Business
Trump Booked at Fulton County Jail, Leaves After 20 Minutes
Drugs are easy to find inside Fulton County Jail but it’s no cakewalk.
Thursday evening, Donald Trump’s mug shot was released to the public after he was booked at an Atlanta, Georgia jail on more than a dozen felony charges. The jail that booked him, Fulton County Jail, has a long rap sheet of smuggled drugs, constant violence, and notorious murderers and serial killers through the decades.
ABC 7 reports that Trump’s mug shot was a historic first: the first former U.S. president to have his mug shot taken. (Nixon came close but was given a full and unconditional pardon by Gerald Ford on September 8, 1974.)
It’s the culmination of a wide-ranging criminal case surrounding the former U.S. president’s alleged attempts to overturn his 2020 election, particularly in Georgia which was vital to win the votes needed.
Trump—aka inmate No. P01135809 according to Fulton County Jail records—was photographed with a stern look and the photo instantly went viral. Eighteen other defendants are facing charges for their alleged roles in overturning the 2020 election. Trump was indicted four times this year, but this is the first time he’s facing RICO charges and the first time his mug shot has been taken.
District Attorney Fani Willis oversaw the investigation and the racketeering charges against Trump and 18 co-defendants. Others include Trump’s former attorney Rudy Giuliani and chief of staff Mark Meadows.
Thursday also marked Trump’s less triumphant return to X, formerly known as Twitter, where he posted his own mug shot along with the message in all caps: “ELECTION INTERFERENCE. NEVER SURRENDER!”
Trump only spent around 20 minutes at the Fulton County Jail, however, before returning to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport to fly back to Bedminster, New Jersey.
For most other inmates at the jail, many on drug-related charges, the realities are a lot harsher with hard time. RICO or racketeering charges are among the most severe. In the cannabis world, RICO charges have been used for and against numerous cannabis companies. Cases against state-legal cannabis activities are based on the allegation that such activities violated the federal Controlled Substances Act and thereby satisfied the predicate act requirement under RICO, the firm Duane Morris explains.
Fulton County Jail and its History of Drugs
Some people speculate how easy it is to obtain drugs in jail. The “never-ending drug hustle behind bars” never stops at jails in America, wrote Olivia Fields of The Marshall Project. It’s one of the core reasons the War on Drugs failed.
Fulton County Jail is also plagued with insider drug trade. Other inmates at Fulton County apparently had access to weed, cigarettes, and drugs, which were being smuggled in by at least one prison contractor.
Fox 5 reported on June 22, 2022 that TreQuera Lashell Ford was a contracted medical assistant for the Fulton County Jail who was arrested for smuggling pot into the jail. Officials said Ford was stopped on May 14, 2022 because she smelled like weed, and admitted to smoking in her car before coming to work.
Police began to routinely search her bag and she panicked, grabbed her keys and ran, walked through the parking lot, jumped in her car and left. Deputies reportedly found 6.8 ounces of cannabis, 20 grams of crack cocaine, 200 cigarettes, and loose tobacco.
“Let me be clear, if you attempt to smuggle anything into the Fulton County Jail, you will be caught, and you will be arrested,” Fulton County Sheriff Patrick Labat said. “Our deputies and investigators worked relentlessly to bring this fugitive to justice.”
Police didn’t stop there: They tapped her phone and recorded conversations proving she was smuggling drugs into the jail. Ford was contracted to work at the jail for only a few months before she was busted.
The Fulton County Sheriff’s Office said an extensive search spanning multiple jurisdictions finally found her and arrested her in Grenada, Mississippi.
Fulton County Jail and Violence
USA Today reports that the jail has been built a total of four times, and the first opened in 1904, and was rebuilt as Atlanta City Jail on Peachtree Street in 1927. In 1961, a third facility was built on Jefferson Street.
Ten years later, the Jefferson Street jail was home to the 1971 riots. In 1971, inmates at the jail protested poor living conditions and overcrowding, erupting in a riot that led to extensive property damage and injuries. (The same year the larger Attica Prison riot in New York turned out to be worse.)
In 1984, voters approved a $44.3 million bond for a new county jail, running a tab of upwards of $50 million, and that’s the modern facility that Trump was booked into.
Producer-turned-murderer Phil Spector and serial killer Wayne Williams also did time at Fulton County. Trump, however, is probably the most high profile figure to be booked at Fulton County.
Source: https://hightimes.com/news/trump-booked-at-fulton-county-jail-leaves-after-20-minutes/
Business
New Mexico cannabis operator fined, loses license for alleged BioTrack fraud
New Mexico regulators fined a cannabis operator nearly $300,000 and revoked its license after the company allegedly created fake reports in the state’s traceability software.
The New Mexico Cannabis Control Division (CCD) accused marijuana manufacturer and retailer Golden Roots of 11 violations, according to Albuquerque Business First.
Golden Roots operates the The Cannabis Revolution Dispensary.
The majority of the violations are related to the Albuquerque company’s improper use of BioTrack, which has been New Mexico’s track-and-trace vendor since 2015.
The CCD alleges Golden Roots reported marijuana production only two months after it had received its vertically integrated license, according to Albuquerque Business First.
Because cannabis takes longer than two months to be cultivated, the CCD was suspicious of the report.
