JUDGE ORDERS SHUTDOWN OF S.F. POT CLUB

Organization's founder says he'll keep selling

In a huge blow to the medical marijuana movement, a San Francisco Superior
Court judge yesterday ordered the immediate closure of San Francisco's
Cannabis Cultivators Club, the nation's largest dispenser of medicinal pot.

Superior Court Judge David Garcia rejected the argument of the club's
founder, Dennis Peron, that the mass sale of medical marijuana was legal
under Proposition 215, the medical marijuana initiative passed by state
voters in 1996.

Reached at the club yesterday, Peron sounded shaken, sometimes on the verge
of tears.

``This isn't the greatest day in my life,'' he said, ``but it gives me
resolve to fight all the more.''

Peron said the club would continue to operate in spite of Garcia's orders.

``There are sick people living in this building,'' he said. ``This is their
social club, the only place they have to go. We serve 9,000 people here. If
(narcotics agents) want to close it, they're going to have to bring in the
tanks and stage another Waco.''

The San Francisco Sheriff's Department has proved unwilling in the past to
shut medical marijuana clubs, so any action would probably fall to state
agents.

Matt Ross, a spokesman for Attorney General Dan Lungren, said he did not
know when or if state agents would move to close down the club.

In 1996, before the passage of Proposition 215, state narcotics officers
shut the club, on 1444 Market St., during a raid. A criminal case is still
pending against Peron and several co-defendants as a result of that action.

Before yesterday's ruling, Peron had argued that he could provide marijuana
to sick and injured people because he was a ``primary caregiver'' as
defined by the language of the initiative.

But Garcia said that only patients and their immediate caregivers could
possess and cultivate pot under Proposition 215. Under his ruling,
marijuana clubs and other outlets do not fall within that category, and pot
may not be exchanged between one caregiver and another.

Garcia ruled that the evidence that Peron was engaging in the illegal sale
of marijuana ``was uncontradicted.'' And he granted a nuisance abatement
order that allows either the San Francisco County Sheriff's Department or
the California Bureau of Narcotics to close the club and seize its
contents.

Peron said the judge's ruling is the latest in a series of attempts to
undermine the will of the voters.

``It's all this technicality crap,'' he said. ``They hinge the whole thing
on `caregivers.' It's not about caregivers. It's about a system that won't
give up -- it's about automatic hate.''

Peron said that as he understands the judge's orders, ``we can do what
we're doing as long as we are being reimbursed directly by the patients,
not other caregivers.''

Lungren said Garcia's decision was based on admissions by San Francisco
Cannabis Club staff members that they were selling to other clubs.

``That's clearly against the law,'' he said. ``(Under state law), the only
individual who can provide marijuana to another person is a primary
caregiver, a person who attends to all an individual's needs, not just the
marijuana.''

Lungren said he wanted to put the debate about cannabis clubs behind him
and instead finance studies to determine whether marijuana has any genuine
medical efficacy.

Ross, the spokesman for Lungren, said state agents would not move against
primary caregivers who were legitimately growing pot specifically for their
patients.

``We've said in the past that we wouldn't do that,'' he said.

San Francisco District Attorney Terence Hallinan expressed dismay at the
court order.

``I'm afraid we'll have a burst of illegal marijuana dealing in the city,''
Hallinan said. ``It's a sad situation.''

)1998 San Francisco Chronicle