Richard Lee, the former rock band roadie turned medical marijuana advocate, tells the LA Times that he’s bowing out as owner of Oaksterdam University, his pot cultivation school in downtown Oakland. The news comes on the heals of its being raided, along with Lee’s home, by federal agents Monday. He says he’s afraid he’s facing federal drug charges.
Add: He says he plans to transfer the business to new operators. Just how that’ll go remains to be seen. For the moment, the Oaksterdam dispensary remains open, but he’s shutting down his marijuana nursery because his stock of mother plants was confiscated in the raid. An excerpt:
"I've been doing this for a long time. Over 20 years.... I kind of feel like I've done my time," Lee said Thursday. "It's time for others to take over."
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"I never wanted to be the quote unquote leader of the legalization movement," he said in a telephone interview. "I saw myself as just one small soldier in a big war. But I look at it as a battlefield promotion."
