Key court ruling on medical pot favors Spokane man
Dec 11, 2012, 2:44 PM | Updated: 5:02 pm
A state appeals court tossed out the drug trafficking convictions of the first man to operate a medical marijuana dispensary in Spokane, Wash.
The 2-to-1 ruling by the Division III Court of Appeals clears Scott Shupe, who freely admitted selling medicinal marijuana to more than 1,200 patients, but to no more than one at a time. That was critical to the appeals court ruling. The appeals court rejected the state’s argument that the medical marijuana law restricts sales by any provider to just one patient, period.
The appeals court dedicated significant language to analysis of one phrase in the state’s Medical Use of Marijuana Act, which allow a provider to sell medicinal marijuana to “only one patient at any one time” and focusing on the definition of the word “at.”
Schupe was convicted in March, 2011 of delivery of a controlled substance, possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver and manufacture of a controlled substance but his prison term was delayed, pending the appeal.
The ruling seems to clarify the state rules for selling medicinal pot in Washington but it’s still not clear how the federal government will enforce its ban on any sales or possession of marijuana, medicinal or other.
