TIGHT LAWS KEEP POLICE UNAWARE OF LEGAL POT

Other Caregivers Worried About Theft After Boulder Robbery

BOULDER, Colo. -- Due to tight privacy regulations built into
Colorado law, few people know the names of medical-marijuana
caregivers or how many people are certified to provide the drug in the state.

In fact, the law makes it so difficult to identify the people who can
legally provide marijuana that the Boulder County Drug Task Force
doesn't know how many certified marijuana caregivers are in the
Boulder County region. That has officers spending considerable time
investigating pot-growing operations purporting to be legal;
double-checking caregiver certificates and patient cards; and making
sure caregivers don't have more than the allowed amount of marijuana,
said task force Sgt. Barry Hartkopp.

"We are trying to determine how many we might have and make sure they
are all working within the laws in dispensing the marijuana,"
Hartkopp said. "They are flying under the radar pretty well right now."

For instance, a medical-marijuana distributor in Boulder that was
robbed Tuesday afternoon was unknown to many of the law-enforcement
officers who responded to the call for help. Hartkopp said he doesn't
know how many patients are served by the New Options Wellness Clinic,
2885 Aurora Ave.

"Confidentiality of caregivers and users is important to (the state)," he said.

According to the Colorado Department of Public Health, which
certifies caregivers and issues patient cards, the confidentiality of
providers and users is protected by law, and "no lists of doctors,
patients or caregivers are given to anyone."

The state's Web site details the law and says authorities can only
view a registry of users to verify information on specific cards.
According to the site, "The registry database resides on a
stand-alone computer and is password protected and encrypted."

Hartkopp said his task force is investigating how the four men
suspected in Tuesday's robbery at the New Options clinic knew about
the facility, and whether the center is legally certified by the state.

"We are still checking into whether this business is legal," he said.

Prospective caregivers and users must go through a lengthy
state-certification process to provide or use marijuana legally. The
state keeps a registry of users but not of caregivers, said Mark
Salley, spokesman for the state public health department.

The law, enacted Nov. 7, 2000, to make it legal for people to use
marijuana as medicine, defines a caregiver as a person who is 18
years or older and has "significant responsibility for managing the
well-being of a patient who has a debilitating medical condition."

Warren Edson, an attorney from Denver who helped co-author the law
more than a decade ago and who advises about 20 medical-marijuana
dispensaries in the state, said there are three to five legal
dispensaries in Boulder and about 30 in Colorado.

Robberies, like the one in Boulder this week, are among his greatest fears.

"I'm afraid that what happened yesterday will become more common,"
Edson said Wednesday. "I urge security ... whether it's video or
security guards or whatever. I'm very concerned about this."

At Boulder Alternative Medicine -- one of the few "open"
medical-marijuana dispensaries that allow anyone with a
medical-marijuana card to walk in for treatment -- security is tight
and the owners are vigilant about how they store the product.

Jay Epstein, co-owner of the medical-marijuana dispensary at 1325
Broadway on Boulder's University Hill, said his company -- which has
been seeing patients for more than two months -- is in a "really good
location."

"We are a block from a police annex, on a second story," he said.

It also allows only one to two patients in the shop at a time,
closely monitors the medicine, uses a camera security system and has
panic buttons, Epstein said. And, he said, employees keep small
amounts of marijuana and money in the clinic at any given time.

"We go straight to the bank and make deposits," he said. "If someone
wants to come in and steal $800 worth of medicine and less than $500
in cash, they can go for it. That's why I have business insurance."

Epstein said more medical-marijuana dispensaries are popping up in
and around the area, and demand is growing -- his business has seen
about 150 people since opening.

Mark Rose, 49, of Nederland, has been using medical marijuana himself
and providing it to others for years and said that as he prepares to
open a dispensary in Nederland called "Grateful Meds," security has
become a major concern.

"I'm more nervous about being robbed than anything," he said.

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MEDICAL MARIJUANA IN COLORADO

The Colorado Department of Public Health tracks the number of
medical-marijuana cardholders by county. Here are the numbers, as of April 30:

613 registered patients in Boulder County

865 in Denver County

770 in Jefferson County

755 in El Paso County

697 in Lamar County

543 in Arapahoe County

445 in Adams County