Charles Parkin
Long Beach
City Attorney

On August 12, 2014, Plaintiff, SJK, LLC, et al., filed an action in the Superior Court contending that the City’s ban on medical marijuana businesses was in violation of State law. Plaintiffs alleged that the City’s ban conflicted with various provisions of the State’s Compassionate Use Act and the Medical Marijuana Program Act. In a recent ruling, the Superior Court concluded that Plaintiffs’ claims had no merit and ordered that the matter be dismissed. The Court concluded that the Plaintiffs’ action was barred by the applicable statute of limitations and that the California Supreme Court’s ruling in City of Riverside v. Inland Empire Patients Health and Wellness Center, Inc., clearly allows cities to regulate medical marijuana businesses including the banning of such facilities. The trial court also acknowledged that the City’s ban of medical marijuana facilities was not an impermissible ex post facto law, and was in fact, a statute designed to protect the public’s health, safety and general welfare and was adopted for a legitimate non-punitive purpose. The City will be awarded costs incurred during the course of the litigation. In an earlier ruling in the case, the trial court awarded the City sanctions against the Plaintiffs and their attorney of record in the amount of $1,665.00 for failure of plaintiffs to adhere to the rules regarding pre-trial discovery.