MONTANA MEDICAL MARIJUANA PROVIDERS AGAIN HOLDING TRAVELING, ONLINE CLINICS

Montana's tough new medical marijuana law was supposed to end the
phenomenon of assembly-line doctor appointments or online
recommendations for therapeutic cannabis.

It didn't.

While some medical marijuana businesses have shut down during the
legal wrangling over the new law, others are staging one-day clinics
where people can get a doctor's recommendation for marijuana.

And Jason Christ, the Missoula medical marijuana entrepreneur who
staged the roaming "cannabis caravans" that signed up hundreds of
patients at a time, announced last week he's reviving his online "Teleclinics."

"We are seeing patients for their mmj cards by the hundreds," brags
the website for CarePlus+, the new name for Christ's business that
gained notoriety as the Montana Caregivers Network and, later, CannabisCare.

Christ's email announcing the service touted "visits on your computer
with a Montana-licensed physician," as well as in-person visits "with
our travelling doctors."

That's exactly what the new state law - approved by the 2011
Legislature without Gov. Brian Schweitzer's signature, only to see
portions struck down by District Court Judge James Reynolds of Helena
a day before it went into effect - aimed to stop.

"I don't think there's an argument that the former
teleclinic/traveling model is permitted," said Sen. Jeff Essman,
R-Billings, who sponsored the law restricting the 2004 voter
initiative that legalized the medical use of marijuana. "The
intention to prohibit the traveling clinics was quite clear."

The new law went into effect July 1. The CarePlus+ website lists
clinics in Missoula on July 21 and July 23, one in an unspecified
area in the Flathead on July 30 and one in Helena July 31, as well as
a Missoula teleclinic July 17.

Another business, The Healing Center, offers clinics in Bozeman on
July 25-26 and in Butte on July 27.

"Walk-ins welcome," says the website, which lists a series of one-day
clinics in Montana, Arizona and Alaska. "All patients will qualify
(as per state law)."

Mike Smith, executive director of The Healing Center, said about 40
to 50 people are seen at each of the clinics in a business model he
plans to take nationwide. He bristled at any comparison to Christ's caravans.

"We do not do it like Jason Christ," he said. "We see every patient,
one at a time, in a doctor's office."

The new law mandated an automatic review - at the physician's cost -
by the state Board of Medical Examiners of any doctor recommending
medical marijuana for more than 25 patients within a year. State
health statistics show a single, unnamed physician signed
recommendations for more than one in five of Montana's 30,000
registered medical marijuana users. But that requirement was among
the provisions blocked by Reynolds.

Still, the Legislature wanted all doctor's recommendations for
medical marijuana to come from "a bona fide legitimate patient
relationship," said Assistant Attorney General Jim Molloy. "The
intent therefore was to make it unlawful to recommend medical
marijuana by the use of traveling or temporary medical clinics."

Tom Charlton said he's "trying to toe the line" when it comes to the new law.

"We're continuing business as before, even though it's not like
before," said Charlton, who was a caregiver for medical marijuana
patients as part of his M4U business in the North Reserve Business
Park in Missoula.

Along with another nearby medical marijuana business, M4U staged a
three-day clinic over the weekend so that Charlton's old patients
could designate him as their medical marijuana provider. Another
two-day clinic is set for next month. All of M4U's clinics take place
in Missoula, he said.

Under the old law, Charlton was a caregiver, permitted to grow six
marijuana plants for each of an unlimited number of patients. The new
law requires him to re-register as a provider. It limited providers
to three patients, but that portion was temporarily blocked by Reynolds.

The law also mandates that patients using medical marijuana for
chronic pain - who comprise two-thirds of those with medical
marijuana cards - bring X-rays or MRI scans from their primary
physician to support their claims, and to obtain a recommendation
from a second doctor.

Charlton said the rule at M4U's clinic is simple: No records, no
recommendation.

The Healing Center's website notes that "since our doctors are
consulting about a patient's eligibility to acquire their medical
cannabis ID card we require that all of our patients have at least
one other current physician."

And Christ's email said CarePlus+ could refer patients to "outside
services" for lab work, X-rays and MRIs.

Christ told the Missoulian last October that nearly all Montana
Caregiver Network recommendations were made via online Skype video
appointments. At the time, he boasted that MCN had signed up 80
percent of the state's then-23,000 medical marijuana cardholders.

The state Board of Medical Examiners ruled in November that online
visits could only be used for medical marijuana card renewals.
Christ's note about the CarePlus+ services said the Teleclinic visits
included "follow-up recommendations," but didn't specify that online
visits were limited to renewals.

Debate over the new state law, along with a series of federal raids
on several medical marijuana businesses around the state this spring,
cast a pall over Montana's booming medical marijuana industry. Many
in the business openly criticized Christ for provoking the law that
they say is destroying their livelihoods.

Christ had assumed a considerably lower profile in the last year
after a series of lawsuits and counter-suits involving former
employees and business partners, as well as a pending felony
intimidation charge that stems from an alleged bomb threat against a
Missoula Verizon store.

So his email last week appeared to signal what some see as an
unwelcome return to prominence.

"The damn Teleclinics," Smith called them. "He's already pissing people off."

Dr. John Stowers, a plaintiff in the suit filed against the new law,
dashed off a furious email in response after Christ announced CarePlus+.

"So here we go again! You stupid arrogant (expletive)," Stowers
wrote. "Haven't you figured out that you created the majority of the
problems in the first place. ... I have no doubt the Medical Board
will not be so complacent with you and your whore doctors this time around."

Essman chose his words more diplomatically.

"Mr. Christ's problem ultimately is going to be with federal law
enforcement," he said. "... Mr. Christ is definitely facilitating the
distribution of a controlled substance, as are the physicians he's
affiliated with. At some point, some aggressive young prosecutor is
going to issue a subpoena to obtain that doctor's name and have a
visit with Mr. Christ."