News » LA Dispensaries To Resume Operations After Judge Issues Injunction





When nearly 1,000 dispensaries opened in the Los Angeles area, it was viewed as many as a hailing to its Wild West roots as entrepreneurs rushed to get their piece of the new, legal, marijuana industry in California. That all came to a halt when the city council passed a draconian law making the majority of dispensaries illegal and forcing them to close. Several dispensaries continue to operate despite frequent raids by local authorities. Feeling that the law violated their rights, many of these businesses – nearly 100 – chose to sue the city hoping to have the new law overturned.

Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Anthony J. Mohr today agreed with their position, issuing an injunction against the new law. Legally this means that the city is once again limited in its ability to regulate and control medical marijuana dispensaries, at least for now.

The offending piece of wording that Judge Mohr found in the ordinance was a requirement that only allowed dispensaries register with the city after 2007, when a ban on new dispensaries was already in place. Mohr said that “the justification for using that date as a bright line was compromised, if not confounded, by the fact that it was unnecessary to register,” he wrote. “The requirement had ceased almost two months earlier, and no one could have anticipated that compliance with a dead statute would be necessary in order to continue as a collective three years later.”

The deadline was therefore “arbitrary and capricious such that it violates the equal protection clauses of the United State and the State of California.”

While attorneys for the dispensaries say that this will allow their clients to resume, or continue, their operations without fear of further raids. The judge did give the city options in how it could deal with the law. The may file an appeal, taking the case to trial in an attempt to prove the legality of the legislation, or the City Council could redraft the law altogether.

[source LA Times]

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