Speaker 1: When I write, y'all all across the USC contain lights
Speaker 1: day to l a. Come on the California the Valley.
Speaker 1: We represent that Kelly County. So if you're keeping it
Speaker 1: real on your side of your town, you tune into
Speaker 1: Gangster Chronicles Gangsters. He's gonna tell you how we go.
Speaker 1: If I lie my nose will girl like Pinocchio, We're
Speaker 1: gonna tell you to choose in nothing but the Gangster Chronicals.
Speaker 1: This is not your average show. You're now tuned into
Speaker 1: the Reil m C eight Dick James and Big Stails
Speaker 1: the streets. Hello still James eight, y'all negle better give
Speaker 1: me my fine down. I put that on the set.
Speaker 1: I need to go. Give me some water. Mirror my
Speaker 1: motherfucking feet fucking with me. Gangster Chronicles of my ass. Hey,
Speaker 1: Granny her money it gast granny. Y'all know me. Wh
Speaker 1: Thank you for tuning into another episode against the Chronicles.
Speaker 1: Make sure you hit that I heard button subscribe like
Speaker 1: rting comment For my iPhone users, make sure you go
Speaker 1: to that purple button on your phone. That's the Apple
Speaker 1: podcast button. Subscribe to the show. Leave a comment so
Speaker 1: we can keep bringing you this content. You know, despite
Speaker 1: we being illegal under federal laws a Schedule one drug.
Speaker 1: The US legal marijuana industry was estimated at thirteen point
Speaker 1: six billion dollars in two thousand nineteen, creating three hundred
Speaker 1: forty thousand jobs to voted to the handling of marijuana.
Speaker 1: According to the New Frontier data, the total thirty eight
Speaker 1: states in the District of Columbia have legalized marijuana four
Speaker 1: medical use fifteen in which allowed those legally consumer drug
Speaker 1: for recreational use as a two thousand twenty one of
Speaker 1: those people that a pioneer the business is our guests
Speaker 1: and like Virgil Grant, but first I want to introduce
Speaker 1: my homeboys, J Jil you know man, and this is crazy.
Speaker 1: And two thousand four Virgil open the first cannabis shops
Speaker 1: off of the Team Freeway in l A. And later
Speaker 1: he opened several more shops. Successful businessman and everything, doing
Speaker 1: everything proper. But this business became the target of federal
Speaker 1: you know, the whole conflict between the federal and state law.
Speaker 1: So when he legalized and stuff, the federal government has
Speaker 1: studies saying that it's legal. Anyway, his shops kept getting
Speaker 1: cracked and shut down everything, and then he was incarcerated
Speaker 1: for six years and he was releasing two thousand and fourteen,
Speaker 1: that we have them here to day with us inside
Speaker 1: of his wonderful establishment. Thank you for having us over.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, it's a pleasure day having us over. Man.
Speaker 1: So we have a situation that she was doing everything
Speaker 1: the right way, had all your paperwork permits in order,
Speaker 1: wasn't doing no monkey business. But they kept reading the shops. Yes, sir, yes, sir.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know that's uh they did. You know.
Speaker 1: The story that I really tell is that prior to
Speaker 1: my rage, they did about eight to a levin raids
Speaker 1: in West Hollywood and Hollywood right before my rage. We're
Speaker 1: talking probably less than thirty days before I got raided.
Speaker 1: Nobody went to jail, everybody reopened. They raided me thirty
Speaker 1: days later, and guess what, whoa So it's just the difference.
Speaker 1: I mean, you you you had license for this year.
Speaker 1: I'm black, they white. I mean that was really the
Speaker 1: difference because they operated under the same color of the
Speaker 1: law that I operated under, with the same guidelines I
Speaker 1: was operating under. So there was no difference. A matter
Speaker 1: of fact, they were a little bit wilder than me.
