Rod and Clients Give NC Prosecutor Educational Tour of Extraction Facility

When it comes to hemp and CBD, education is crucial. Many of my clients in the hemp and CBD space have had the unenviable experience of seeing their lawful products featured on breathless news reports about law enforcement raids with headlines that use words like “illegal”, “Schedule I”, “synthetic”, “dangerous”, “high”, etc. There is no easy solution to this problem. Typically, any charges that are filed against the unfortunate shop owners who carry the products are dropped. When prompted, news stations will occasionally run follow up stories to discuss legal hemp and CBD. But it seems that no matter how much bigger the industry grows we continue to see raids and news stories based on inaccurate facts and a fundamental lack of education. In fact, as the industry grows so do the news stories and raids.

For this reason, I think that it is vitally important to educate the public, and particularly local law enforcement, about hemp and CBD- both the legal parameters that govern and regulate them and their health benefits. I got an opportunity to do both today when my clients and I gave a NC prosecutor a tour of their extraction facility, which produces industrial hemp extract suspended in MCT for tinctures. (It’s telling that both my clients and the prosecutor wanted to remain anonymous- my clients because they are overwhelmed with work and don’t presently want the calls that publicity will bring and the prosecutor because hemp is new to him and he is concerned about negative publicity.)

Most of the education that I do involves writing and speaking about the law. As important as an academic understanding of hemp law can be, there is no substitute for what Mike Newhouse of the movie Dazed and Confused calls “good ol’ worthwhile visceral experience“. Everyone got some today: we all felt the sticky flowers, smelled the skunky aromas, listened to the vivid description of the extraction process by my clients, and viewed the stark industrial equipment and the crisp clean room. It was a great experience and, as these things usually go, we all left with a better understanding. Thank you to my clients and to the prosecutor (you all know who you are) for taking the time today to participate in some experiential education. As Wooderson, another character in the movie, famously says, “Right on, right on, right on.”

Rod Kight is a lawyer based in Asheville, NC. He is licensed in North Carolina and Oregon and represents legal cannabis businesses. You can contact him by clicking here.