Pubdate: Tue, 15 Dec 2015
Source: Orange County Register, The (CA)
Copyright: 2015 The Orange County Register
Contact:  http://www.ocregister.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/321

WHERE THE MONEY IS

Santa Ana police officers responded in the predawn hours of Nov. 2 to 
reports of shots fired in the parking lot of South Coast Safe Access, 
the first medical marijuana dispensary - among 20 winners of a 
lottery for a chance at a handful of permits - to open for business 
in the city.

According to the Register, "when [officers] arrived, they found a man 
in his late 40s with a gunshot wound to his stomach."

That man has since told his story to the OC Weekly, which noted that, 
"Standing at the entrance to the dispensary when the attack occurred 
was a security guard, but in compliance with Santa Ana's regulations 
for licensed pot clubs, he wasn't armed."

That policy seems dangerously inappropriate. Because the federal 
government still considers marijuana a Schedule I drug, along with 
heroin, LSD, ecstasy and peyote, and because traditional banks must 
adhere to federal regulations in order to stay in business, the 
marijuana industry by and large is a cash-only business.

The nature of a cash-only operation, especially one forced to operate 
from industrial areas, seems inherently vulnerable to robbery and the 
potential bloodshed that could result.

"Theoretically we anticipated that this was going to happen," Randall 
Longwith, an attorney for the dispensary, told the Register at the time.

The attorney, the Register reported, also "claims to have asked the 
city to allow the store to have an armed guard but was denied." Such 
protection is essential, he said, because, "the store's inventory and 
money make it a target."

As medical marijuana dispensaries are a legally permissible business 
within Santa Ana, they, much like any other business with valuable, 
highly coveted inventory, like dealers in precious metals and coins, 
jewelry stores and banks, the safety of its clientele and employees 
should be paramount and its trained security guards should be armed.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom