[420 Girl]

SAN DIEGO — Local and federal investigators shut down 14 medical marijuana dispensaries and arrested 30 people after an undercover operation allegedly found widespread violation of the state's medicinal pot law by storefront sellers.

The actions, announced Thursday, amount to one of the most aggressive law enforcement steps yet to thwart what has become rampant growth in California cities of storefront operations purporting to legally sell medical marijuana to qualifying patients.

California, which first passed its medical marijuana law in 1996, is one of 13 states that permits use to treat pain and illness if recommended by a physician. The state laws remain in conflict with federal law making possession, sale and cultivation of marijuana illegal.

San Diego District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis said charges had yet to be filed against most of those arrested. Two of those arrested face federal drug charges, U.S. Attorney Karen Hewitt said. Others were arrested for violation of state law.

The district attorney asserted that medical pot sellers who advertised openly in local publications and on the Internet were flouting state requirements that they be set up as cooperatives or collectives and in fact were for-profit sellers of marijuana for recreational use. One of the businesses had recorded $700,000 in marijuana income in six months, Dumanis said, and six guns and $70,000 cash were seized in the raids.

"It appears these so-called marijuana dispensaries are nothing more than for-profit storefront drug dealing operations run by drug dealers hiding behind the state's medical marijuana law," Dumanis said.

She and San Diego Police Chief William Lansdowne said their undercover investigation found that none of the medical marijuana stores they examined was run legally.

The police chief said investigators estimate 40 to 50 such sellers were doing business in the city and more in the surrounding county. Their visibility in San Diego is far smaller than in some other areas of the state, such as Los Angeles, where ads in local publications and on the Internet suggest there are hundreds. Dumanis said she wanted San Diego to avoid the problems Los Angeles has with widespread public marijuana sales.

Americans for Safe Access, which advocates medical marijuana use, blasted Dumanis as "a notorious opponent of medical marijuana" bent on thwarting California law.

Dumanis said none of the sellers was found to have sold to individuals lacking a proper physician's recommendation. She said the sellers had violated requirements for structuring and operating as collectives or cooperatives as laid out in law.

Source: Raids shut down 14 sellers of medical pot - USATODAY.com

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