Police: 2 dead in pot dispensary robbery attempts

2010-06-25T02:45:12Z

Police: 2 dead after robbery attempts at 2 Los Angeles medical marijuana dispensaries

Police say robbery appeared to be the motive in killings at two medical marijuana dispensaries in Los Angeles that occurred within hours of each other.

Police say an employee of the Hollywood Holistic store was found dead at the scene Thursday night following an apparent robbery attempt. Police would not say how the work...

Police say man killed in LA pot dispensary

2010-06-24T18:45:17Z

Police say man dead, 1 wounded in shooting at Los Angeles medical marijuana dispensary

Police in Los Angeles say a man has been killed and another wounded in a shooting at a medical marijuana dispensary.

The police department said Thursday that an unknown number of suspects burst into the Sunset Boulevard store in the Echo Park neighborhood around 4:15 p.m. and opened fire.

Police set up a perimeter...

Some 440 medical pot shops ordered to close in L.A.

2010-06-07T14:00:38Z

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Around 440 self-described medical marijuana dispensaries across Los Angeles were under orders to close on Monday, nearly five months after city officials voted to shut most of them down.

An estimated 135 dispensaries may remain legally open as of Monday as a new city law formally takes effect. City leaders hope to eventually whittle that nu...

Judge denies bid to stop closure of LA pot shops

2010-06-04T12:00:57Z

Judge denies last-minute attempt to stop shutdown of LA pot dispensaries

A judge has decided against coming to the aid of medical marijuana dispensaries threatened with closure under a new city ordinance.

Superior Court Judge James Chalfant rejected a bid Friday for a temporary restraining order that would prevent officials from enforcing the law.

A group of 12 patients has sued the city, sayi...

Drug overdose: Medical marijuana facing a backlash

2010-05-21T14:45:53Z

Medical marijuana is facing a backlash; civic leaders complain of an overdose of pot shops

The vandals struck in the middle of the night, hurling Molotov cocktails through the windows of two medical marijuana businesses and spray-painting "NOT IN OUR TOWN" just before the Billings City Council was supposed to take up a ban on any new pot shops.

Montana and other states that have legali...

Los Angeles prepared to smoke out pot dispensaries

2010-05-10T09:45:16Z

Eric Matuschek has had his share of bumps and bruises as a Hollywood stuntman, but he hasn't quite felt the pain he faces right now.

Matuschek stands to lose his livelihood — albeit a more risky one — as the owner of a pot dispensary. He and hundreds of other business owners across Los Angeles have until June 7 to close their clinics or they may be confronted with civil fines and even jail time.

City officials ...

Calif city tries to shut down pot-on-wheels

2010-05-09T15:16:04Z

A rolling marijuana dispensary has hit a bump in the road after seven months of selling chocolate-covered cookies, brownies, pretzels and other marijuana-laced items outside a clinic.

The Riverside County city of Norco has asked a court to permanently shut down the Lakeview Collective-on-Wheels, a 1985 Pace Arrow motor home outfitted with display cases.

Stewart Hauptman a...

LA begins process of closing hundreds of pot shops

2010-05-03T15:46:48Z

LA begins laborious task of closing hundreds of pot dispensaries

Hundreds of medical marijuana dispensaries are being told they must shut down to comply with a recently approved city ordinance in Los Angeles.

More than 500 letters were expected to be mailed Tuesday to collectives across the city, where dispensaries had been multiplying in recent years as city officials struggled to approve a local law.

Calif. pot clinic owner sentenced in profit scheme

2010-03-22T20:15:20Z

Los Angeles-area medical marijuana clinic owner gets 6 years in prison in pot-profit scheme

The former owner of six Los Angeles-area medical marijuana dispensaries, including one store linked to an accident that killed a motorist and paralyzed an officer, was sentenced Monday to six years in federal prison for selling pot for profit.

U.S. District Ju...

L.A. marijuana dispensary law challenged in court

2010-03-03T09:45:07Z

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Medical marijuana activists filed suit on Tuesday seeking to block a new Los Angeles ordinance they say is overly restrictive and would force virtually every pot dispensary in the city to close.

Provisions largely banning dispensaries from residential and commercial areas and giving them a week to find a new location once the law takes effe...

