Medical marijuana lab says it was raided by DEA

[Newsjock]

Source: Associated Press

DENVER (AP) -- A lab that tests medical marijuana for dispensaries and patients said Thursday it was raided by federal drug agents and ordered to turn over patient records.

Full Spectrum Laboratories president Bob Winnicki said Drug Enforcement Administration agents showed up at his facility in Denver on Wednesday when he was at the Capitol for a hearing on proposed medical marijuana regulations.

The lab provided The Associated Press with a copy of a DEA subpoena requesting that it turn over customer and patient records over a six month period through Wednesday.

Winnicki, who had applied for a DEA license to dispense controlled substances, said he wasn't charged with a crime but agents seized about $10,000 worth of marijuana.

... The Obama administration has said it won't target medical marijuana operations in states that allow them as long as they're complying with state laws and aren't fronts for drug traffickers. Colorado is one of 14 states to allow people to use marijuana to treat various medical conditions.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2010/01/28/national/a175420S42.DTL&tsp=1

[tridim]

1. Well, actually Holder said the feds wont target "MMJ dispensaries"..

Not "MMJ Operations".

Even so, this is obviously wrong. The Feds have gone rogue, and that is fucking scary.

[slay]

42. Yes. This is VERY wrong.

The DEA is STACKED to the brim with people who vote Republican. It's IMO the worst law enforcement agency in the history of EVER and should be abolished. Hey Obama - I think I just found a way to save the country a shit ton of money! Abolish the DEA and legalize and tax marijuana. Everyone wins - except the DEA assholes who deserve to rot in hell for stopping sick people from smoking pot.

[Xicano]

51. +1 Abolish the Nixon creation, abolish the DEA.

An extra judicial total waste of money.

[tularetom]

2. I've noticed that what the Administration says and what actually happens

are sometimes very far apart.

I think a lot of these bureaucrats don't believe they actually work for the executive branch of the government.

I don't know who the fuck they think they work for however.

Somebody in the WH needs to whack a few peepees.

[rcrush]

4. Well we know the CIA pretty much does what it wants. I guess that goes for the DEA to.

[Lost4words]

45. And ICE as well. Laws! Laws? we dont need to worry bout no stinking laws!

[nosmokes]

3. No hope for dope?

[tridim]

5. Another article about the raid here.. Nobody was arrested or charged.

http://blogs.westword.com/latestword/2010/01/medical_marijuana_bill_about_d.php

[RainDog]

8. sounds like the DEA was trying to intimidate the witness/company

...who just so happened to be testifying as the raid occurred?!?!

this is more bullshit. they were trying to comply with federal and state regulations.

Prohibition is over for pot.

We're still a long way from working out the details and law, but my spidey-sense tells me we're beyond the tipping point.

[tridim]

10. Yep, this was all about intimidation, which is illegal.

The lab should sue the DEA. They'll win.

[Posteritatis]

12. Of course, they might arrest the patients now that they have the records. (nt)

[alfredo]

15. The raid may not be targeting the lab. There could be a doctor that is

passing out prescriptions without just cause, like some doctors do with pain killers.

[uncle ray]

24. the lab doesn't have doctors or patients for that matter.

they are a testing lab, and nothing else. they offer their services to dispensaries, growers, or even a patient who wants his MJ tested. these people are trying to ensure that the use of medical marijauna is safe for patients. they are a legal business that happens to have some large quantities of marijuana pass through their doors as they will "certify" an entire crop for a grower. it is far more than a few stoners sitting around test smoking a joint and saying "yep, that's some good shit!" a big problem for them, is the nature of their business and the restrictive colorado law, though providing a beneficial service legitimizing the marijuana business, the law doesn't allow them to handle the MJ without actually being a "caregiver' to patients. colorado law states that there may be a maximum of 6 total plants per patient, and at most 3 of those may be in flowering, and you may posess two ounces of usable cannabis. these limits are to be divied up between the patient and any caregiver they may have, there is no provision in the law for a business such as this one.

[alfredo]

32. Even though they may not be covered by the law (an oversight) they still may

not be the focus of the raid. It could be much easier to get info on a specific doctor through this route than going directly to the records of that doctor. This testing firm didn't have a legal leg to stand on if it attempted to protect its data.

[Occulus]

29. IOW, a bunch of thugs ripped them off.

If nobody was arrested or even charged, that's how I see it, anyway.

[Ignis]

48. I know another group that uses force and theft for intimidation.

It's called the Mafia.

[izquierdista]

6. Let me guess

The local head of the DEA who authorized this raid is a Bush holdover. Now, if I had the same divination skills for lottery numbers....

[Flaneur]

9. And Obama just nominated another DEA Bush holdover to head the agency.

Michele Leonhart, acting administrator. Defender of infamous lying DEA snitch Andrew Chambers, defender of medical marijuana raids as SAC in Los Angeles, defender of the US government monopoly on growing marijuana for legitimate scientific research. Yay!

