Owners and patients of a medical-marijuana dispensary have sued the city of Centennial, saying it violated the state constitution and land- use regulations when it shut down the store Oct. 19.
Medical-marijuana lawyer Robert Corry said the lawsuit will help establish how local governments handle the issue and set parameters for an upcoming legislative review of medical-marijuana law.
“It will hopefully establish from a legislative perspective that this is a constitutional right and show them what they can and cannot do,” Corry said Monday.
Centennial City Attorney Robert Widner said he hadn’t seen the lawsuit so couldn’t comment on it.
CannaMart was shuttered after city officials banned medical-marijuana dispensaries within city limits, saying sale, use and possession of the drug violates the federal Controlled Substance Act.
The 30-page lawsuit, filed in Arapahoe County District Court, says the ban is “baseless, arbitrary and an abuse of the city’s discretion.”
“The city of Centennial doesn’t have the power to do this,” said Corry, who specializes in medical-marijuana cases.
University of Colorado law professor Richard Collins said both sides have legitimate arguments.
Corry has a good point when he says the city has no right to enforce federal law that contradicts state statutes, Collins said. However, voters gave patients a right to grow and possess marijuana for medical purposes, but the amendment they passed says nothing about sale, he added.
The Colorado Court of Appeals recently ruled that someone has to do more than sell marijuana to a patient to qualify as a caregiver, Collins said.
“Centennial could argue that this business doesn’t qualify as a caregiver and so has no legitimate status to sell,” he said.
CannaMart owners Igor Kaminer and Stan Zislis applied for and received a Centennial sales-tax license for the dispensary at 8006 E. Arapahoe Road.
“At the time the business was opened, it was lawfully approved by virtue of the issuance of a sales-tax license within Centennial, under the Centennial land-use code,” the lawsuit states.
CannaMart opened in September and served 600 patients. During the first 12 days of operation, it collected about $1,400 in sales tax, according to Kaminer and Zislis.
Eric Frasher, 41, who has multiple sclerosis and bought marijuana at CannaMart, is also a plaintiff in the lawsuit.
He said pot has helped reduce the number of addictive pain medications he must take.
Tom McGhee: 303-954-1671 or tmcghee@denverpost.com