Speaker 1: Do you attest that too, Uh, them knowing that you
Speaker 1: were in the weed game before or you know, because
Speaker 1: of the street ties or whatever, or because of the
Speaker 1: color of the skin. What do you feel. I would
Speaker 1: say more the color of the skin because I wasn't
Speaker 1: on the radar with my street ties, always stayed off
Speaker 1: the eight are I mean, yes, I had to uh
Speaker 1: prior state convictions of cannabis prior to that that I
Speaker 1: did state time uh and before the FED time, but
Speaker 1: that wasn't on the radar. I wasn't on the radar
Speaker 1: as active street sALS. So they had to get you.
Speaker 1: They had to prove. I mean, you know, I I
Speaker 1: don't know uh if it was a point to prove
Speaker 1: or if it was just we gotta take another brother down. Now.
Speaker 1: You gotta keep in mind, I had six locations at
Speaker 1: this time, so I'm moving stronger than anybody in the industry,
Speaker 1: stretching from Compton to the valley. So, um, you know,
Speaker 1: all of that played the factor. Uh, the fact that
Speaker 1: when the FEDS investigated me, and I knew they was
Speaker 1: investigating me, they was following me around. I've seen him
Speaker 1: sitting on Long Beach Boulevard at the right aid. You
Speaker 1: know that the video cameras out and you know I
Speaker 1: could see them. Um. I just continued to operate, operate everything,
Speaker 1: you know, right mate. I didn't you know, cutting no corners.
Speaker 1: I didn't do no backdoor deals or nothing like that,
Speaker 1: you know. But they still came at me. So, uh,
Speaker 1: they charged me with forty one counts uh conspiracy to
Speaker 1: um uh conspiracy to distribute a hundred kilograms and more
Speaker 1: of marijuana th AC product promotional uh, money laundry and
Speaker 1: money laundry. So when it was when it was all
Speaker 1: said and done, then what they did is they grabbed
Speaker 1: my wife. Right. So this was the kicker. She never
Speaker 1: even she worked for Triple A. She never even worked
Speaker 1: at the stores, even bend in the stores, running the
Speaker 1: stores like that, you know. But they pulled her in
Speaker 1: to get me to go on and take a deal
Speaker 1: because they knew I was getting ready to fight them
Speaker 1: all the way and I had to support of the industry,
Speaker 1: and they knew that. And the industry didn't look like me,
Speaker 1: so I had to support of a bunch of white
Speaker 1: people that was backing me up. When we were doing
Speaker 1: a rally in front of the Federal building, they you know,
Speaker 1: in one of the fists told me, said, I've seen
Speaker 1: you out there in your suit in front of the
Speaker 1: Federal Building rally and with your you know, with your
Speaker 1: your your activists, you know, cannabis activists. You know. So
Speaker 1: they knew already what I was about politically, uh, in
Speaker 1: the industry and as an owner operator. You see what
Speaker 1: I'm saying. So, um, you know, yeah, yeah, absolutely. But shoot,
Speaker 1: they only stayed on me because it was simple. They
Speaker 1: only stayed on me forty something day, forty seven days.
Speaker 1: Like their investigation was literally forty seven days, which means
Speaker 1: you didn't have nothing to investigate. You see me go
Speaker 1: to Crenshaw, You see me go to my Compton store.
