http://www.baycitizen.org/marijuana/sto ... pensaries/
The U.S. Department of Justice has ordered landlords to evict at least four Bay Area medical marijuana dispensaries or face criminal charges, The Bay Citizen has learned.
The move is part of a "concerted effort" by the federal government to crack down on the state's medicinal pot industry, marijuana advocates and criminal defense attorneys say.
On Friday morning, the four U.S. attorneys in California will hold a news conference detailing "actions targeting the sale, distribution, and cultivation of marijuana in California," according to a press release issued by the Justice Department late Thursday.
The actions directed at what the Justice Department calls the "commercial marijuana industry" highlight the escalating conflict between federal and state authorities over medical marijuana, which is legal under state law but illegal under federal law. As some California cities have looked to dispensaries for much-needed tax revenue, the federal government has toughened its stance toward the state’s marijuana industry.
“It looks like there is a concerted effort for an offensive against the dispensaries in California,” said Bill Panzer, a criminal defense lawyer who represents dispensaries. “The Obama administration, for all the talk that he gave during the campaign, the reality is his policies haven’t been that different from Bush’s," Panzer said.
Source: The Bay Citizen (http://s.tt/13rNi)
