Assistant City Manager Fred Cohn said the city filed notice Tuesday requesting the court ask MyCaregiver “to explain why it should not be held in contempt.”

Friday’s search, he said, turned up marijuana and documents indicating marijuana transactions were taking place at the co-op at 554 Lighthouse Ave.

Attorney Richard Rosen, who represents MyCaregiver co-founder Jhonrico Carr-Nshimba, said the city brought the contempt action “based on small technicalities about zoning and business licenses. It is completely ignoring the big issue, which is why is it legal everywhere else in California except Monterey?”

Pot Shop In Contempt?

Fred Cohn gets his man.

Cohn said Carr-Nshimba and at least one other MyCaregiver employee were on the premises at 554 Lighthouse Ave. when city code compliance coordinator David Wright and a police escort arrived, but refused to allow entry. After police forced their way inside, it took about an hour to search the premises, according to Cohn. There were no arrests.

The city sued MyCaregiver and Carr-Nshimba in February 2010, arguing that the operation violated the city’s zoning laws because they do not specifically accommodate medical marijuana facilities.

Judge Robert O’Farrell granted a temporary injunction against the operation last year, agreeing with the city that Carr-Nshimba had not been forthright on his business application by describing it as a “health care cooperative,” and said he would be distributing “herbal remedies.”

Lighthouse Avenue Pot Pushers Plucked

The council initially approved the moratorium at its Jan. 19 meeting for a 45-day period in response to the opening of a medical marijuana club, MyCaregiver Inc., at 554 Lighthouse Ave.

Other factors included uncertainty about federal and state laws, lack of specific mention of such facilities in Monterey’s municipal code, and increases in crime in cities where the dispensaries are permitted, particularly burglaries,robberies and illegal sales related to marijuana transactions.

Dope Hope? Um, Nope

Richard Rosen, LOL. Defender of David Stamm and Chowdergate lawyer.

Richard Rosen and Jeanine Strong say they will not only prove the nonprofit co-op is operating legally, but will go after the “real violators” — local governments and law enforcement agencies that have refused to implement the medicinal marijuana law.

In the 14 years since the Compassionate Care Act legalized medicinal marijuana in the state, said Rosen, not one medical marijuana facility has been authorized in the county.

“While the rest of the state is following the law, Monterey County is and has been consistently flaunting the law,” he said. “It’s a terrible and dangerous policy because when government ignores the law, it encourages everyone to ignore the law.”

The rest of the state is realizing that it’s about money and not compassion. They are closing down dispensaries.

L.A. Times:

The city of Los Angeles has warned 439 medical marijuana dispensaries that they must shut their doors by June 7. City prosecutors began notifying dispensary operators the first week of May, the first step in what could be a lengthy and expensive legal battle to regain control over pot sales.

New Monterey Marijuana Market Gets Lawyer