Speaker 1: You see me go to my Guardina store. You see
Speaker 1: me go to my downtown store. And you see me
Speaker 1: take my kids to school in the morning. Right, So
Speaker 1: this is all they seeing what I'm doing that I'm not,
Speaker 1: you know, meeting somebody in the back alley or nothing
Speaker 1: like that. Under the table, under the table deals. You know,
Speaker 1: when they when they arrested me, when they actually picked
Speaker 1: me up, I had my five daughters in the car
Speaker 1: taking them to school, and they pulled me over. They
Speaker 1: had Carson shaff I was in Carson, they had a
Speaker 1: Carson share of pulled me over and then they he
Speaker 1: uh said, I can't tell you much, but I already
Speaker 1: knew what the deal was. I already knew when they
Speaker 1: pulled me over and there was no traffic stop, for
Speaker 1: no reason to pull me over. It just hit me, Oh,
Speaker 1: they're here for me. This is what this is about. Right,
Speaker 1: So then they handed me, he cuffed me, put me
Speaker 1: in the backseat of the car, took me from my kids,
Speaker 1: and I'm sure they got on their cell phone, started
Speaker 1: calling up the yant day grandmom and so on and
Speaker 1: so forth, and handed me off to the fiends and they,
Speaker 1: you know, traded cuffs on me and then put me
Speaker 1: in the car with the leading agent because he wanted
Speaker 1: to be the one to bring me in, which name
Speaker 1: was Patrick Kelly. So you know he's yeah, he's advanced
Speaker 1: his career like he was doing uh what do you
Speaker 1: call it, uh for the president. He was bodyguarden for
Speaker 1: the president and stuff like that secret serve. So he
Speaker 1: is a career. A lot of people from the judge,
Speaker 1: his career catapultic from this um Chris Louis Witch and
Speaker 1: I remember all these casts by first and last name
Speaker 1: from my case. He became a judge, the a USA
Speaker 1: became a judge. Um, and then uh, I mean just
Speaker 1: everybody that was involved in that case, UH was able
Speaker 1: to from what they did, so a situation more than
Speaker 1: what it was, more than what it was licensed. You
Speaker 1: you was doing everything that you didn't You didn't have
Speaker 1: new problem, knew hanging out new bullish it and none
Speaker 1: of that. You wouldn't even know I was there. If
Speaker 1: you didn't know I was there, Like you know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying, everybody knew that that was the only there
Speaker 1: was the only dispensary Incomftent. First, First of all, it
Speaker 1: was only dispensary south of the ten freeway, so long
Speaker 1: Beach hadn't opened up south Gate and uh beil Or
Speaker 1: made when none of those even existed. We're talking two
Speaker 1: thousand and four, so we're talking when there were very
Speaker 1: few shops even in the industry. And I was one
Speaker 1: of the first Well you know, I know you spoke
Speaker 1: upon your prior rest before that, but you being a
Speaker 1: legal business owner that should have negated all the other stuff.
Speaker 1: How did they think they had the right, Like out
Speaker 1: of all these people they previously popped, no one went
Speaker 1: to jail, but she went to jail. Do you think
Speaker 1: it possibly be had been some kind of collusion with
Speaker 1: between them and something when the White shops, maybe somebody
Speaker 1: that was jealous of your success, possibly turning you in. Um.
Speaker 1: I can say that when I went at the court,
Speaker 1: that judge was hell been on me going to jail
Speaker 1: period because the questions he asked and the answers he got.
Speaker 1: So let me explain this. When I went to jail
Speaker 1: the first time, they arrested me and my wife because
Speaker 1: she had no criminal history. She got out on on
Speaker 1: a signature bond. I had to build out two hundred
Speaker 1: fifty thousand dollars bill. So I build out took me
Speaker 1: thirty days because they have to appraise your house. They
Speaker 1: got to make sure the money is clean money and
Speaker 1: so on and so forth. So I build out thirty
Speaker 1: days later and was on pre trial. And so as
Speaker 1: I was on pre trial, I was still circulating through
Speaker 1: my shops. My shops were back opened up and running,
Speaker 1: and I'm circulating through my shops. So they come and
Speaker 1: catch me at my Guardena store right getting opening up,
Speaker 1: going into my Guardena store. And then next thing you know,
Speaker 1: I and here's something banging on the door. I'm thinking
Speaker 1: one of the customers. I look up at my video
Speaker 1: camera and I see him in riot again, and I
Speaker 1: look at the back door right because I'm like, I
Speaker 1: can hit this back door. You know, I've been running
Speaker 1: track off my life. I was. I was Lynnwood's number
Speaker 1: one quarter millar and hurdler. You feel me. So I
Speaker 1: was like, okay, it's still hey man, I didn't ran before,
Speaker 1: so I'm not tripping right, So I said, this is
Speaker 1: the figs. They know. They didn't bend everywhere. They didn't
Speaker 1: have been in my house. They know who I am,
Speaker 1: no where I'm all right, let me just go on
Speaker 1: and see what this is about. So open up the door. Uh.
