TheMan13
Well-Known Member
Update: A source and friend of Marijuana.com via Facebook states that 20 are in the process or will be hit throughout the day.
The DEA levied a series of raids against medical marijuana facilities in both Denver and Boulder today, smashing windows and confiscating cannabis along the wayand offering zero explanation.
While the DEA deemed the actions confidential and has not offered any reasoning behind the actions, the IRS appears to be involved as wellwhich unfortunately means it could be a tax evasion situation, money laundering investigation, or another cleanse of sorts (all of which: yea, justified).
These individuals very well could have been violating state law in some fashion and have done something egregious worthy of having your property trashed. If so,they got what they deserve
But we probably wont ever find out for awhile, so its worth playing the devils lettuces advocate.
The IRS involvement does not ensure that these collectives were doing anything illegalit merely indicates they were being investigated. And the forceful arm of the law was definitely, clearly used in this instance.
At one raid in Boulder, a pile of seized marijuana lay in the snow like Christmas trees. At the VIP Cannabis dispensary in Denver, broken glass from a shattered front window littered the parking lot whileagents hauled boxes of evidence into a U-Haul truck.
Whether these raids are fair or unjust (to be determined), its a hard pill to swallow for those of us who work in this emerging industry and thought we were past looking in our rearview mirror every 15 seconds for flashing lights.
Because we thoughtand were told by the DEAthat state laws would be respected, we were safe, and violent raids were a thing of the past. Instead, rather than performing a subtle investigation, the DEAjust weeks until legalization in Coloradomade what certainly seems like a statement: we still control your fate.
Of course, since theyre not telling us what these businesses did, we can only hope they were doing something that warranted these actions by the government:
The Drug Enforcement Administration, Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigations, the Denver Police Department and state and local law enforcement are today executing lawfully obtained search warrants and seizure warrants, said Jeff Dorschner, spokesman for the DOJ.
Although we cannot at this time discuss the substance of this pending investigation, the operation under way today comports with the Departments recent guidance regarding marijuana enforcement matters, Dorschner said in his e-mailed statement to The Denver Post.
As this is an on-going investigation, no additional information will be made available, he said. [Denver Post]
Its a dark, sad, and confusing day for the industry. It had been almost six months since we heard the DEA had taken action like this, and that was to Colorados cousin in Washington. If memory serves me right, its been over a year, andcloser to 18 months since Ive written about any kind of raid in Colorado.Although we cannot at this time discuss the substance of this pending investigation, the operation under way today comports with the Departments recent guidance regarding marijuana enforcement matters, Dorschner said in his e-mailed statement to The Denver Post.
As this is an on-going investigation, no additional information will be made available, he said. [Denver Post]
Again, we dont know the reason for these raids, and hopefully theres a legitimate reason for the raids. But we can only sit, watch, and wonder.
The timingweed goes legal in under 6 weeks and the whole world is watching usis suspicious to say the least. So someone was breaking the law and got what they deserved, or this was a statement.
Or maybe the DEA needed some money for their Christmas bonuses?
http://www.marijuana.com/news/2013/11/why-did-the-dea-just-raid-colorado-dispensaries-and-grow-operations/