L.A. sued over new medical marijuana law

2010-03-02T11:30:18Z

L.A. faces first court challenge over crackdown on medical marijuana dispensaries

A lawsuit filed Tuesday challenges Los Angeles' crackdown on medical marijuana dispensaries, claiming it would force nearly all of them to close.

The suit by the nation's largest medical marijuana advocacy group accuses the city of violating the state constitutional rights of pot clinic operators and claims the city ordinanc...

Pot comics Cheech and Chong roll out new film

2010-04-16T07:03:03Z

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Comedian Cheech Marin, one-half of the most famous pot-smoking duo of the 1970s, lent his celebrity to a medical marijuana convention that opens on Friday in Los Angeles, and used the occasion to plug a new movie.

The documentary of Marin's reunion last year with his longtime partner, ...

LA cracks down on 21 marijuana dispensaries

2010-04-16T07:03:51Z

Los Angeles authorities have gone after 21 medical marijuana dispensaries, arresting one owner and filing lawsuits and eviction orders against outlets.

The actions Thursday involved alleged violations of state and federal marijuana laws.

Assistant City Attorney Asha Greenberg says prosecutors acted on complaints from residents and weren't targeting the medical mar...

Colo. pot dispensaries welcome state regulation

2010-04-16T07:18:30Z

Colorado lawmakers have an unlikely ally in their first attempt to curb the state's booming medical marijuana industry: owners of the some of the shops that sell pot.

Many dispensary owners say they're on board with regulations if they give them uniform guidelines and avert a more severe crackdown like one approved this week in Los Angeles. Hundreds of Los Angeles pot shops face closure after the City Council voted Tuesday to ca...

Los Angeles to close hundreds of marijuana vendors

2010-04-16T07:19:12Z

Los Angeles Tuesday gave final approval to an ordinance slashing the number of medical marijuana dispensaries, which have grown to almost 1,000 since sale of the drug for medicinal use was approved in 1996.

By a 9-3 vote, the Los Angeles City Council said 187 dispensaries would remain open for now, but it intends to reduce the number to no more than ...

L.A. council votes to close most pot dispensaries

2010-04-16T07:19:35Z

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The Los Angeles City Council approved an ordinance on Tuesday that will shut down hundreds of medical marijuana dispensaries that recently opened in America's second-largest city.

The statute, passed on a...

LA City Council moves to close pot dispensaries

2010-04-16T07:31:53Z

LA City Council gives first OK to law that would close most medical marijuana dispensaries

The Los Angeles City Council on Tuesday tentatively approved an ordinance to close most of the city's medical marijuana dispensaries, winding down months of debate on how to limit the rapid spread of such clinics.

The ordinance, if passed next week by a simple majority of the 15-member coun...

LA City Council delays marijuana ordinance vote

2010-04-16T08:35:14Z

LA City Council postpones pot ordinance vote that could close hundreds of dispensaries

The Los Angeles City Council delayed a vote Wednesday on a medical marijuana ordinance that could close hundreds of pot dispensaries across the city.

The council asked planning officials to return next week with zoning maps that show how many pot dispensaries could close if the city bans the sh...

Los Angeles council set to vote on pot ordinance

2010-04-16T08:32:45Z

The Los Angeles city council could vote on a much-anticipated medical marijuana ordinance Wednesday, ending a bottleneck that resulted in hundreds of pot dispensaries cropping up across the city.

The draft ordinance would provide guidelines for the nation's second-largest city that would greatly reduce the number of marijuana storefronts and would push them out of neighborhoods and into industrial areas.

While other

LA council set to vote on pot ordinance

2010-04-16T08:34:51Z

Los Angeles City Council prepares to vote on medical marijuana ordinance

The Los Angeles city council could vote on a much-anticipated medical marijuana ordinance Wednesday, ending a bottleneck that resulted in hundreds of pot dispensaries cropping up across the city.

The draft ordinance would provide guidelines for the nation...

Los Angeles restricts medical marijuana outlets

2010-04-16T08:33:30Z

Los Angeles city authorities passed an ordinance restricting the number of medical marijuana dispensaries, which have grown to almost 1,000 since the drug was authorized for sale for medicinal purposes in 1996.

The city council said on Tuesday 137 dispensaries would remain open for now, but it intends to reduce the number to no more than 70 over time.

The council will also enact a series of new restrictions in the sale of ...

