No word on reopening medical marijuana dispensary

New Jersey's sole medical marijuana dispensary closed this summer without warning, leaving registered patients with a tough choice.

They would have to cope with severe nausea, muscle spasms, seizures and pain without the medication, or make a purchase underground, risking arrest.

"It's very frustrating for patients, even tragic," said Roseanne Scotti, director of the New Jersey Drug Policy Alliance, a research group that advocates for the legalization of marijuana. "Many say, thank God for the illegal market." Some patients, she said, are terminally ill and have little time to wait for the Greenleaf Compassion Center to reopen.

Greenleaf, in Montclair, near New York City, stopped selling cannabis in June. It had been open only six months.

It had to "shut temporarily to restock. We're trying to find out when they're reopening," Scotti said, adding that she had not received any return calls for weeks.

The nonprofit's founders, Julio Valentin and Joe Stevens, have not returned several calls from The Inquirer in recent weeks.

Greenleaf's website and Facebook page give no hint that the dispensary is closed - or that it is still in business.

On June 28, Valentin told the Newark Star-Ledger that Greenleaf would be closed for about two weeks "to build up a surplus of quality medicine." He said some of the crop was "inferior" with some plants producing little product.

Those two weeks have turned into nearly two months, and Greenleaf is still not open, patients say.

"I've called the governor's office and the medical marijuana department, and both said they have no answers for me as to what I should do," said Richard Caporusso, a disabled Medford man who uses cannabis for muscle spasms and Crohn's disease.

"They said the black market is there, but there are risks. . . . I have been waiting since June for a call [from Greenleaf] setting up an appointment to come in and make another purchase. I need to medicate daily to function as a normal human being," he said.

Caporusso and another patient, Caroline Glock of Ocean County, sued the state Department of Health last year, saying it had deliberately delayed implementing the program. Glock has since died. Caporusso is seeking a court order directing the department to approve more dispensaries, among other remedies.

Only three of the six dispensaries that the state approved two years ago are growing cannabis. The other two dispensaries are expected to open in the fall.

Greenleaf's closing is another setback in the more-than-three-year-old medical marijuana program. An estimated 500,000 people are eligible to use cannabis because they are terminally ill or suffer from a dozen serious diseases and conditions specified in the program.

Greenleaf has served only 126 of the state's 1,200 registered patients. The rest are on a waiting list. Its operators have said they were overwhelmed with the demand.

In June, a state Health Department spokesperson said Greenleaf informed the agency that it had "limited product for distribution." She said that this came as a surprise and that a new batch of marijuana had recently been tested and was "in the pipeline."

At that time, the department said it had urged Greenleaf to sell all available product.

The department will not comment on the dispensary's status. In an e-mail Tuesday, a spokesperson wrote: "You should contact Greenleaf regarding their plans." Last week, the department said in an e-mail that the availability of medicinal marijuana and the pace of Greenleaf's operation were based on its business capabilities and the independent business decisions of its directors.

Greenleaf's Facebook page, which at one time brimmed with hundreds of postings from patients and links to informative websites about medical marijuana, is now sparse.

Three postings appear, including one that says: "My experiences with GCC [Greenleaf] have been superb. They are kind and professional. I know they are doing all they can within the limits that the doh [Department of Health] has put on us all."

It was written five months ago by Susan Sturner, who went by the name Rowyn Capers.

She has had a change of heart.

"I'm livid," said Sturner, a Lawrenceville woman with glaucoma. She said that she had used cannabis daily since Greenleaf opened in December and that she was "angry and upset" when her medication was abruptly stopped in June.

"The pressure in my eye spiked and caused damage," she said, saying she had to undergo surgery on her left eye. When she called the Health Department to ask if it would help her obtain cannabis, she said she was told that a new dispensary would open in Egg Harbor, Atlantic County, in the fall.

That dispensary, the Compassion Care Foundation, has announced that it expects to open in September or October and that it should have a supply large enough to serve everyone on the waiting list.

Sturner said she recently switched her registration to the Egg Harbor dispensary because she doubts Greenleaf will reopen. She said that Greenleaf's operating hours were reduced in March and that it was open only about two days a week.

Greenleaf also announced in March that it would restrict its new clientele to North Jersey residents. Current customers from South and Central New Jersey would be allowed to come back for refills.

Another dispensary plans to open in about three or four months in a former electronics store in Woodbridge, in Central New Jersey. This month, that dispensary received a permit to begin the three-month growing process.