News: Il: Medical Pot Lures Former Law Enforcers

[+Malamute]

Newshawk: http://www.drugsense.org/donate.htm
Pubdate: Mon, 28 Dec 2015
Source: Seattle Times (WA)
Copyright: 2015 the Associated Press
Contact: opinion@seattletimes.com
Website: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/409
Author: Alan Scher Zagier, the Associated Press

MEDICAL POT LURES FORMER LAW ENFORCERS

Big Business

'Who Better Would You Want to Oversee Your Compliance Than a Cop?'

COLLINSVILLE, Ill. (AP) - With fewer than 4,000 approved patients,
the nascent medical-marijuana business in Illinois is off to a slow
start. Yet it hasn't kept away a cadre of cannabis entrepreneurs who
once relied on guns, badges, tough drug laws and lengthy prison
sentences to fight pot. STEVE NAGY / BELLEVILLE NEWS-DEMOCRAT Scott
Abbott, a retired Illinois State Police colonel, speaks with Mark
Lewis, left, and Jeff Greer in September at the new medical-marijuana
dispensary being built in Collinsville, Ill.

While neither state regulators nor the medical-marijuana industry
track the number of employees who were former law-enforcement
officials, The Associated Press has identified no fewer than 17 in
Illinois, many of whom have outsized influence - from a trustee of
the state's chapter of the Fraternal Order of Police to one-time
undercover narcotics officers.

"Who better would you want to oversee your compliance than a cop?"
said Scott Abbott, a retired Illinois State Police colonel paid to
help a company adhere to the state's strict laws and regulations at
two dispensaries.

The pull of such post-police jobs extends well beyond Illinois, such
as Washington state and Colorado, where marijuana is legal for
everyone over 21. But industry members in Illinois and beyond say the
state is unusual in the degree to which former law-enforcement
officers are not just working security but taking hands-on roles with
patients and leading businesses - even with the uncertain future of a
four-year pilot program that expires in 2017 and has received
lukewarm support from first-term Gov. Bruce Rauner.

Many have had a late-stage transformation, coming to see the drug
less as a societal harm and more as good public policy - and good
business. There's likely no better example than Terrance Gainer, a
former Chicago homicide detective, Illinois State Police director,
assistant police chief in Washington, D.C., U.S. Capitol Police chief
and U.S. Senate sergeant-at-arms.

After some initial reluctance, the 68-year-old said he was swayed in
part by "the sea change in society and our attitudes" toward the drug
and the possibility of big business. He advises Chicago-based Green
Thumb Industries on its security needs, has worked with prospective
marijuana-business owners in Florida and New York, and testified in
support of the industry before Maryland lawmakers.

"The business people involved in this are very serious about their
investments," he said.

Other players in Illinois include retired Will County Circuit Judge
Robert Livas, co-founder of a company licensed to open two
Chicagoarea dispensaries who was once named judge of the year by the
Illinois State Crime Commission. Another is a former Chicago-area
assistant state's attorney who handled gang crimes and now is vice
president of a company that owns a dispensary. There's also an
ex-Cook County prosecutor-turned-general counsel of PharmaCannis, the
state's single largest pot provider with four dispensaries and two
indoor-growing operations.

There's also Arnette Heintze, a former U.S. Secret Service senior
executive who helped protect two presidents. Terry Hillard, Heintze's
partner at the Chicago consulting firm that advises medical-marijuana
growers and retailers on security, spent five years as Chicago's top cop.

Retired U.S. Marshal's inspector Jim Smith said his private security
company is "trying to corner the market" in medical-marijuana
protection and armored transportation.

The law-enforcement ties run especially deep in Collinsville, where
Abbott is joined by a dispensary manager who also spent more than two
decades with the highway patrol. Their commute is familiar - the
soon-to-open HCI Alternatives dispensary is next to the state police
regional headquarters.

Former law-enforcement officers proliferate in the states that
pioneered the medical-marijuana and legal marijuana businesses.

Denver Relief Consulting, which handles everything from businessplan
development to legislative advocacy, counts a retired Los Angeles
County sergeant and Israeli National Security adviser among its top executives.

A Seattle-based medical-marijuana investment firm lured Pat Moen, a
10-year Drug Enforcement Administration official, to join it in 2013.

"It's been incredibly rewarding," he said, estimating he's spoken
with more than 100 current or former law-enforcement officers about
making a similar career transition. "This is a mainstream product
sought my mainstream consumers."

Ben Percy, general manager of Trinity Compassionate Care Center in
Peoria, Ill., switched careers after a 27-year stint with the
Illinois State Police that included an assignment on a drug
interdiction team that patrolled Interstate 55, which connects the
Gulf of Mexico to the Great Lakes.

"We took quite a bit of money, drugs and criminals off the road," he said.

Percy and others draw a sharp distinction between medical marijuana
and recreational use but also describe dramatic conversions borne
from seeing the benefits of marijuana for the sickest of patients,
including children with epilepsy or cancer-stricken relatives.

"I've done a total about-face on my views," he said.

Abbott and others noted that they're still involved in the business
they were before - law enforcement.

"I never got to pick and choose which laws I enforced ... This is the
same thing," Abbott added. "It's legal right now. As long as they
follow the law, I've got no problem with it."

[outsideinthecold]

Hypocrisy abounds.

Edited December 29, 2015 by outsideinthecold

[+Malamute]

Yea....

 

 

[t-pain]

retired police tired of those minimum wage warehouse/mall security jobs.

[Restorium2]

"Who better would you want to oversee your compliance than a cop?"
said Scott Abbott, a retired Illinois State Police colonel paid to
help a company adhere to the state's strict laws and regulations at
two dispensaries.

 

Probably someone other than a cop who has been trained to lie for a living .....

[t-pain]

yeah, a cop who lies for a living and that was also trained that he has government immunity in just about anything he says.

 

thats who i want for ... legal advice.

[AmishRnot4ganja]

This "New attitude" they speak of has me totally scratching my head. If marijuana is legalized, what is going to keep central and south America from running all these guys out of business with cheaper prices and higher quality?