Marijuana Blog

​The oldest group that represents the political interests of L.A. marijuana dispensaries is getting behind a statewide voter initiative that would provide tighter government control of pot shops.

Say what?

An alliance of cannabis collectives is actually in favor of greater California regulation? Yes, and here's why:

Pot shops in L.A. and across California are against the ropes. In Los Angeles they're on the verge of being banned altogether. Dispensaries seem to want to show that they can be safe and legal.

The Medical Marijuana Regulation, Control, and Taxation Act would not only tax, license and regulate pot shops, it would create a Bureau of Medical Marijuana Enforcement to make sure they follow the rules.

One of the proposed initiative's authors is none other than longtime dispensary advocate Don Duncan.

The Greater Los Angeles Collective Alliance (GLACA) this week says it's all for the initiative. Who's a longtime affiliate of the group? Don Duncan. (He's even listed as a contact on the press release announcing the org's support for the statewide proposal.)

GLACA only lists 13 "affiliated collectives" on its website, but it has been a relatively powerful voice when the L.A. City Council takes up the issue of regulating the 500 or so pot shops in town. City Hall's latest move, still in progress, is to ban them all.

The group's president, Yami Bolanos, says this:

"We see this voter initiative as a necessary step in protecting patients, local access to medicine, and our communities."

The org is putting $50,000 behind the effort, which still needs to gather valid signatures to get on the ballot. Would you vote for it?

FORT WORTH, Texas - Seventeen Texas Christian University students, including four football players, were arrested Wednesday morning in a massive drug selling sting that has rattled the campus and the Big 12 conference.

The arrests were part of a six-month undercover operation by the Fort Worth police department and the TCU campus police.

The four athletes arrested are top linebacker Tanner Brock; defensive lineman D.J. Yendry; offensive tackle Tyler Horn; and cornerback Devin Johnson, according to Fort Worth police documents. 

"We have a responsibility to ensure that our campus environment is healthy and safe," said Chancellor Victor Boschini, Jr. "I want to make it loud and clear to everybody that if you want to do this kind of thing, you can't go to TCU."

All of the students are subject to immediate expulsion.

"There's no doubt all arrested today are drug dealers," said TCU Police Chief Steven McGee. "These students engaged in hand-to-hand delivery with undercover officers."

The students communicated via social media, McGee said.

The drugs involved included marijuana, cocaine, "molly" -- a powdered form of ecstacy, ecstacy pills, and prescription drugs like Xanax, Hydrocodone and Oxycontin, McGee said.

TCU just recently joined the Big 12 conference, a huge change for the nationally-recognized team. Four of the arrested students are football team members.

"This is a student issue, not a student athlete issue," Chancellor Boschini said.

Drugs are not new to the campus. According to a FAQ post also on the school's site, 71 students were disciplined in 2011 for drug law violations.

Parents and family members of TCU students can call 1-866-321-7428.

Statement from TCU Head Football Coach Gary Patterson

"There are days people want to be a head football coach, but today is not one of those days. As I heard the news this morning, I was first shocked, then hurt and now I'm mad.

"Under my watch, drugs and drug use by TCU's student-athletes will not be tolerated by me or any member of my coaching staff. Period. Our program is respected nationally for its strong ethics and for that reason the players arrested today were separated from TCU by the University. I believe strongly that young people's lives are more important than wins or losses.

"This situation isn't unique to TCU-it is a global issue that we all have to address. This isn't just about bad decisions made by a small percentage of my team. It is about a bigger issue across this country and world.

"As a coach, I do the best I can to educate members of my team. We have programs in place that teach student-athletes about what they should and shouldn't do and how to be successful in life. I talk to them about how to be students and upstanding men that uphold the TCU name and its traditions.

"At the end of the day, though, sometimes young people make poor choices. The Horned Frogs are bigger and stronger than those involved."

ATLANTA -- A Georgia middle school student claimed in a lawsuit Wednesday he was humiliated and traumatized when he was brought to a vice principal's office and forced to strip in front of classmates who said he had marijuana.

The student, then in the seventh-grade, said he still suffers from emotional distress because his classmates taunted him by calling him Superman, the underwear he was wearing when he was strip-searched. The student is suing the Clayton County school district for unspecified punitive and compensatory damages.

Clayton County school officials didn't immediately respond to requests for comment about the lawsuit, filed in federal court.

The student, identified in court documents as D.H., said officials at Eddie White Academy initially strip-searched three other students on Feb. 8, 2011, after suspecting they had marijuana. One of them accused D.H. of having drugs, and he was brought to then-vice principal Tyrus McDowell's office.

While the three classmates watched, D.H.'s pockets and book bag were searched but didn't find anything, the lawsuit said. One of the students told school officials he had lied about D.H. having drugs, but administrators continued the search as D.H. begged to be taken to the bathroom for more privacy, according to the lawsuit.

D.H. was ordered to strip and again, no drugs were found. The lawsuit didn't say whether drugs were found on the three students.

"The strip searches were done intentionally, willfully, wantonly, maliciously, recklessly, sadistically, deliberately, with callous indifference to their consequences," according to the lawsuit, which also names the county's sheriff's department and several former school officials as defendants.

The student's attorney, Gerry Weber, said a 2009 U.S. Supreme Court ruling found school officials can't perform even a partial strip search of a student, even if they have probable cause.

Weber also litigated a case nearly a decade ago in which the federal appeals court in Atlanta found that a mass strip search of Clayton County students was unconstitutional because it violated their Fourth Amendment rights, which protect against an unreasonable search and seizure.

"This is like deja vu," said Weber. "It is simply beyond belief that students are still being stripped naked in the Clayton County schools."

Redding, who is now running for county sheriff, was fired about a month after the search, the lawsuit said. McDowell was placed on administrative leave before subsequently resigning.

Redding declined to comment and McDowell could not immediately be reached.

The student's mother, Angela Dawson, said her son still hasn't recovered.

"This situation has broken the very foundation of my child's education because in order for him to learn, he has to believe that what schools are trying to teach him is right and now he questions them after they stripped him of his clothes and dignity," she said. "His trust is broken."