UPDATE: Citrus Heights Police Raid Suspected Illegal Marijuana Operation
CITRUS HEIGHTS (CBS13) — Citrus Heights police raided a residence on Thursday allegedly being used as a medical marijuana dispensary for profit and arrested two people suspected of running the operation.
Police say the arrests were the results of an extensive investigation into Great Care Cooperative in the 8000 block of Sunrise Boulevard. A city moratorium bans any medical marijuana dispensaries in Citrus Heights, but this one was allegedly operating without a business license out of the duplex.
Police also served search warrants at private residences in Roseville and Granite Bay on Thursday morning and arrested Steffany Vilas, 27, and Richard Garland, 55.
The small signs on the gate out front of the Citrus Heights residence -- "GCC Patient Parking Only" -- offer the first clue as to what police say was going on, and it's what next-door neighbors suspected for quite some time.
"You could smell it coming in our unit," Shannon Kingsbury told CBS13. "I'd come home from school and it would smell like someone was smoking weed in our house."
Aside from the smell, there was the traffic going into and out of the location constantly, another neighbor said.
"All day long you hear that gate open and shut, open and shut," James Caruthers said. "I kept on talking to my landlord about it, and he said it was legit. Obviously, it wasn't."
Detectives and the SWAT team served a search warrant at the property at about 7 in the morning, busting what they're calling an illegal pot dispensary.
In the wake of the federal crackdown on medical marijuana, Citrus Heights put a mortorium in place banning dispensaries. Police say this one kept operating anyway.
"In addition to this location operating without a business license, basically they're taking advantage of people who actually have a medical need, dispensing marijuana for profit," Citrus Heights Police Officer Chad Morris said.
CBS13 found a phone number for Great Care Coopartive at the Sunrise address, but couldn't get through to a live person.
Similarly, police say nobody was at the residence Thursday morning, but investigators pulled out a lot of evidence, including marijuana buds and cash.
The recorded message for Great Care collective says the hours are 9 in the morning until 10 at night, seven days a week, and indeed police say potential customers were showing up Thursday morning.
