California’s Supreme Court delivered a victory for the state’s marijuana program, rescinding a lower court ruling in a case that suggested federal prohibition could be used locally to undermine the cannabis market.
The case in question concerns a lawsuit filed by a company in Santa Barbara County that objected to the use of an easement, which is a right to use another person’s property, for the transportation of state-legal cannabis products. A state appellate court sided with the company, ruling in January that federal law preempted the state’s and that the easement could not be utilized for marijuana transport.
But the highest court in the state has now reversed that decision, rescinding the ruling.
“We are pleased the Court agreed to address that Court of Appeal decision at the Department of Cannabis Control’s (DCC) request, supporting California law and its legal cannabis industry,” DCC Director Nicole Elliott said in a press release on Thursday.
While the case—JCCrandall v. County of Santa Barbara—was specific to the company and county, DCC said that the appeals court’s original decision “suggested more broadly that California’s cannabis regulations were unlawful because cannabis is federally illegal.”
Without an intervening decision from the state Supreme Court to rescind the opinion, that could have opened the state up to litigation challenging other parts of its marijuana laws.
Hellbound and Down 