The Federal War on Medical Marijuana Becomes a War on Children
Automatic weapons. Check. Helicopters. Check. Dogs. Check. Bulletproof vests. Check.
You may not buy the government's characterization of its campaign against medical marijuana patients as a "war on drugs," but increasingly violent, militaristic tactics in recent months offer a troubling glimpse into the federal law enforcement community's mentality: To them, this is war.
Raids on medical marijuana dispensaries throughout California on July 17 by federal Drug Enforcement Administration agents, often with local law enforcement officers in tow, seemed designed to send a clear signal that the feds were deliberately escalating their war on medical marijuana patients.
The enemy, then, are people like Ronnie Naulls, a Riverside medical marijuana patient who owned two of the dispensaries raided that day.
A church-going family man who used medical marijuana to ease chronic pain from injuries sustained in a 2001 car accident, Naulls already had two successful businesses -- one as an IT consultant and another as a real estate property manager -- when he established the Healing Nations Collective to save fellow Corona patients the hours-long drive to Los Angeles for medicine.
By all accounts, Naulls ran his collectives with exemplary scrupulousness. He maintained strict dress codes and professional standards for all employees. He paid state taxes on the dispensaries -- amounting to several hundred thousand dollars a year -- even when loose tax regulations allowed other dispensary owners to slip through the cracks. Profits from the dispensaries went to local and national cancer organizations.
Nevertheless, at 5:50 a.m., July 17, Naulls' home and businesses were invaded by DEA agents armed with shotguns, automatic rifles -- even helicopters. They seized everything he owned: his businesses, his property, all of his accounts.
But that wasn't the worst of it. County child protective services came along on the raid and took Naulls' three daughters, aged 1 to 5, and charged him and his wife with child endangerment. They weren't even accused of breaking any state laws.
When Naulls spoke to his children in their foster home, the oldest said, "Daddy, we're ready to come home now. We promise to be good."
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