Federal agents raided Oaksterdam University in downtown Oakland on the morning of 2 April 2012, sealing the cannabis trade school along with its museum, a dispensary run by its founder, and the founder’s apartment.[1][2] Agents from the Internal Revenue Service and the Drug Enforcement Administration, backed by US Marshals, served a sealed federal search warrant, and an IRS spokeswoman would not state the purpose of the raid.[1][2]
Founder Richard Lee was briefly detained at his apartment during the search but was not arrested, and no other arrests of the raid’s targets were reported.[1] About a dozen protesters gathered outside the school, whose large mural makes it a neighbourhood landmark, holding signs against federal crackdowns on medical marijuana.[2] Protesters included Americans for Safe Access executive director Steph Sherer, and a rally against the raids followed at Oakland City Hall.[3]
Why Oaksterdam mattered
The school teaches would-be medical marijuana providers horticulture, business and dispensary law, and does not distribute marijuana.[1] Lee was the main backer of California’s defeated 2010 Proposition 19, which would have legalised recreational marijuana, spending more than 1 million dollars on the campaign.[1] The raid was the latest move in a federal crackdown in which prosecutors had joined late the previous year to shut dozens of dispensaries by threatening landlords with property seizure.[1]