Speaker 1: They get me on the ground. The leading agent, Chris
Speaker 1: Louis again. It's our second time meeting each other once again.
Speaker 1: The first time when he cut me, the second time
Speaker 1: when he recovered me right. So, um, he looked down,
Speaker 1: he said, Virgil, and then a turnament. Uh, turn up
Speaker 1: and look at him and say yeah, get him up
Speaker 1: off the floor, get inside and close the store up.
Speaker 1: So he wanted everybody inside like nothing ever happened. Um
Speaker 1: and pulled me inside and then they begin to take
Speaker 1: all the product out the store. Long story short. When
Speaker 1: I go to when I go to in front of
Speaker 1: the judge, the judge say, was there anything in his
Speaker 1: pre trial conditions saying that the stores couldn't be open
Speaker 1: while he's on pre trial? No, you're honor, So was
Speaker 1: there anything in his pre trial conditions saying he couldn't
Speaker 1: be at his stores while on pre trial? No, you're honor.
Speaker 1: So I'm thinking, Ship, I'm good. I'm about to get out. Man,
Speaker 1: they kept my ass locked up. I didn't that no
Speaker 1: matter what. The judge even asked the question to my
Speaker 1: attorney was he licensed in every one of his locations?
Speaker 1: And the judge, I mean my attorney was like, yes,
Speaker 1: here is licenses right here. I'm thinking, oh, this is this?
Speaker 1: Is it right here? All right? The judge understand. Ship.
Speaker 1: They took my ass back in that cell when it
Speaker 1: was all said and done, and uh fought it from
Speaker 1: the inside. Yeah, it was obvious. It was obvious, you know,
Speaker 1: because after all of that, it was it was still
Speaker 1: and then Obama put out the cold memo, the cold memo.
Speaker 1: This was right, I'm still in under the Obama administration,
Speaker 1: but he bring the cold memoir judgement trying to hear
Speaker 1: none of that. I couldn't say medical, I couldn't say patients.
Speaker 1: I could not use that language of terminology in federal court.
Speaker 1: Why because it is a scheduled one drug. They don't
Speaker 1: give a damn about medical marijuana. And could you explain
Speaker 1: to the people out there that may not be familiar
Speaker 1: with the schedules like schule on. So let me let
Speaker 1: me just be clear about this. Marijuana is a Schedule
Speaker 1: one drug. Cocaine, meth and fed aine and everything else
Speaker 1: a schedule too. Why so you understand? Why so because
Speaker 1: they want to keep it where they want to keep it.
Speaker 1: The government when you say that marijuana gives the most
Speaker 1: danger risk drug ever, I mean, how soft because they
Speaker 1: can't control it the way they truly want to control it.
Speaker 1: So understanding that they got to put it in a
Speaker 1: category that they can control it in and make it
Speaker 1: a Schedule one drug. Now they have control of it
Speaker 1: because they can put you in jail if they don't
Speaker 1: want you dealing it, selling it, growing it, or using it.
Speaker 1: You see what I'm saying. So that's how they are.
Speaker 1: They are controlling it. But we don't really deep dive
Speaker 1: into that. So this is how they keep control of
Speaker 1: everything that we do. They make a law that say
Speaker 1: you can't do it. Now they're control it. And now
Speaker 1: they ca your grass up for doing so, going to
Speaker 1: jail and getting six years. They took you away from
Speaker 1: your fire girls. Yes, I mean did they make you like?
Speaker 1: Did they push you? Did that? How you like me?
Speaker 1: It gets the world now, man? Uh So I was
Speaker 1: angry my first three years in prison. I when I
Speaker 1: first got there, I went to the whole maybe about
Speaker 1: a week or two later because I was CEO came
Speaker 1: at me and I just wasn't trying to hear it.
Speaker 1: Mmy man, that's that just set me off that you
Speaker 1: want to call me an m mate. Not no, I'm
Speaker 1: not your inmate. Man, I got a name, you gotta name.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call you by your name. I got a name.
Speaker 1: You called me by my name. