It does my heart good to type “Police return stolen marijuana”!
BOULDER, Colo. – Several cartons and dozens of mason jars filled with high-grade marijuana were turned over by Boulder Police on Thursday to owners of a medical marijuana dispensary, returned to those who lost it in a brazen theft just one week ago.
The marijuana, more than 28 different strains of weed, were recovered by police from a quartet of men who allegedly stole it in a mid-afternoon heist — along with surveillance equipment owned by the New Options Wellness Clinic — and were then tracked down and arrested as they tried to flee on U.S. 36.
The four are scheduled for a preliminary hearing in Boulder County Court July 6; in the meantime, the drugs were logged by police as evidence for the prosecution of the theft case, but on Thursday were returned to the clinic, which has remained open since the heist.
“Basically, we consider this a routine return of property to victims of a crime,” said Boulder Police spokeswoman Sarah Huntley. “We are basically returning property to victims. It’s not adversarial in any way at all. We are hoping to prosecute this case successfully and get them the justice they deserve.”
It was seen as anything but routine by representatives of the clinic. There are numerous cases of police returning marijuana to clinics, but in most cases that has occurred when it was the police who seized live plants, were then ordered by courts to return them, and often, have done so with the plants in considerably worse shape than when they’d been taken.
Representatives of the New Options Wellness Clinic would not estimate by weight how much marijuana was stolen, or how much the police gave back to them today. However, Huntley said the original amount stolen mostly filled two 18-gallon Rubbermaid tubs.
Our Colorado activists are still trying to get police to take care of the live plants they seize, as Amendment 20 mandates they do. One attorney in Aspen likened it to cops taking in a dog during a seizure raid – they don’t just pick up the dog, throw him in a box and not feed and water him, do they? And it’s not like they don’t have plenty of ballasts, lights, and other grow equipment they’ve got in evidence from dozens of illegal grow seizures.
Still, it’s great to finally have police on our side for once, isn’t it?
How fortunate we are to have the Boulder Police on the side of Medical MaryJane. A thousand times thanks as god blesses the awakening few…………
One of the things I hate most about marijuana prohibition is that it creates an adversarial relationship between us and police. I like cops! My cousins are cops. So many of us would love to be able to call police for various reasons, only to think twice because we keep some weed on our person or at our homes. So many of us would love to drive down the street without that heightened sense of anxiety when we see a car with a ski rack pull in behind us on the freeway at night, thinking the rack is lights and the car is a cop.
People against marijuana should think about how much real crime goes underreported because tokers are reluctant to call police.
Hey, police in Boulder, thank you for protecting marijuana people…..We really appreciate your efforts.