One of the sixth-place finishers in the highly-competitive sweepstakes for one of Arkansas’ five prized pot-growing licenses has filed a protest with the state Medical Marijuana Commission ahead of the regulatory panel’s much anticipated meeting on Wednesday.
In a letter from Wright Lindsey Jennings attorney Erika Gee, River Valley Relief Cultivation of Fort Smith alleges that fifth-place finisher Delta Medical Cannabis Company of Jonesboro provided “misleading, incorrect, false or fraudulent information” to the commission. The Little Rock attorney representing the Fort Smith partnership then asks the five-person panel to halt the final award of medical pot licenses until the claims are investigated.
“We would like the commission to delay the final awarding of the licensees until they have a chance to check the top applications for misleading, false or fraudulent information,” said Storm Nolan, spokesman and one of the key investors for River Valley. “Up to this point, there’s been no mechanism for the commissioners to be able to ascertain the veracity of the information in the applications provided to them.”
According to Gee’s complaint, Delta Medical’s application revealed a number of “representations” [that] appear to be false.” For one, the complaint states that the Jonesboro partnership falsely bolstered the background and qualifications of its cultivation team, noting that one employee misrepresented his experience as an owner of a medical marijuana business in Colorado.
