Employees of Montana Cannabis are detained as federal agents and local authorities raid the medical marijuana operation in Helena, Mont. A medical marijuana law approved by the state’s voters in 2004 left gray areas when it came to regulation, police authority and commercial sales. When the number of registered pot providers topped 4,800 with billboard ads and huge greenhouses operating in the open, the feds stepped in.HELENA, Mont. – Medical marijuana businesses worried that federal agents will close them down now have a roadmap to avoid prosecution, courtesy of the Justice Department’s decision to allow legal pot in Colorado and Washington state.
The agency said last week that even though the drug remains illegal under federal law, it won’t intervene to block state pot laws or prosecute as long as states create strict and effective controls that follow eight conditions.
“The DOJ is saying you guys need to color inside the lines,” said Teri Robnett, founder of the Cannabis Patients Action Network, a Westminster, Colo.-based medical marijuana advocacy group. “If you color inside the lines, we’ll let you keep your crayons.
“If you don’t, we can come in and take your crayons away,” she said.
The DOJ’s policy memo comes after voters in Colorado and Washington last fall passed first-in-the-nation laws to allow recreational pot use and follows similar agency statements in recent years that helped spur the creation of medical marijuana systems across the U.S.