[harkadog]

11. Dont bet on the lottery

Robert Castillio is head of the DEA's Denver office and was promoted to the executive ranks by Clinton. He joined under Carter. http://www.advocatescouncil.us/RCastillo.htm

[izquierdista]

13. Which one of you two is right?

:shrug:

[harkadog]

20. Both

Castillio is the head of the Denver office which led the raid and Leonhart is head of the DEA in DC.

[John Q. Citizen]

23. More people were arrested under Clinton than under Reagan. Lots of Dem drug warriors out there..

There is no monopoly on drug warriors by party. Though I would guess that the Greens and the Libertarians are under represented on the enforcement side when compared to the Dems and the Repos.

[Romulox]

36. Clinton's DEA put more people away for pot than Reagan and Poppy Bush combined.

Joe Biden sponsored the legislation that put Tommy Chong in jail for selling bongs on the internet. :hi:

[rgbecker]

7. No doubt just looking for terrorists under the Patriot act....Move along, nothing here.

Probably didn't have time to get the FISA warrants yet.......

[boppers]

14. $10,000 worth of marijuana, but they weren't growers, or a dispenserary?

Patient records? If they weren't a dispensary, why would they have patients?

"Winnicki said his operation isn't a dispensary"...

Sounds like a case of operating an unlicensed dispensary under false pretenses of being a "testing lab", or possibly related to a much larger illegal grow, with the lab laundering the product.

[RainDog]

16. then why would they go to the trouble to attract federal attention?

it makes no sense to apply for approval from fed labs if they were trying to run a front. makes absolutely no sense.

no way would they bring down attention on themselves in that way.

in addition, the raid occurred as one of the employees was testifying about medmj standards.

no, the raid was an attempt to either intimidate or to make the witness look bad by having people make up ideas like yours.

[Robb]

17. Actually it makes plenty of sense.

Hiding in plain sight is nothing new. :shrug:

[RainDog]

18. so, the mafia wants to traffick in pot so it calls a federal agency to tell them?

please.

[boppers]

33. If they applied, they got attention to be on the up-and-up to get approved.

If they were already operating under the radar, and then applied to get a permit, but did *not* yet have a permit, that's a tad like applying for any other business license after already running the business semi-legally (illegally?)...

Lets say this was a different, federally regulated, product. Suppose they were selling machine guns. They decided to apply for a legal permit to do so, but were *already in the business* of selling machine guns. By asking for a permit, they would be investigated, and likely discovered to have been operating without a permit.

Why would they do such a thing? Perhaps they realized that operating with a permit, or even operating with a permit *application*, was more legally defensible than operating without a permit.

[RainDog]

44. they weren't required to file for approval from the federal govt

but did anyway.

did you even read the article?

[boppers]

47. They filed to get access to baseline standards plants, to accurately characterize their strains.

Yes, I read the article.

[RainDog]

49. then it should be clear that your scenarios do not match the reality of the situation

here, quoted from the first article:

A lab that tests medical marijuana for dispensaries and patients was raided on Thurs.

Drug Enforcement Administration agents showed up at facility in Denver on Wednesday when was at the Capitol for a hearing on proposed medical marijuana regulations.

Winnicki , who had applied for a DEA license to dispense controlled substances, said he wasn't charged with a crime...

...the agency investigates facilities that apply for DEA licenses.

..."We don't target these operations unless they come up in the normal course of our operations," he said of medical marijuana operations. (b/c they applied for a license, in other words)

Winnicki said his operation isn't a dispensary but the only lab of its kind in Colorado. He tests marijuana for mold, fungus and pesticides and tests the effectiveness of different strains of marijuana for treating various ailments for dispensaries and patients.

...He said he uses scientific instruments and applied for a DEA license back in October to use standards needed to test the marijuana. He said he didn't hear from the DEA until Wednesday.

(so maybe the DEA felt like they had to go to the lab guy's place b/c they had never responded to his request and there he was in DC? Maybe b/c they hadn't done their job?

...He said the marijuana that was seized included a rare strain...

(maybe the rare strain is identified with a particular group the DEA wants to find out about...for whatever reason. maybe the DEA has friends at Eli Lilly. lol. however, the timing leads me to believe the raid has to do with their failure to deal with the lab's request, followed by the guy showing up in DC... occam's razor.)

THEN, there's another link in this thread, here:
http://blogs.westword.com/latestword/2010/01/medical_marijuana_bill_about_d.php

which is about the same lab and the same raid:

In October, the Obama administration issued a memo confirming that its Justice Department wouldn't actively pursue prosecution of medical marijuana businesses in states that had legalized the process. As such, Full Spectrum should have been in the clear -- but in an attempt to preclude any problems, the lab formally applied for analytical lab licensure through the DEA.

"We didn't need to do that, but we thought it was the right thing to do," Aldworth says. "We've worked really hard to make sure that everything we're doing is above board. We've tried to get the best advice from the smartest people about all parts of our business, and we're trying to follow their advice as well as we can. And we're trying to be engaged in the community. That's the reason we were at the Capitol. We think it's important that people know what we're doing and why we're doing it."

so, I read this information and think it makes the most sense to assume this lab was not a grow operation trying to "hide in plain sight" etc. etc. This is a case of the DEA not doing a good job, not respecting the laws of the community, not following the terms that Obama laid out to not target medicinal operations...

anyway, my take, based on info available. ymmv, and seemingly does.

edit to add one last link:

http://www.tokeofthetown.com/2010/01/marijuana_advocates_condemn_federal_raid_of.php

Dispensaries deliver small samples (about 500 milligrams) of marijuana they get from growers to Full Spectrum, which uses high-performance liquid chromatography to determine their potency. The tests reveal amounts of THC and other cannabinoids, the active ingredients of cannabis.

