Global Ganja Report

Orange County Superior Court Judge David Chaffee ruled Aug. 19 that the city of Anaheim may legally prohibit medical cannabis dispensaries. This is the second hearing of Anaheim vs Qualified Patients' Association, which was remanded to the lower court by the 4th District Court of Appeal in Santa Ana last year. The court ruled that Anaheim's  dispensary ban is a valid exercise of local police powers and is not pre-empted by Prop 215 or SB 420. The decision concedes that SB 420 protects patients and caregivers engaged in collective cultivation, but that protection is limited to cultivation, not distribution. The decision cites a litany of case law giving local government broad powers to regulate for nuisance abatement.

Wisconsin Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen announced Aug. 11 that six suspects—five Mexican nationals and one US citizen—were arrested in connection with a large-scale cannabis cultivation operation in the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest. Officers from federal, state and local enforcement agencies eradicated some 10,000 plants over several acres about 25 miles northwest of Park Falls. Law enforcement was alerted by a hunter’s tip last November. About 175 agents were involved in the operation, which uncovered the crops and a campsite used by the growers, where loaded firearms were reportedly found. Ashland County residents have been warned not to pick up hitchhikers as agents continue to search for four suspects.

On Aug. 9, the Board of Supervisors in California's Kern County passed an ordinance that bans medical marijuana cooperatives. But advocates have already launched a referendum drive to stop the ordinance. "We want to see an ordinance that works for everybody," said Craig Beresh, president of the California Cannabis Coalition. "That regulates it, gets taxed and is beneficial for Kern County as well as the collectives." Professional signature collectors are headed to Kern County to drum up more than 17,000 names needed before the ordinance goes into effect Sept. 9. (KGT, Bakersfield, Aug. 11)

Superior Court Judge Paul Vortmann in California's Tulare County ruled Aug. 11 that a cannabis collective cannot operate on land zoned for agriculture, dismissing a property owner's arguments. "In this state, marijuana has never been classified as a crop or horticultural product," Vortmann wrote. Cannabis is a controlled substance, the ruling stated, adding that "the court finds as a matter of law that growing marijuana...is not an agricultural use of property."

Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne on Aug. 8 asked a Maricopa County Superior Court judge to shut down three unlicensed Phoenix-area medical marijuana establishments that he said illegally charge fees to provide patients with cannabis. Horne said in a press release that the clubs "falsely claim to be operating lawfully under the Arizona Medical Marijuana Act."

Federal prosecutors in Dayton are wrapping up a case against 11 immigrant men charged with cultivating thousands of cannabis plants. All have pleaded guilty and seven have received sentences ranging from a year to 18 months in prison. When the arrests were announced in the fall, state Attorney General Richard Cordray said the case was further evidence of what he called "cartel-sponsored mega-marijuana farms taking root in Ohio." But defense attorneys say the defendants were poor day laborers trying to earn money for their families with no idea about what they were being hired to do.

California's Legislative Analyst's Office released a status report on Aug. 5 concluding that California is unlikely to meet the US Supreme Court's two-year deadline to reduce the state's prison population by 34,000 inmates. California's prisoner realignment plan, which entails shifting thousands of low-level offenders to county jails, could reduce the prison population by 32,000 inmates—still a few thousand inmates short of decreasing the 180% prison capacity to the mandated 137.5% capacity, by June 27, 2013.

Arrested last August in San Francisco for possessing marijuana, meth and child porn, Dennis Peron had his day in court Aug. 3, and scored a win when the DA dropped the case because the "burden of proof" was not "beyond a reasonable doubt." Peron immediately declared, "They dragged my name through the mud for a year. I'm going to sue [the San Francisco Police Department] for a million dollars. They soiled my name for no reason."