[420 Girl]

The California Supreme Court has agreed to review a petition by five Dana Point pot dispensaries asking whether a legislative subpoena – in this case a city's request for dispensary client records – can be appealed.

Or, as a lower court has ruled, can that legislative subpoena only be reviewed by a petition for an "extraordinary writ," a different criteria.

A writ is a different standard of review requiring the dispensaries, in this case, to show that an Orange County Superior Court judge abused her discretion in issuing an order to enforce the city subpoena.

The appeals court can deny the writ outright, so dispensaries would like to go the route of a regular appeal, which would give the case a whole second look, said attorney Lee Petros for Point Alternative Care, one of the five medical marijuana shops that have been fighting to keep company records out of the city's hands.

The city wants a quicker resolution by way of a writ because it is concerned that the dispensaries may be operating in violation of existing zoning.

"I am obviously pleased with (the justices') decision to grant review," Petros said.

The ruling on how dispensaries can appeal a legislative subpoena not only affects this case, Petros said, but would set precedent on how any legislative subpoena issued by a government body may be appealed. So far, various California district appeals courts have disagreed on how to handle such a request.

While the matter now before the high court stems from whether the Dana Point dispensaries should turn over records to the city, justices are not yet being asked to tackle that core question.

Under California law, a legislative subpoena gives an administrative body such as a city or county the authority to force groups or individuals to turn over records or testimony. It is an authority exercised hundreds if not thousands of times and sometimes challenged, but Petros said he knows of no case in which a legislative subpoena seeking pot dispensary records was at the heart of an appeal.

The city's attorney could not immediately be reached for comment.

The 4th District Court of Appeal last month declined to reinstate an appeal by the dispensaries to keep them from turning over company records, including financial data and clients' names, to the city under a subpoena order.

In its Feb. 11 order, the court gave the dispensaries until Friday to file a petition for a writ that the city says would allow the court to review the matter more expeditiously than through a normal appeal. In January, the court had found that the "case is not from an appealable order" and deemed it an "extraordinary writ" petition.

The Supreme Court's decision to review the dispensaries' petition stops all lower court proceedings until the justices issue an order, following briefs filed by both sides and possibly oral arguments sometime in the future.

The question of whether a legislative subpoena is appealable as a final judgment in a special proceeding or whether it may only be reviewed by a petition for a writ remains unsettled in California, Petros said.

In his petition for review filed with the Supreme Court, Petros says that "the court should grant a review to give guidance to the lower courts in California on this important issue."

"Current decisions lack uniformity," he wrote. "In the absence of a definitive ruling from this Court, there will be no uniformity of decision as it relates to legislative subpoenas."

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