Aldworth said lab employees have no idea why DEA agents raided the lab. She said the lab is legally designated as a caregiver for several medical marijuana patients in Colorado.

Last year U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder announced a new Justice Department policy that federal authorities wouldn't seek to arrest people who are in compliance with their state's medical marijuana laws.

[tridim]

19. It is a laboratory that tests MMJ for chemical properties.

They don't sell MMJ.

The "records" are growers and patients who are having their medicine tested at the lab.

[boppers]

38. Why "customer and patient" records, then?

Wouldn't they all simply be "customers"?

[tridim]

39. Probably because the media is lazy.

[Occulus]

30. Consider who sets the street value

I've heard of cases in which only seeds were found and each seed was considered a potential pound of marijuana. You can imagine the potential sentence.

I always take police "street value" numbers with an entire salt quarry, because they themselves are the ones who by their own actions inflate or deflate the street value. If a pot dealer ever says "they're after everyone right now", you can grab your ATM card and go to the machine, because you're going to need more money than you were prepared to spend. A side bonus for the police is the proceeds they get from auctioning off the stuff they steal seize from you when they do their raids. Those proceeds fund things like tasers and acoustic and microwave crowd "control" weaponry.

One reason they are so against any form of marijuana legalization is that more people would end up using pot if it were legal than the more dangerous, actually addictive drugs (coke, heroin, meth, crack, etc.). Legalizing pot would drive people to it and away from harder drugs, which would further dry up their revenue stream (funding and asset seizures) beyond that of the legalization itself.

[boppers]

31. Who set the value, in this case?

"Winnicki, who had applied for a DEA license to dispense controlled substances, said he wasn't charged with a crime but agents seized about $10,000 worth of marijuana."

It's not explicit, but it sounds like it wasn't the police, but Winnicki, setting the price. Of course, I can't help but wonder what motivations also come into play for dispensaries to also set "street values" high, or low, for various reasons.

[Romulox]

34. What a surprise to see you defend the mindless War on Drugs.

:hi:

[boppers]

40. Yes, because enforcing medical standards is EVIL!

Johnson & Johnson, Bayer, GlaxoSmithKline, Pfizer, they should *all* be allowed to operate whatever kind of businesses they want, without the government regulating them. Medical substances should be free of having any licenses, permits, standards, and anything less than that is a mindless War on Drugs!

Yeahbutno.

If a company is going to be part of the medical products industry, they need to be regulated as part of the medical industry.

[Flaneur]

50. Seems like this operation was asking to be regulated.

Instead, they got raided. Way to enforce medical standards, DEA.

[truthisfreedom]

21. Maybe they were out of pot?

Just sayin'.

[slay]

43. lol

my friend has a cop pull him over one night, take his weed, and say he was lucky as he let my buddy go. it happens. but in this case, the DEA are just being fucking assholes - the law enforcement arm of the Alcohol, Tobacco, and Pharmaceutical lobbies. :puke:

[SlingBlade]

22. Obama Adminitrsation DEA Nazis

Now, How bout this fucking, 'Change We Can Believe In" Mr. Obama ?
Looks like the same old Bush RePuke kinda shit going on here.

Either clean this fucking den of Fascist assholes out or go fucking impeach yourself

ASSHOLE !

[Dogmudgeon]

25. Register Guns, Not Patients!

(That ought to hit a few buttons.)

--d!

[DeSwiss]

26. K&R

- I suppose this won't make it to the list of Obama accomplishments......

[NICO9000]

27. Wow - $10K worth of weed!

What is that - about a couple of pounds maybe? How much did this exercise in terror cost the taxpayers?

Fuck this shit - just a bunch of fascist thugs ruining a lot more lives than pot ever could.

[boppers]

46. Dude, where are you buying your weed?

That's about 62 pounds worth by my usual numbers. I realize prices vary, but who pays $5,000 a pound?

[Flaneur]

52. $3,000 a pound for kind bud is a typical price.

What are you buying, Mexican dirt weed? On the Mexican side of the Rio Grande? $160 or so a pound? Good lord, an ounce of kind bud goes for $400 or so.

[TexasObserver]

28. One year into the Obama administration and this stuff is still going on.

What an abuse of federal resources. The president wants to cut the budget. Cut DEA's funding by 90%, and tell them "these are the drugs we want you to concentrate on: meth, crack, cocaine, and those in Rush Limbaugh's personal possession."

[Romulox]

35. More "heated rhetoric" from the Obama admin, another broken promise.

And AG Holder is a long time anti-marijuana advocate. :hi:

[DiverDave]

37. More bullshit from

my "change" prez...

[defendandprotect]

41. Right wing corruption of government and agencies -- on and on -- !!