WEST HOLLYWOOD—Two of West Hollywood’s four medical marijuana dispensaries were closed following the enactment of new Department of Justice (DOJ) guidelines regarding medical marijuana. After a DEA raid on the two facilities, Alternative Herbal Health Services and Zen Healing, were closed.
The other facilities were raided, but were allowed to remain open. The reasons for the inconsistency are as yet unclear.
Both Alternative Herbal Health Services and Zen Healing declined to speak to the media. LAPD personnel were involved in the raids, despite California law protecting medicinal marijuana, citing the supremacy of federal statute/regulation over local and state law.
While marijuana may be taken with a doctor’s prescription in the state of California, federal law still prohibits the sale and distribution of marijuana in the fifty contiguous states under its purview. Medical marijuana dispensaries are a felony under federal law, and therefore can be closed without warning.
