Federal agents raided 10 marijuana clinics Wednesday, the same day city leaders introduced a measure calling for an end to the crackdown on the dispensaries allowed under state law.
The bust netted five arrests, large quantities of marijuana and cash, and was the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's second-largest since California voters approved medical marijuana sales in 1996. The drug remains illegal under federal law.
DEA spokeswoman Sarah Pullen said the timing of the bust and the city's action was "purely coincidental."
The agency has maintained the clinics are distribution points for illegal drugs and earn their owners big profits. Those arrested Wednesday included clinic owners and managers, though no patients, for investigation of marijuana distribution.
Councilman Dennis Zine, who earlier in the day wrote a letter to DEA Administrator Karen Tandy asking the agency to stop the raids, called the federal agents "bullies."
"Instead of using resources to go after drug dealers ruining neighborhoods and poisoning school kids, they're going after individuals dying of cancer and suffering from AIDS who need cannabis to have any type of appetite," Zine said. MagazineLane.com
The bust netted five arrests, large quantities of marijuana and cash, and was the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's second-largest since California voters approved medical marijuana sales in 1996. The drug remains illegal under federal law.
DEA spokeswoman Sarah Pullen said the timing of the bust and the city's action was "purely coincidental."
The agency has maintained the clinics are distribution points for illegal drugs and earn their owners big profits. Those arrested Wednesday included clinic owners and managers, though no patients, for investigation of marijuana distribution.
Councilman Dennis Zine, who earlier in the day wrote a letter to DEA Administrator Karen Tandy asking the agency to stop the raids, called the federal agents "bullies."
"Instead of using resources to go after drug dealers ruining neighborhoods and poisoning school kids, they're going after individuals dying of cancer and suffering from AIDS who need cannabis to have any type of appetite," Zine said. MagazineLane.com
