Leigh Ann LaDuke was picking up her kids from school on the afternoon of Friday, March 4, when she heard the police had paid her business a visit while she was out. LaDuke is the sales manager of\u00a0The Shoppe, a vape-supply and CBD store in Fort Oglethorpe, GA. In addition to CBD oil and tinctures, vaporizer batteries and e-juices, The Shoppe also stocked products containing Delta-8 THC.<\/p>\n
An increasingly common and somewhat controversial cannabinoid, Delta-8 THC is derived from source material originating in the federally legal hemp plant. However, since Delta-8 produces a high similar to federally illegal cannabis\u2019 Delta-9 THC\u2014and since you can buy it online, at smoke shops, gas stations or anywhere else a merchant stocks it on shelves\u2014Delta-8 products are popular in states where cannabis is still illegal,\u00a0such as Georgia<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n This also means Delta-8 is very unpopular with law enforcement. And in at least three jurisdictions in Georgia, local sheriff\u2019s offices and district attorneys appear to have launched an all-out assault on Delta-8 THC\u2014despite state and federal laws allowing the drug, advocates and attorneys told Cannabis Now.\u00a0<\/p>\n It all adds up to what increasingly looks like a desperate, last-ditch War on Drugs battle in the final years before nationwide legalization, waged by what even a state judge worries are \u201crogue\u201d law enforcement officials.<\/p>\n Upon her return to work, LaDuke discovered a letter left from a detective from the local Catoosa County Sheriff\u2019s Office. The communication, signed by Catoosa County Sheriff Gary R. Sisk, informed her that sheriff\u2019s representatives had \u201cpurchased items from your store and had them tested,\u201d and that they contained a\u00a0\u201csignificate [sic] level of Delta 9.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s your responsibility to know what you are selling and what it contains especially when I\u2019m telling you it\u2019s a violation of Georgia law,\u201d Sisk\u2019s letter continued, adding that\u00a0The Shoppe<\/a>\u00a0had until April 30 to remove \u201cthese illegal items\u201d and if they didn\u2019t, \u201cWe already have the evidence needed to move forward with prosecutions and seizures.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Puzzled and upset, LaDuke and Joe King, owner of The Shoppe, went to the sheriff\u2019s office to sort things out. They had certificates of authentication showing their products were well within state limits, which say\u00a0anything derived from hemp, cannabis with 0.3% Delta-9 THC or less, is legal to sell.<\/a><\/p>\n They were told that the county has an ongoing problem with \u201cpeople actively overdosing on cannabis.\u201d The sheriff\u2019s office had purchased products from The Shoppe and sent them off for their own testing, and \u201cthey tested higher than the Georgia law allowed,\u201d said LaDuke, who didn\u2019t believe a word of what she heard.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe asked for proof and what was purchased that day, and we were refused,\u201d she said. \u201cWe also offered COAs for our products and were told that ours do not matter because they tested our products.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n The Catoosa Sheriff\u2019s Office didn\u2019t\u00a0\u00a0return a call for comment to Cannabis Now. But according to Ryan Ralston, the executive director of Peachtree NORML, the Georgia branch of the organization, The Shoppe is one of several stores in at least three Georgia jurisdictions to be subjected to a Delta-8 crackdown: Gwinnett County, east of Atlanta; and Madison County, in northeast Georgia, in addition to Catoosa County, in the northwest of the state on the border with Tennessee.<\/p>\n In these places, local law enforcement seem to be waging a sort of war of choice, a last stand of the War on Drugs.<\/p>\n \u201cThe vast majority, if not 99 percent, of the DAs and sheriffs and chiefs of police have recognized that Delta-8 is, in fact, lawful,\u201d Ralston said. What\u2019s happening, he says, is that \u201ca couple of rogue DAs or sheriffs have taken it upon themselves to declare Delta-8 unlawful and then [move to] take enforcement action.\u201d<\/p>\n Ralston has a theory on why this is ramping up now.<\/p>\n \u201cYou have the reinvention of\u00a0Reefer Madness\u00a0<\/em>here in Georgia,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Ralston noted that 2022 is an election year, and conservative sheriffs up for re-election (such as Sisk) may be trolling for a wedge issue. In several instances, law enforcement officials have claimed\u2014so far, without showing any proof\u2014that children have been accessing Delta-8 products.