California Marijuana Dispensary Worker Gets 3 Years In Prison

Photo: Michael Fagans/Bakersfield.com

Israel Cavazos, manager of Nature’s Medicinal Co-Op in Bakersfield, California, measures bags of marijuana for a patient one day after the dispensary was raided again in 2009. Cavazos has been sentenced to 42 months in federal prison, and his co-worker Jonathan Chapman on Monday got 37 months.

​A medical marijuana dispensary employee in Bakersfield, California has been sentenced to more than three years in federal prison for “conspiring to distribute and possess with intent to distribute marijuana.”

Jonathan Michael Chapman, 32, of Bakersfield, was sentenced to 37 months in prison, reports TurnTo23.com. The barbaric sentence was handed down Monday by U.S. District Judge Anthony W. Ishii and announced by U.S. Attorney Benjamin B. Wagner.

Chapman admitted that between 2005 and July 2007, he worked at Nature’s Medicinal Co-op, a Bakersfield business engaged in distributing marijuana. In 2007, federal agents from the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) seized what they claimed was more than 85 kilograms (187 pounds) of marijuana from the dispensary.

Photo: Felix Adamo/Bakersfield.com

Medical marijuana patient Rex Palmer showed up at Nature’s Medicinal Co-Op but couldn’t get his medicine because of the raid.

​Prosecutors claim Nature’s Medicinal Co-Op logged $9.6 million in sales from January 2006 to September 2006, reports The Associated Press.

Five other Bakersfield defendants have already been sentenced after pleading guilty:

• Timothy Glenn Doolittle, 42, was sentenced to 2.5 years in prison and five years of supervised release

• Jennifer Diane Brown, 37, was sentenced to one year in prison and three years of supervised release

• John Shanks, 62, was sentenced to 20 months in prison and three years of supervised release

• Israel Cavazos, 38, was sentenced to 42 months in prison and three years of supervised release; and

• John Wayne Wyatt, 31, was sentenced to 2.5 years in prison and three years of supervised release.

Two other defendants are still awaiting trial. Assistant U.S. Attorney Kathleen A. Servatius is prosecuting the case.

The case comes as the result of a witch-hunt, I mean investigation, by the DEA, the Internal Revenue Service, the Kern County Sheriff’s Department, the Bakersfield Police Department, and the Southern Tri-County High Intensity Drug Task Force, all of which spent thousands of taxpayer dollars to lock up citizens for helping sick people.

- http://www.tokeofthetown.com

Feds Forced To Give Back $14K Seized From Pot Dispensary

Graphic: Hollywood Goodfella

​Federal authorities agreed last week to give back nearly half of the $29,350 in cash seized from a man who represents a man who operates a medical marijuana dispensary in San Marcos, California.

The decision to return $14,383 — about 49 percent of the money seized — was part of a settlement that stems from a December incident in which Ron Chang, the man behind the collective, was stopped by federal agents while hauling marijuana on Pala Road, reports Teri Figueroa of the North County Times.

Law enforcement claims that smugglers use the well-traveled back road to avoid the border checkpoint near Temecula on Interstate 15.

Chang’s attempt to set up a dispensary caused a stir in conservative San Marcos, which enacted rules preventing any such businesses from setting up shop in the city of about 84,000 residents.

His first dispensary, Medical Marijuana Supply Collective, was shut down by a Vista-based judge’s order back in October. A second shop, Club One Collective, was then set up in the same location, and in April was ordered to close by the same judge.

Both times, the city of San Marcos sued in state court to shut down the dispensaries.

The property has now been surrendered to the landlord, and there are no plans to reopen the dispensaries, according to Club One’s attorney, Nathan Shaman.

“For all intents and purposes, Club One has ceased to function,” said Shaman, who represented the shop in the cases brought by San Marcos.

He also represented the dispensary in the federal battle over the confiscated cash.

The government gave back more of the ash than it typically does in such seizure cases, admitted Assistant U.S. Attorney Bruce Smith, who represented the federal government in the case of the seized cash.

“I reviewed it and looked at the events and the quality of the evidence and decided that this was the best thing to do,” Smith said, admitting that the disparity between state and federal laws regarding medical marijuana can create “a real conundrum.”

Club One and some of the medical marijuana patients it served from Oceanside to Temecula found themselves the subjects of raids in April. Federal agents seized computers, corporate records and documents, according to Shaman.

The April raids came just four months after Chang’s run-in with federal agents after he got stopped and his cash was seized.

Details of that December encounter are revealed in a federal complaint seeking to permanently seize the cash found in the truck. That complaint — filed on April 15, two weeks before the raids — says that on December 21, 2010, a U.S. Border Patrol agent pulled Chang over as he drove a truck north on Pala Road.

About 9:40 a.m. on that day, a veteran Border Patrol agent in a marked car spotted a man in a red sweatshirt, driving a rented box-truck with Indiana license plates. The agent claimed he saw the truck driver shift to look into his rearview mirror at the marked Border Patrol car.

According to court documents, the agent claimed that prompted him to follow the truck as it headed north on Pala Road into Temecula.

Once that truck merged onto I-15, the agent flipped on his lights and siren and pulled it over. Chang was the driver, and authorities said he was headed to drop off items at his warehouse business in Murrieta.

Agents claim Chang consented to a search of his truck. Agents claim the search turned up $29,350 cash in a duffel bahg, 1.22 pounds of marijuana, and growing equipment.

Feds raid medical marijuana facility, 2 other Oakland County properties

Federal agents raided at least three properties in Oakland County this morning.

U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents were at Caregivers of America, a medicinal marijuana facility in Walled Lake, a home in Commerce Township and an office building in Novi.

DEA Group supervisor Andrew Eiseman said sealed federal search warrants were executed at all three locations, but few other details were released.

He would not say why the warrants were issued or provide more details about the investigation. He did not say if any arrests have been made and would not comment on whether the raids were connected.

The home raided is located in the 3300 block of Benstein Road and is owned by Romel and Ban Casab, according to the Oakland County Assessor’s Office. Romel Casab has said in a lawsuit that he is one of the owners of the former Packard plant in Detroit.

A neighbor who lives across the street from the home said she first saw agents at the home shortly after 7 a.m. today. A black convertible was taken out of the garage and driven out before it was towed away, neighbor Annette Winberg, 66, said. Another car was also taken, she said.

About 10 agents were at the home this morning with four or five cars when a Free Press reporter arrived.

The medicinal marijuana facility in Walled Lake is located at 1020 Decker Road. Walled Lake assessor records say it is owned by 1020 Decker LLC. The assessor’s office said it sends the company’s tax bills to a suite on West 12 Mile Road in Novi. The DEA confirmed that agents were also at the location on 12 Mile this morning executing a search warrant.

Calls to Caregivers of America and to the Commerce Township home were not returned. A woman at the home in Commerce Township declined to talk to a Free Press reporter.

The DEA is working with the Oakland County Sheriff’s office on the raid.

http://www.freep.com/article/20110412/NEWS03/110412028/Feds-raid-medical-marijuana-facility-2-other-Oakland-County-properties