pot dispensaries by suing the city Tuesday, saying the recently adopted ordinance is so restrictive it will cause even law-abiding businesses to shut down.Americans for Safe Access, the nation’s main medical marijuana advocacy nonprofit group, filed the lawsuit along with the Venice Beach Care Center and Pure Life Alternative Wellness Center, two dispensaries that have operated in Los Angeles since 2006 — before the city’s moratorium on dispensaries took effect.
Source : Cannabis News
Tags: LA, marijuana, marijuana for medical use, Medical Marijuana, medicinal marijuana
Existing Laws on Pot Must Be Enforced
Mar 8, 2010 Online Issue
By Carmen Trutanich
Source: Los Angeles Daily News
Los Angeles, CA — In response to civil lawsuits filed against shops illegally selling and distributing marijuana in Los Angeles, the advocacy group Americans for Safe Access recently claimed that the City Attorney’s Office was misreading California law and should dismiss these actions. I respectfully disagree. These lawsuits are based upon the plain language, spirit and intention of these public health and safety laws. More importantly, these actions do not prevent or interfere in any way with a patient’s right to obtain medical marijuana from lawful collectives or other means allowed under existing law.
Source : Cannabis News
Tags: LA, marijuana, marijuana laws
Los Angeles gets tough on medical marijuana shops
Nov 22, 2009 Online Issue
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Past the security man and his pit bull and through a haze of eye-watering smoke, two youths load up a pipe next to a row of shiny 
glass jars with two dozen varieties of marijuana bud displayed like candy.
Hundreds of pot shops have sprung up in the last couple of years across Los Angeles, taking advantage of California’s medical marijuana laws to do a brisk trade in cannabis offerings branded with names like “Big Buds” and “Super Trainwreck”.
Roughly 1,000 marijuana dispensaries now cater to cancer patients and recreational dope smokers alike — but city prosecutors declared war on many of them this month with threats to take action against those selling pot for profit.
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Tags: LA, medical marijuana shops
Prosecutors Attack Proposed L.A. Ordinance to Regulate Marijuana Dispensaries
Nov 22, 2009 Online Issue
Attorneys at the Los Angeles City Attorney’s office and the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office blasted a proposed city ordinance this week for 
running afoul of state laws that prohibit the sale of marijuana.
The Los Angeles City Council postponed a scheduled Wednesday vote on the ordinance, which would have regulated marijuana dispensaries in Los Angeles. Another vote is scheduled for Nov. 24.
The proposed ordinance comes as the medical marijuana dispensaries have increased dramatically in Los Angeles. Also, the city just lifted a two-year moratorium on regulating dispensaries.
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Tags: LA, marijuana dispensaries