\u00a0<\/p>\n Others speculated that Sisk may also have encouragement from a local\u00a0multi-jurisidictional drug task force<\/a>. But what he doesn\u2019t have is support from the state of Georgia itself.\u00a0<\/p>\n After Patsy Austin-Gatson, the district attorney in Gwinnett County, declared in January that selling Delta-8 was a felony offense and tried to enforce a county-wide ban\u2014staging at least two raids, filing felony charges against at least one individual and seizing millions of dollars\u2019 worth of product, according to estimates\u2014two local vape shops sued to stop her.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n In response,\u00a0a state judge imposed a monthlong restraining order<\/a>, staying Austin-Gatson\u2019s hand.<\/p>\n \u201cI have concerns that this may or may not be a rogue DA,\u201d said Judge Craig Schwall, according to the\u00a0Atlanta Journal Constitution<\/em>.<\/p>\n Austin-Gatson\u2019s office didn\u2019t return a telephone message to Cannabis Now seeking comment.\u00a0<\/p>\n Tom Church, one of the attorneys handling\u00a0the cases<\/a>\u00a0on behalf of the offended vape shops, confirmed on April 22 that the monthlong temporary restraining orders imposed on Austin-Gatson, have been appealed by the state attorney general\u2019s office.\u00a0<\/p>\n That means the legality of Delta-8 in Georgia may ultimately hinge on a judge\u2019s order. In the meantime, Austin-Gatson has declared Delta-8 products OK if they\u2019re not food products\u2014meaning anyone selling Delta-8 gummies, possibly the drug\u2019s most popular form, is still at risk, Church said.<\/p>\n \u201cA lot of people are paying attention to this lawsuit, which is good\u2014we need clarity in the law,\u201d he said. \u201cOf course, we think it\u2019s unambiguous that Delta 8, Delta-10 and other cannabinoids as long as it\u2019s not Delta-9 can be put in all types of products.\u201d<\/p>\n In the meantime, The Shoppe is teetering on the brink of viability. Though the letter was the only warning LaDuke received, that was enough.<\/p>\n Rightly fearful of a raid, LaDuke and King pulled all their Delta-8 products, severely reducing their sales, but even that hasn\u2019t ended their problems with the law. The Shoppe\u2019s remaining customers \u201care getting pulled over\u201d on their way in or out of the store, she said, further discouraging business.\u00a0<\/p>\n According to Peachtree NORML\u2019s Ralston, the Delta-8 campaign could be a politically motivated distraction. All the areas where the crackdowns have occurred have something in common: violent crime rates \u201c3% to 5% higher\u201d than statewide rates, he said, plus the ever-worsening opioid overdose crisis.\u00a0<\/p>\n Looking decisive or tough on something easy\u2014such as federally legal products sitting on a shelf in a store\u2014might be a good way to direct attention elsewhere. The same week LaDuke received her letter, a neighboring county recorded five fentanyl overdoses, she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cYet, we\u2019re the issue,\u201d she said. \u201cBusting several prominent businesses wouldn\u2019t only make them look good, but fund them.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI feel like we\u2019re all in a movie or a dream.\u201d<\/p>\n The post Georgia\u2019s War on Delta-8\u00a0THC<\/a> appeared first on Cannabis Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Leigh Ann LaDuke was picking up her kids from school on the afternoon of Friday, March 4, when she heard the police had paid her business a visit while she was out. LaDuke is the sales manager of\u00a0The Shoppe, a vape-supply and CBD store in Fort Oglethorpe, GA. In additionContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[50,136,4347,6846,734,90,65,146,16159,97],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54618"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54618"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54618\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54619,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54618\/revisions\/54619"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54618"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54618"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54618"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}The Letter and the Law<\/strong><\/h4>\n
Rogue DAs and a Rearguard Action<\/strong><\/h4>\n
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The War on Drugs Continues<\/strong> in Georgia<\/h4>\n
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\nRead More: Georgia\u2019s War on Delta-8\u00a0THC<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"