75A - PH - MEDICAL MARIJUANA - PROHIBIT

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That set off' a scramble by many to open shops to beat any decision - and led to the 45 shops that opened in the city. lr.~ all, the city of Los Angeles has ] 4g retail-like medical marijuana shops or home-delivery services. "Out of the chaos, that's where the opportunists move in," Duran. said. Dispensary owners who contend they work. hard to run. a reputabtc operation take issue with the opportunist label, though several. declined to calk to the Business Journal for this story......Uuder state l.aw, in order to receive medical marijuana, patients must get a doctor to provic]e a written recomrl~endation -nicknamed. scripts, although they're technically not prescriptions. The scripts also give the recipients the right to legally grow marijuana f<~r medical purposes. For roughly $70 to ~ 100, depending on the neighborhood, patients with a script can ptrrchase one-eight}. of an ounce of processed n~ariju.atla for personal use......Prices at dispensaries, sometimes known as cannabis clubs, tend to be equivalent to or slightly higher than pot available on the street, with clinic owners touting the greater safety and. cleanliness of their facilities. (Wltilc~ ASA and others complain about inflated dollar estimates for seizures, at $70- $100 per US rru~xce that is equivalent to $b',96(/-$12,800 per pouted. As mentioned beloK~ they are pcrre/Tasing at $3,000-$4,000 per pound w/zich realizes a profrt of $4,960 to $8,800 per pound.) Investigators contend that much of the marijuana sold by L.A. clinics comes from many of the same sources as what's available on the street. It's often imported from Canada and. lviexico, Pullen said, in violation of California Law that: reduires medical marijuana to be grown within the state. A dispensary might pay $3,000 to 54,000 wholesale for a pound of marijuana then mark that amount up by as much as 100 percent, according to the DEA. Sut efinic owners such as Ed consider the DEA's contentions ludicrous, at least for clinics that care about their clients....... Tcrkrng Precautir~ns• However, even. some patient advocates admit larger dispensaries often. tutor to underground. fnowers. '111e DEA also believes that clinic sales to people without scripts or under false pretenses are more widespread. than the clinic community acknowledges. Ed said he drills his staff on state ]aw and. recommended codes of conduct promoted by patient advocacy g~t•oup Americans for Safe Access. Still, many law enforcement officials and community critics paint a sordid picture of the clinics as crime magnets that are often located too close to schools and parks and are too lax in screening clients. They also are apt to become targets of robberies and other crimes themselves because of their large caches of drugs and cash.. Source: http://www marijuana cam/420/dry-war-headline-news/52099-ca-ridin~- hit~h.htrnl 2b 75A-121