After inspecting the company’s premises, the CCD alleged Golden Roots reported cultivation, transportation and sales in BioTrack but wasn’t able to provide officers who inspected the site evidence that the operator was cultivating cannabis.
In April, the CCD revoked Golden Roots’ license and issued a $10,000 fine, according to the news outlet.
The company requested a hearing, which the regulator scheduled for Sept. 1.
At the hearing, the CCD testified that the company’s dried-cannabis weights in BioTrack were suspicious because they didn’t seem to accurately reflect how much weight marijuana loses as it dries.
Company employees also poorly accounted for why they were making adjustments in the system of up to 24 pounds of cannabis, making comments such as “bad” or “mistake” in the software, Albuquerque Business First reported.
Golden Roots was fined $298,972.05 – the amount regulators allege the company made selling products that weren’t properly accounted for in BioTrack.
The CCD has been cracking down on cannabis operators accused of selling products procured from out-of-state or not grown legally:
- Regulators alleged in August that Albuquerque dispensary Sawmill Sweet Leaf sold out-of-state products and didn’t have a license for extraction.
- Paradise Exotics Distro lost its license in July after regulators alleged the company sold products made in California.
Golden Roots was the first alleged rulebreaker in New Mexico to be asked to pay a large fine.
Source: https://mjbizdaily.com/new-mexico-cannabis-operator-fined-loses-license-for-alleged-biotrack-fraud/
Business
Marijuana companies suing US attorney general in federal prohibition challenge
Four marijuana companies, including a multistate operator, have filed a lawsuit against U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland in which they allege the federal MJ prohibition under the Controlled Substances Act is no longer constitutional.
According to the complaint, filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Massachusetts, retailer Canna Provisions, Treevit delivery service CEO Gyasi Sellers, cultivator Wiseacre Farm and MSO Verano Holdings Corp. are all harmed by “the federal government’s unconstitutional ban on cultivating, manufacturing, distributing, or possessing intrastate marijuana.”
Verano is headquartered in Chicago but has operations in Massachusetts; the other three operators are based in Massachusetts.
The lawsuit seeks a ruling that the “Controlled Substances Act is unconstitutional as applied to the intrastate cultivation, manufacture, possession, and distribution of marijuana pursuant to state law.”
The companies want the case to go before the U.S. Supreme Court.
They hired prominent law firm Boies Schiller Flexner to represent them.
The New York-based firm’s principal is David Boies, whose former clients include Microsoft, former presidential candidate Al Gore and Elizabeth Holmes’ disgraced startup Theranos.
Similar challenges to the federal Controlled Substances Act (CSA) have failed.
One such challenge led to a landmark Supreme Court decision in 2005.
In Gonzalez vs. Raich, the highest court in the United States ruled in a 6-3 decision that the commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution gave Congress the power to outlaw marijuana federally, even though state laws allow the cultivation and sale of cannabis.
In the 18 years since that ruling, 23 states and the District of Columbia have legalized adult-use marijuana and the federal government has allowed a multibillion-dollar cannabis industry to thrive.
Since both Congress and the U.S. Department of Justice, currently headed by Garland, have declined to intervene in state-licensed marijuana markets, the key facts that led to the Supreme Court’s 2005 ruling “no longer apply,” Boies said in a statement Thursday.
“The Supreme Court has since made clear that the federal government lacks the authority to regulate purely intrastate commerce,” Boies said.
“Moreover, the facts on which those precedents are based are no longer true.”
Verano President Darren Weiss said in a statement the company is “prepared to bring this case all the way to the Supreme Court in order to align federal law with how Congress has acted for years.”
While the Biden administration’s push to reschedule marijuana would help solve marijuana operators’ federal tax woes, neither rescheduling nor modest Congressional reforms such as the SAFER Banking Act “solve the fundamental issue,” Weiss added.
“The application of the CSA to lawful state-run cannabis business is an unconstitutional overreach on state sovereignty that has led to decades of harm, failed businesses, lost jobs, and unsafe working conditions.”
Business
Alabama to make another attempt Dec. 1 to award medical cannabis licenses
Alabama regulators are targeting Dec. 1 to award the first batch of medical cannabis business licenses after the agency’s first two attempts were scrapped because of scoring errors and litigation.
The first licenses will be awarded to individual cultivators, delivery providers, processors, dispensaries and state testing labs, according to the Alabama Medical Cannabis Commission (AMCC).
Then, on Dec. 12, the AMCC will award licenses for vertically integrated operations, a designation set primarily for multistate operators.
Licenses are expected to be handed out 28 days after they have been awarded, so MMJ production could begin in early January, according to the Alabama Daily News.
That means MMJ products could be available for patients around early March, an AMCC spokesperson told the media outlet.
Regulators initially awarded 21 business licenses in June, only to void them after applicants alleged inconsistencies with how the applications were scored.
Then, in August, the state awarded 24 different licenses – 19 went to June recipients – only to reverse themselves again and scratch those licenses after spurned applicants filed lawsuits.
A state judge dismissed a lawsuit filed by Chicago-based MSO Verano Holdings Corp., but another lawsuit is pending.
Source: https://mjbizdaily.com/alabama-plans-to-award-medical-cannabis-licenses-dec-1/
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