Los Angeles gets tough on medical marijuana shops

2010-04-16T08:58:53Z

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Past the security man and his pit bull and through a haze of eye-watering smoke, two youths load up a pipe next to a row of shiny glass jars with two dozen varieties of marijuana bud displayed like candy.

Hundreds of pot shops have sprung up in the last couple of years across Los Angeles, taking advantage of Medical marijuana shops abound in California as cities scramble to regulate them

A surge in medical marijuana in California has left communities trying to regulate or ban the drug. This wine country town has welcomed a dispensary as a strong source of tax revenue during the recession.

Peace in Medicine marijuana dispensary is a clean, modern operation in a former auto dealership, and has more registered pat...

Maine becomes 5th state to allow pot dispensaries

2010-04-16T09:24:12Z

Voters approved a referendum making Maine the fifth state to allow retail pot dispensaries, but medical marijuana advocates say it won't become like California, where hundreds of marijuana shops have popped up and come under critical scrutiny.

California, Colorado, New Mexico and LA speeds up push for law against new marijuana clinics after judge bars moratorium

Los Angeles officials are speeding up consideration of a new law to outlaw most new medical marijuana outlets after a judge barred a moratorium.

The city attorney's office on Tuesday delivered a draft of a proposed ordinance that would be among the most restrictive in the state.

It would force most pot dispensaries t...

Pot advocates: Looser guidelines leave questions

2010-06-25T20:14:38Z

Loosening of federal guidelines on medical marijuana does not dispel decades of mistrust

A new Obama administration policy loosening guidelines on federal prosecution of medical marijuana on Monday signaled to users that they had less to fear from federal agents but still left their suppliers to contend with a tangled mesh of state laws and regulations.

The Masked gunmen rob Los Angeles medical marijuana store of pot, $15,000 cash

Robbers in ski masks got away with pot and cash in a stickup at a Los Angeles medical marijuana store.

Police spokesman Richard French says three gunmen held up the Gourmet Green Room dispensary shortly before 11 p.m. Thursday.

The robbers took about $15,000 in cash and an undisclosed amount of marijuana and fled in a silver ...

Pot advocates exhale after AG signals policy shift

2010-06-26T01:39:39Z

Medical marijuana users and dispensary owners in California have held their breath for years — fearful they would be targeted for prosecution by the federal government.

They finally exhaled this past week when U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said federal agents will now target marijuana distributors only when they violate both federal and state laws, a departure fro...

Attorney general signals shift in marijuana policy

2010-06-26T01:42:24Z

Attorney General Eric Holder signals a change on medical marijuana policy, specifically raids

Attorney General Eric Holder signaled a change on medical marijuana policy Wednesday, saying federal agents will target marijuana distributors only when they violate both federal and state law.

That would be a departure from the policy of the Bush administration, which targeted medical marijuana dispensaries in <...

Whiff of change in US medical marijuana policy

2010-04-16T14:43:43Z

Obama may end raids on California medical marijuana dispensaries as policy undergoes review

The White House won't say it explicitly. Neither will the Drug Enforcement Administration. Yet there is a whiff in the air that

Stan Lee Walk of Fame

2011-01-04T14:32:35Z

Comic book creator Stan Lee strikes the Spiderman pose as he poses after receiving a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Los Angeles, Tuesday, Jan. 4, 2011. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

...

Michael Jackson Doctor

2011-01-04T13:01:27Z

Sean Kang, a Michael Jackson fan from New York, holds up a sign in protest to Michael Jackson's doctor, Conrad Murray, at a Los Angeles Courthouse in downtown Los Angeles Tuesday, Jan. 4, 2011. Dr. Conrad Murray appeared in a Lo...

APTOPIX Michael Jackson Doctor

2011-01-04T10:31:37Z

Latoya Jackson arrives at a Los Angeles Courthouse in downtown Los Angeles on Tuesday, Jan 4, 2011. A prosecutor has opened a hearing that will determine whether Michael Jackson's doctor will stand trial in the superstar's death by saying the pop superstar was already dead by the time help was summoned. Los Angeles on Wednesday, Dec. 29, 2010. A new storm came just days after a week of wet weather saturated parts of the state, but there were no immediate problems in communities susceptible to debris flows and mudslides.(AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

LSU UCLA Basketball

2010-12-28T22:00:15Z

LSU's Katherine Graham, right, shoots over UCLA's Markel Walker during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game in

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