STATE LAWYER ASKS JUDGE TO CLOSE CANNABIS CLUB

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- Describing San Francisco's major medical marijuana
club as a ``drug house,'' a state lawyer urged a judge Friday to change his
mind and order the club closed immediately.

The latest faceoff between Attorney General Dan Lungren's office and Dennis
Peron, founder of the Cannabis Cultivators' Club, took place in a courtroom
filled with Peron's clients and supporters and presided over by a judge who
has issued a tentative ruling in Peron's favor.

Superior Court Judge David Garcia's tentative decision, issued before the
hearing to guide lawyers' arguments, was to deny closure of the club and
send Lungren's civil suit to a jury trial, now scheduled April 27.

Garcia said there appeared to be disputed factual questions, to be resolved
at a trial, about whether Peron and his club could qualify as ``primary
caregivers'' allowed to furnish medical marijuana under Proposition 215. The
November 1996 initiative, sponsored by Peron, allows patients or their
primary caregivers to cultivate and possess marijuana if recommended by a
doctor to treat the effects of AIDS, cancer therapy and other illnesses.

But Senior Assistant Attorney General John Gordnier said a state appeals
court has already decided that Proposition 215 did not legalize clubs like
Peron's that distribute marijuana to large numbers of patients.

``Drug houses like the one Mr. Peron operates are not sanctioned by the
voters,'' Gordnier told Garcia. ``He wants to continue to provide drugs to
thousands, and the Court of Appeal has said you can't do that.''

Peron's lawyer, J. David Nick, argued that the appellate court had merely
denied the ``primary caregiver'' label to businesses that sold marijuana to
patients coming in off the street, without establishing a long-term
exclusive relationship of providing health care. He said he could show that
Peron, since passage of Proposition 215, was acting legally as the exclusive
caregiver for his clients, charging them only for the cost of growing and
providing marijuana.

``This man is doing the work of God,'' Nick said, as Peron sat in the front
row.

Garcia said he would rule in the near future.

The U.S. Justice Department is also seeking to close six medical marijuana
clubs in Northern California, including Peron's, the oldest and largest. The
government contends the clubs violate federal laws against possessing and
furnishing marijuana, regardless of Proposition 215. A federal judge has
deferred a ruling until after a final round of written arguments, due April
16.

Peron's club, then called the Cannabis Buyers' Club, has been allowed to
operate by San Francisco authorities. But Lungren ordered a raid in August
1996 by state agents, who said they seized large amounts of marijuana, found
minors on the premises and saw marijuana being sold to customers who lacked
a doctor's recommendation.

Lungren obtained a criminal indictment from an Alameda County grand jury
against Peron and five others. He also got an injunction shutting down the
club. But Garcia allowed it to be reopened after Proposition 215 passed,
saying the initiative allowed the club to act as a primary caregiver and
provide marijuana to patients who were unable to get it themselves.

The 1st District Court of Appeal overruled Garcia and said the club was not
a primary caregiver, a ruling that Lungren's office contends could be used
to close all marijuana clubs in the state. But the ruling did not prohibit
charging patients for the cost of growing and supplying marijuana, and
specified that someone like a hospital administrator could be the primary
caregiver for multiple patients -- language that Peron contends could be
applied to him.