After a recent shootout at the home of medical-marijuana activist Steve Sarich, police found 375 pot plants, $10,700 in cash and a stack of credit-card receipts showing Sarich's business had collected hundreds of thousands of dollars from pot-related sales and services in just a few weeks. Sarich now is waiting to find out if the King County Prosecuting Attorney's Office will charge him with drug dealing. The case is being watched closely in the medical-marijuana community, in part because the number of patients qualifying to use pot for medical purposes is expected to swell in the next few years, thanks to a new state law. To cater to those patients, a number of for-profit companies are staking claims in territory once dominated by nonprofits. [continues 1286 words]
The number of Washington patients qualifying for medical marijuana -- and businesses catering to them -- is likely to swell even more in the next few years thanks to a new state law. After a recent shootout at the home of medical-marijuana activist Steve Sarich, police found 375 pot plants, $10,700 in cash and a stack of credit-card receipts showing Sarich's business had collected hundreds of thousands of dollars from pot-related sales and services in just a few weeks. [continues 1600 words]
High demand, low cost and scattered law enforcement have created an underground river of prescription drugs that flows across the border from Mexico into U.S. medicine cabinets, the pockets of people practicing do-it-yourself medicine and the illegal pharmacies frequented by recent immigrants. "It's not like cocaine," said Sachi Hamai, who heads a Los Angeles task force that has raided 148 backroom pharmacies and clinics since September. "It's not like there's one big kingpin in Colombia. There are lots of drugs in Mexico. It's easy access. Anyone could go over there." [continues 767 words]
