Griffen is an attorney in Harris Sliwoski’s Los Angeles office, where he focuses his practice on corporate, transactional, intellectual property, data security, regulatory, and litigation matters across a wide variety of domestic and international industries.
On February 7, 2024, California Assembly Member Aguilar-Curry introduced AB 2223. The bill, if passed, would significantly change the state’s cannabis and hemp industries – for better or worse. Today, we’ll take a look at how AB 2223 could change both the cannabis industry and hemp industry in the Golden State. First though, a brief
California publishes quarterly data concerning its “enforcement” efforts against the illegal cannabis market. Over the last couple of quarters, I’ve gotten in the habit of analyzing this data (see here for Q3 2023, and here for Q2 2023). I’ve been blogging here since 2018 and my opinion is that the state is doing very, very
Every election cycle, we grade the many of the presidential candidates based on their track record with cannabis (here’s our summary of 2020’s main candidates). We kicked off 2024 with our analysis of incumbent President Joe Biden (Grade C), and followed up with Republican challenger Ron DeSantis (Grade C+), who recently dropped out of the
Cannabis regulation efforts are usually sold to voters or legislators with the express promise that a state will be able to milk the new industry for all it’s got through cannabis taxes. Don’t believe me? Well, look no further than California’s landmark Proposition 64, also known as the Control, Regulate and Tax Adult Use of Marijuana
Big federal law changes in cannabis regulation are on the horizon. One area where I expect a lot of movement in the coming years is with respect to gun rights. I write on this topic fairly extensively, and you can see my links below. Today I want to talk about what changes I think are
We spill a lot of ink on the Canna Law Blog talking about different types of business entities that cannabis entrepreneurs often use. In most cases though, the choice is between LLC and corporation. It may come as a surprise to some readers that some states have many different subcategories of corporations, including California. Today
I spend a LOT of time blogging about the importance of written cannabis contracts as a general concept (most recently here or here). Today I want to talk about something that a lot of people overlook when it comes to cannabis contract drafting: how the contract will actually be signed. You may think this is
2024 is going to be a crazy year for cannabis businesses and investors. Among many other things, there will be a general election, possible rescheduling to Schedule III of the Controlled Substances Act (CSA), an upcoming Farm Bill that could re-tool how hemp and hemp products are regulated, and maybe even some federal cannabis legislation.
One of the most persistent and common failures in the cannabis industry is using handshakes instead of written cannabis contracts. This is an issue I’ve written about for years (most recently here), and it doesn’t seem like there has been much of a willingness to change. A lot of companies would like to move into
You may think that due diligence is something reserved for business or real estate purchases. But due diligence is also a must for lenders in cannabis loan transactions. I recently wrote a post about what borrowers can look forward to in cannabis loan transaction. Today I want to do a deeper dive into due diligence
