September 27, 2007

DEA Raids Sacramento Pot Plant

Amid protests from medical marijuana patients and supporters, the United States Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) raided a medical marijuana dispensary in Sacramento, California, yesterday, reports the Sacramento Bee.

Search warrants were served at the River City Patient Center, as well as several other locations and storage facilities in the area. The DEA seized processed marijuana and marijuana plants, cash, computer information, documents and equipment.

Gordon Taylor, the agent in charge at Sacramento’s DEA office, said that the California state law that allows marijuana to be used for medical purposes—which conflicts with federal laws—is “simply not working.”

“I don’t think the general public really knows what’s going on behind the doors of these medical marijuana dispensaries, and if they did, they’d be outraged,” he said.  

However, medical marijuana supporters say that many patients will be forced to do without it because of the raid. About a dozen states allow the use of marijuana as a medical aid, and some HIV-positive people rely on the drug for relief from painful HIV med side effects.

"It's very upsetting because…they are stopping people that actually need medical marijuana," said one patient about Wednesday’s raid. "They need to quit harassing medical marijuana patients."