## Facts

- William Colvin was a qualified medical-marijuana patient who operated a nonprofit medical-marijuana collective through dispensary locations in Los Angeles County.
- The collective had thousands of patient-members; a small subset of members cultivated marijuana, while most members participated by purchasing marijuana through the dispensary.
- The collective used revenues to cover operating expenses, reimburse cultivators, and pay Colvin a salary, and it maintained business licensing, member verification, and security procedures.
- Police stopped Colvin while he transported about one pound of marijuana between two locations of the same collective.
- Colvin was prosecuted for transporting marijuana under Health & Safety Code § 11360.
- After a bench trial, the court found Colvin was a qualified patient but rejected immunity under the Compassionate Use Act (Health & Saf. Code § 11362.5) and the Medical Marijuana Program Act, including § 11362.775.
- The trial court denied Colvin’s motion for acquittal, reasoning that the collective was not sufficiently “collective” because most members did not cultivate and that the transportation was not sufficiently tied to lawful collective cultivation.

## Issues

1. Whether Health & Safety Code § 11362.775 immunity is limited to collectives or cooperatives in which most members actively participate in cultivation or operations beyond purchasing marijuana.
2. Whether transporting marijuana between locations of the same nonprofit collective can fall within § 11362.775 protection when reasonably incident to the collective’s lawful cultivation and distribution activities.
3. Whether the trial court applied an erroneous legal standard in rejecting the collective/cooperative defense and denying the motion for acquittal.

## Decision

- The Court of Appeal reversed Colvin’s transportation conviction.
- The court held that § 11362.775 does not require that all or most members personally cultivate or otherwise engage in operational “united action” beyond member purchasing.
- A nonprofit dispensary-style collective may qualify for § 11362.775 protection even if a small number of members cultivate and many members primarily obtain marijuana through the dispensary.
- The court rejected the categorical view that transportation is outside § 11362.775; transportation may be protected when it is part of, and reasonably incident to, a lawful collective’s activities.
- Because the trial court relied on an improper, overly restrictive standard for “collective” status and for the relationship between transportation and collective activity, the conviction could not stand on the record.

## Legal Principles

- Health & Safety Code § 11362.775 can provide immunity to qualified patients and caregivers who associate collectively or cooperatively to cultivate marijuana through nonprofit structures, including dispensary-style models.
- “Collective” or “cooperative” status under § 11362.775 is not defeated merely because most members are patient-purchasers and only a minority cultivate, so long as the enterprise is a genuine nonprofit collective arrangement among qualified participants.
- Statutory interpretation of the MMPA should be consistent with the Compassionate Use Act’s purpose of facilitating patient access while protecting qualified participants from criminal liability for medical use-related conduct.
- Conduct ancillary to collective cultivation and distribution, including transportation within the collective’s operations, may be within § 11362.775’s protective scope when undertaken for the collective and not for illicit personal profit.
- A conviction based on rejecting a medical-marijuana collective defense must rest on a correct legal standard for § 11362.775 and the permissible structure and operations of collectives/cooperatives.

## Conclusion

The court reversed the transportation conviction because § 11362.775 immunity is not limited to collectives with broad member participation in cultivation and may extend to nonprofit dispensary-style collectives, including transportation reasonably incident to their lawful collective activities.


People v. Colvin, 203 Cal. App. 4th 1029, 137 Cal. Rptr. 3d 856 (Ct. App. 2012)