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DEA agents, along with federal and local police officers, raided multiple marijuana dispensaries Tuesday under federal law that prohibits owners to distribute, sell and use medical marijuana.
The coordinated sweep involved raids of five dispensaries in Pierce County, five dispensaries in Thurston County and at least six dispensaries in Seattle.
DEA Special Agent Matthew G. Barnes released a statement that said the raids were conducted in part because these businesses were in violation of federal laws "for cultivating, selling or distributing marijuana under the guise of state medical marijuana laws and exploiting such activities to satisfy their own personal greed."
Local medical marijuana users were surprised at the raids.
"I'm in shock because now I have no pain medicine," Cameron Christenson said outside of the Seattle Cannabis Co-op on Rainier Avenue.
Christenson suffers from chronic pain after having 17 surgeries on his leg for an infection that doctors have been unable to cure.
He was on a portable morphine pump for two years and became addicted to the opiate. When he couldn't kick the habit, his doctor prescribed medical marijuana to ease his pain.
"I can think of 100 crack houses in town — why don't you go raid them?" he asked.
"It means people are going to have to go back out on the street and you don't know what you're getting," Christenson said. "It's going to be a nightmare."
Roy Fleetwood arrived at the dispensary to find its doors locked.
"It's a sad day for medical marijuana users," he said. Fleetwood purchases pot brownies and other marijuana edibles for digestive issues. He's has been a medical marijuana user for the past six months.
"This is a great collective garden here and they have 'medibles' and just coming here and shutting it down is absolutely ridiculous," Fleetwood said.
Another medical marijuana user, Ben Holcomb, thinks it's OK that officials go after illegal dealers but does not think they should turn their focus to dispensaries.
"I think the DEA should be targeting those that are selling to those that do not have a medical marijuana license," Holcomb said. Holcomb uses medical marijuana to alleviate arthritis pain in his knee.
"Those people [selling on the black market], are going to be thrilled today," he said. "Their profits just went up."
A news release from the Thurston County Narcotics Task Force said they had been investigating storefronts in the area that were operating as illegal dispensaries for the past five months in what they termed "Operation Green Sweep." Officials made numerous purchases of marijuana from the dispensaries. As a result, detectives secured search warrants for the businesses.
The task force arrested 17 people, who were booked for unlawful possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver.
The DEA issued a statement in regard to Tuesday's raids that said:
"It has never been our policy to target individuals with serious illnesses ... The DEA remains committed to the enforcement of the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) in all states."
The statement iterated the DEA's right to exercise its "investigative authority to pursue criminal actions for any violation of federal law, when warranted." The department's investigations can include any individual or organization that "grow, manufacture or distribute any illegal drug to include marijuana, and those who rent or maintain a property to facilitate drug trafficking."
