Washington state allows medical marijuana but not dispensaries to sell it. Still, says the Kitsap Sun. some 129 hae been established under a murky area of state law that allows providing medical pot only to “one patient at any one time.” One local dispensary says it does indeed help only one card-carrying patient at a time — but they come and go about every 15 minutes. The dispensary has built a clientele of about 500 patients in its two-and-a-half months of operation, and it is already looking to open a second location.
The state Department of Health says dispensaries are not allowed, though it does permit a provider to supply a patient. Making the message further mixed, the Department of Health’s website has astatement saying that dispensaries are illegal — yet the state’s Department of Revenue is registering them as taxpaying entities. Should law enforcement be investigating any of this? Mason County Sheriff’s spokesman Dean Byrd acknowledged that without clarification, police have a difficult time knowing what to investigate and what will hold up in court. “The criminal law should not be ambiguous,” he said. “When there is ambiguity, it ties the hands of law enforcement.”
http://www.kitsapsun.com/news/2011/feb/05/pot-dispensaries-popping-up-to-serve-kitsap/