A Garland County Circuit Judge will consider next week whether to press pause on a state board’s decision to revoke the license of a Hot Springs medical marijuana dispensary owner.
The state Alcoholic Beverage Control Board voted Wednesday to revoke Dragan Vicentic’s license to operate Green Springs Medical dispensary in Hot Springs after a five-hour hearing on allegations of selling products with expired lab tests, improper product labeling and unsanitary conditions.
Vicentic filed a lawsuit in Garland County Circuit Court yesterday and a judge set a hearing for Wednesday at 1:30 p.m. to consider Vicentic’s request for a stay of the ABC Board’s decision to revoke his license. ABC Director Christy Bjornson has been summoned in the case.
The Medical Marijuana Commission has scheduled an emergency meeting for June 25 at 3 p.m. If the judge grants Vicentic’s request for a stay, the board will consider Vicentic’s annual license renewal, which must be renewed by June 30 each year.
The board will also consider Vicentic’s request to sell the business and its assets to Carla McCord, the majority owner of Garland County medical marijuana cultivator Leafology.
Vicentic had hoped to get the commission’s approval for the sale at today’s meeting, but that was not possible after the ABC Board revoked his license on Wednesday.
Bjornson said in Wednesday’s ABC hearing that a revoked license is non-transferrable, meaning the commission can’t approve a change of ownership.
Doralee Chandler, the commission’s counsel from the state attorney general’s office, told the commissioners today that, with the license having been revoked, there was no license in place for the commission to consider. Chandler is also a former director of the ABC.
Scott Hardin, spokesman for the ABC and the Medical Marijuana Commission, said Green Springs Medical is closed and has been removed from BioTrack, the state inventory tracking system. An ABC order allows Vicentic to sell his remaining products to other licensed marijuana businesses in Arkansas within 30 days, but not to patients.
Bjornson revoked Vicentic’s license in a letter on May 2 in which she said the dispensary’s actions brought about the “reckless endangerment of cannabis patients.” Bjornson said revocation was the only available remedy.
Vicentic appealed Bjornson’s decision to the ABC Board, which automatically stayed the revocation until yesterday’s hearing.
In an affidavit filed with his lawsuit yesterday, Vicentic pushed back on Bjornson’s claim.
“There was never any evidence offered that anyone was harmed as a result of any alleged violation of the medical marijuana rules,” he said.