POLICE CLOSE DOWN MEDICAL MARIJUANA PROVIDER IN HILLCREST

San Diego police shut down the county's only large-scale dispenser of
medical marijuana yesterday, reigniting the debate that repeatedly
leaves growers, law enforcers and patients frustrated and confused.

Authorities raided the California Alternative Medicinal Center on
Fourth Avenue in Hillcrest, saying it has been operating as a
for-profit business in violation of the state's 1996 voter-approved
proposition that allows medicinal use of pot.

Detectives seized marijuana, plants and business records at the center
and also searched the Pacific Beach home of Steven Rohrer, whom they
identified as an operator of the center along with his mother, center
president Carolyn Konow, and his girlfriend, Amy Toosley. None of the
three could be reached for comment yesterday.

The proposition allows people to grow and smoke marijuana with a
doctor's consent but provides no standards for how many plants a
person can cultivate. The law has been criticized by police and
activists as poorly written and vague.

"I understand the predicament (patients) are left in, but we can't
stand by and allow folks to sell marijuana," said Lt. Bob Kanaski of
the countywide Narcotics Task Force. "That's not covered by Prop. 215.
It was never intended to allow people to make money off those who are
sick."

Kanaski said a brochure from the center containing price lists
indicated that the center charges $28 per gram of marijuana, the
equivalent of one or two joints, vs. $5 to $10 on the street.

He said he spoke to a patient in front of the center yesterday who
indicated he spent most of his Social Security income on medicinal
pot.

Proposition 215 does not permit marijuana to be sold under any
circumstances, Kanaski said. No arrests will be made until the seized
evidence is examined.

The investigation began last June when the department and the
Narcotics Task Force became aware of marijuana sales, Kanaski said.

Police officials, including Assistant Police Chief George Saldamando,
met with Konow in February when they learned of the sales, Kanaski
said.

"She said (the center) was a for-profit company that sells marijuana
to its clients," Kanaski said. Still, she disregarded the warning, he
said.

In an interview with the Union-Tribune in June, Konow described
herself as a conservative Republican businesswoman who has never
smoked pot. She is a member of a statewide task force studying medical
marijuana organized by Attorney General Bill Lockyer who, unlike his
predecessor, has vowed to make Proposition 215 work.

During the interview, she said her center had been operating quietly
for nearly three years and had 300 to 400 clients. Konow has invited
police officials to drop by, she has had information booths at local
hospital conferences and at the annual AIDS Walk, and she has met with
City Attorney Casey Gwinn to explain her operation.

At that time, she said no one hinted they might bust
her.

Meanwhile, another growing operation, Compassionate Gardens, was shut
down by police in July, when police raided the Hillcrest office and
seized all plants and growing equipment. The nearby center remained
untouched, until now.

Members of Compassionate Gardens, who say they do not sell marijuana
but share the costs of growing it, were so incensed by what they
considered inequitable treatment that they held a demonstration a
month later in front of the center. Some of the members believed that
the center was gouging the terminally ill.

Yesterday's raid left some activists with mixed emotions.

Steve McWilliams of Compassionate Gardens, whose prosecution became
San Diego's first test case of the medical marijuana law, said he is
concerned for patients who have no other place but the street to
obtain the drug.

But McWilliams, who has been pressing city and county officials to
spell out terms of the law so that it can be lawfully implemented,
questioned why the center was allowed to operate until now, and why
Konow was warned by police in advance of the raid.

"We had wondered for a very long time how they were able to operate,"
said McWilliams, who is on probation for distributing marijuana. "We
think it's really odd that the police would just ask somebody not to
sell pot anymore. I wasn't extended the same courtesy as that."