[420 Girl]

Accusing the city of illegally coercing landlords to evict medical marijuana collectives, the San Jose Cannabis Buyer's Collective has filed suit.

"We're staunchly defending the rights of our members and of all medical cannabis patients in San Jose," Dave Hodges, the group's founder said Thursday.

"Our priority has always been, and will continue to be, safe and easy access for patients in need," he said.

Joining in the suit is Pharmer's Health Center Cooperative Inc.

City Attorney Rick Doyle called the suit premature, saying the city is looking at developing guidelines to allow limited use of medical cannabis clubs.

The suit, filed Tuesday in Santa Clara County Superior Court, comes after the city's code enforcement office sent threatening letters to the landlords of 20 dispensaries, resulting in the departure from the premises of the city's first medical marijuana dispensary, San Jose Cannabis Buyer's Collective.

The letters were sent to landlords of clubs about which the city received complaints. The collective subsequently reopened at a new location.

The lawsuit calls for the city's planning director, Joseph Horwedel to stop this practice, which they contend violates state law.

Friday, a Superior Court judge will decide whether to ban the city from threatening dispensaries with compliance orders.

"What the city did is unconscionable," Andy Schwaderer, who runs Pharmer's, said in a statement.

"Putting pressure on landlords to the point where they felt the need to seek eviction is simply wrong."

San Jose City Councilman Pierluigi Oliverio had proposed that San Jose adopt regulations based on those in other cities that would allow an as-yet unspecified number of medicinal marijuana dispensaries to operate in industrial areas of the city — an option the city is considering.

Both clubs, meanwhile, are planning a noon protest rally Tuesday in front of the city's planning department.

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