Early yesterday morning, U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents conducted a sweep of Costa Mesa marijuana dispensaries, raiding several storefronts as well as homes of collective members. The raids appear to confirm that, as spelled out in an Obama administration memo first reported by the Weekly last October, the federal government's war on California weed is showing no signs of ending anytime soon. A press release issued by the U.S. attorney's office states that three of the collectives were located at 440 Fair Dr., which until last September was the location of the now-closed Herban Elements, operated by Sue Lester, erstwhile candidate for city council and a subject of an OC Weekly cover story last year.
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Also raided yesterday was a dispensary on Cabrillo St. In connection with the raid drug agents arrested grower
Jeff Byrne, whose cannabis is marketed under the “Simple Farmer” label,
and seized more than 500 plants at two separate locations.
Simultaneously, the feds raided Otherside Farms, whose owner, Chadd
McKeen, also featured in another Weekly cover story, who according to the U.S. attorney's office complaint,
told a city code inspector that he hoped to “make so much money” from
his marijuana cultivation that he could provide $500,000 in donations to
the city each year, thus staving off layoffs of city employees.
The U.S. attorney's office press release issued today states that the raids were part of an ongoing effort to crack down on storefront dispensaries in California, and that letters “went out today to the owners and operators of currently operating or recently closed marijuana stores–nearly three dozen in Costa Mesa, and one now-shuttered store in Newport Beach. All known stores in these two South Orange County cities are now the subject of federal enforcement actions.”
A member of one of the raided collectives who asked to remain anonymous
said that he and two other employees were detained at gunpoint yesterday
morning at a delivery warehouse, handcuffed, and then released without
being charged. He said the DEA had no search warrant, but was acting on
information provided by an informant, presumed to be a city code
enforcement officer. The source added that the feds confiscated an
unknown amount of cash as well as approximately 10 pounds of marijuana.
Award-winning investigative journalist Nick Schou is Editor of OC Weekly. He is the author of Kill the Messenger: How the CIA’s Crack Cocaine Controversy Destroyed Journalist Gary Webb (Nation Books 2006), which provided the basis for the 2014 Focus Features release starring Jeremy Renner and the L.A. Times-bestseller Orange Sunshine: The Brotherhood of Eternal Love’s Quest to bring Peace, Love and Acid to the World, (Thomas Dunne 2009). He is also the author of The Weed Runners (2013) and Spooked: How the CIA Manipulates the Media and Hoodwinks Hollywood (2016).
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