Attorneys For Asian Dispensary Owners Say Federal Drug Charges Are Racist
By Ann Harrison
Attorneys for eighteen people arrested during the DEA's raid on three San Francisco medical cannabis dispensaries last June argued in U.S. District Court today that their clients were targeted for prosecution because they were Asian.
Laurence Lichter, who represented defendant David Lee, filed a motion to dismiss the case based on selective prosecution and requested a hearing to examine discovery in the case that could support charges of racism.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Scoble, who is prosecuting the case
known as Operation Urban Harvest, told Judge Susan Illston that investigators are still sorting through 175,000 pages of information seized from the defendant's computers that will be admitted as evidence.
Lichter argued that the DEA, with the assistance of state and local law enforcement, had already conducted an extensive investigation of San Francisco's 40 or so medical cannabis dispensaries prior to the raid. But the DEA only arrested people associated with the three Asian-owned dispensaries and alleged during a subsequent press conference that they were members of an Asian organized crime ring.
"I think we will look back someday at this case and see that it is racism that explains these charges," said Lichter after the hearing.
Lichter told the judge that all the mostly Asian defendants were U.S. citizens and not members of a foreign gang. He also argued that there was no evidence of alleged money laundering in the case or trafficking of MDMA – a charge that was linked in the indictment to a single alleged sale of the drug.
"I am outraged," said attorney Anna Ling when she got her chance to address Judge Illston. "Look at the defendants here in this court they are Asian and few Latino people!" Ling noted that the raid was carried out just two weeks after the Supreme Court ruled in the Raich decision that federal authorities could prosecute those using or providing medical cannabis under California law.
"It is a medical marijuana case but they don't want to say that so they say it's an Asian crime ring," said Ling who is representing defendant Edward Park.
Attorney Nedra Ruiz reminded Judge Illston that fellow federal judge Marilyn Patel had characterized a similar case as part of the federal battle against medical marijuana.
Scoble, the government's attorney, argued that the last big federal trial involving medical cannabis grower Ed Rosenthal did not involve any Asian defendants.
But Ruiz noted that providing discrimination in cases such as Operation Urban Harvest is difficult without full access to evidence. She also called on Judge Illston to grant an evidentiary hearing and sort through the information the government presented to the grand jury to secure wiretaps and indictments.
Attorney David Nick, who is representing defendant Enrique Chan, agreed that it was important to prove discriminatory intent in the case. Nick charged that federal authorities added the money laundering and MDMA charges because they understood it would be difficult to get public support for a medical marijuana case in San Francisco.
Nick pointed out that defendants in the case were accused of money laundering simply because they deposited proceeds from their dispensaries into the bank and wrote checks on the account to pay their rent.
Nick said press reports in the San Francisco Chronicle and other newspapers that characterized the defendants as members of an Asian mafia has already destroyed the business of one defendant.
"This is a woman who came here to this country and rose from rags to riches due to her hard work and saw her business flushed down the toilet due to a newspaper story," said Nick.
When Tony Serra got his turn in front of Illston, he argued that the case should rest on the premise that the federal government has spent 40 years suppressing evidence that cannabis can be medically beneficial.
Serra submitted an eight-inch high stack of exhibits documenting the medical uses of cannabis that he said should become part of the record in the case. He told that Judge Illston that she had the jurisdiction to take a new look at the medical arguments for cannabis and suggested that medical experts be permitted to testify.
Federal Judge Marilyn Patel accepted similar exhibits while considering the case of medical cannabis grower Eddy Lepp which has been continued, said Serra.
"It is a dark age for medical marijuana which has been used medically for 2,000 years by civilizations far more sophisticated than our own," Serra told the judge adding that the DEA's own administrative law judge had recommended that marijuana be rescheduled to include medical use.
After listening to the arguments, Judge Illston said she would issue a ruling on the motions. But Illston appeared eager to move the case to trail and set another hearing date of Friday, May 26th at 11 am to hear additional motions and discuss questions about wiretaps and discovery.
Other motions considered in today's hearing involved the severing of Phat Van Vuong's case from the other defendants. Vuong's attorney, Steve Teich argued that his client was allegedly involved only in a 2003 cannabis grow in an Oakland warehouse and had no connection to the San Francisco case.
Teich noted that there has been a continuing grand jury investigation in the Operation Urban Harvest case since October 2005 which has involved subpoenas and financial investigations that may lead to further indictments.
