cannabisnews.com: Landlord Says Pot Growers Must Go 





Landlord Says Pot Growers Must Go 
Posted by FoM on September 21, 1999 at 07:18:09 PT
Tenant dispute caught up in Prop. 215 haze 
Source: San Diego Union Tribune 
A landlord-tenant dispute is smoldering between a property owner who fears trouble from the law and some renters who want a place to cultivate marijuana legally.
Members of the Compassionate Gardens growing service rented a two-room office in Kearny Mesa Sept. 1 as a place to maintain their business and grow marijuana for personal use.When they signed the month-to-month rental agreement, they told the landlord they were a legally established business that would use the space as an office and as a place to grow medicinal herbs. Inside the building, a dozen or so marijuana plants thrive under special lights, while the office is crowded with books, desks and literature asserting the medical benefits of marijuana and recent news accounts of the issue.But when landowner Merle Strum discovered pot was being harvested on his property, he cut off electricity and ordered his tenants out, said Steve McWilliams of Compassionate Gardens. "I don't blame the landlord," McWilliams said yesterday as police were arriving to take a report. "Merle is an unfortunate victim. The fault lies with the elected officials who have not set guidelines." Strum denied shutting off the electricity, which was on yesterday morning. But he did say he wanted the growers to move out. "The space you rent is for office space only, and you cannot grow marijuana there," he wrote in a letter dated Friday. "You are breaking terms of the lease. . . . If you persist, I have no alternative but to call the authorities."Compassionate Gardens was forced from its Hillcrest offices this summer when the building was sold, and the organization has had trouble finding new quarters, McWilliams said. He and his partners, who say marijuana relieves chronic pain they suffer from various illnesses, called San Diego police yesterday to report what they say is an illegal eviction. But officers wanted no part of the dispute. "There really is no police issue here," said Officer Mike Maschmeier. "I'm no attorney, but if it's an eviction issue, that's a civil matter." Maschmeier said he was not overly concerned that marijuana plants were being cultivated in the office. "If they have all the notes they need, as we stand right now, until we're told further, there's nothing we're going to do," he said. McWilliams has been arrested several times for growing marijuana under Proposition 215, the 1996 initiative passed by California voters that allows people to grow and use marijuana with a doctor's consent. He remains on probation from his most recent arrest. "They raid a place, they seize all the property, then hold the threat of prosecution over your head for a year," said McWilliams, who said he wants state officials to adopt a uniform standard for dispensing legal marijuana.In a potentially far-reaching decision, a federal appeals court ruled last week that medical marijuana centers can legally distribute cannabis if it can be shown that patients would suffer imminent harm if denied the drug. McWilliams said the ruling may help clear up the ambiguity in state laws, which are often unevenly enforced and result in disparate sentences. "It's unconscionable that sick and dying people should be treated this way," he said.By Jeff McDonald Published: September 19, 1999San Diego Union Tribune 
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