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As more and more people got hip to Estes' stash, his cavalier attitude would provoke a
<br />spate of armed robberies that left laic University Avenue neighbors terrified. The first
<br />robbery happened in Concord on January 1, 2000. Neighbors called the cops and reported
<br />that several. men had burst out of Estes' house and raced down the street, leaving the door
<br />ajar. When Concord officers arrived at the scene, they found that the front door had been
<br />forced open. They also found no fewer than 1,780 marijuana plants in various stages of
<br />cultivation, even after the break-in. This time, the cops wouldn't be satisfied with
<br />confiscating his stash.. The DA charged Estes with four felony counts of possession and
<br />cultivation. of marijuana for sale, and wi l probably argue that the volume of pot on hand
<br />proved that he was an outright dealer, not a medicinal caregiver. His trial is set to begin.
<br />on August 5. With the heat coming down in Concord, Estes eyed Berkeley. Taking out a
<br />business license and a zoning permit to sell "herbs and other homeopathic remedies,"
<br />Estes set up shop at 1672 University Avenue. From the very beginning, Berkeley Medical
<br />Herbs was characterized by his permissive business style. Michael "Rocky" Grunner
<br />showed up at Estes' door just months into his new operation and handed him a bag of
<br />quality product. Estes says Grunner told him. there was more where that carne from, and
<br />he was certainly happy to buy it. Grunner began hanging out at the club, and Estes
<br />thought everything was working just fine. The massage table was up and ruiming,
<br />patients were streaming through the door, the smoke was flowing freely. But over time, a
<br />tense, nervous atmosphere infected the club. Finally, Estes claims, a friend came to him
<br />and broke the bad news: Grunner was deal.i.ng crank out of the back room. Estes says he
<br />promptly threw Grunner out of the club. But the club's neighbors were beginning to
<br />wont' about the sketchy new element. Machinist Richard Graham is a longtime area
<br />resident and has been known to take a h.it upon occasion.. But he even he draws the line at
<br />Estes' way of doing business, A few months after Estes opened the club, Graham dropped
<br />off a package mistakenly delivered to the wrong address. When Graham asked the man
<br />behind the counter how business was holding up, he offered to set him up with a
<br />physician. for $200. "1 asked them how their operation works, and they told me you just
<br />need a note from the doctor, and. we have a doctor, and you can. get a note for just about
<br />anything," Graham says. "Then he told me the prices, the registration fee to get the note,
<br />$200 per year. I got what I thought was an aggressive sales pitch. He said their doctor
<br />writ help me get it. He looked at me and profiled me, said'You're 51, you've got arthritis,
<br />we can help you.'... I just got the impression that these are people in it to sell marijuana as
<br />a business. I didn.'t feel that these were people motivated to help sick people, which I
<br />think other people are, It was a decidedly unclinical. atmosphere, let's put it that way." In
<br />fact, Estes' operation was so unclinical that it even advertised in the Berkeley Daily
<br />Planet. Superimposed over the image of a big fat bud, the club announced that it had
<br />plenty of pot for sale, listing killer strains such as "Jack Frost, Mad Max, Romulin, G-
<br />Spot, and more." Other club operators groaned in dismay wheza they read the notice:
<br />"One-source shopping for all your medicinal needs! First visit, first gram free with
<br />mention of this ad?" Soon., kids were lining up outside, neighbors and police report, and
<br />the club's busiest hour was between three and four in the afternoon, when Berkeley High
<br />students got out of class. "The biggest complaint was the kids going in and out of there,"
<br />says Lieutenant Al Yuen, head of the Berkeley Police Department's Special Enforcement
<br />Unit, which handles narcotics investigations. "We looked. into that and watched kids
<br />going in and out.
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<br />75A-56
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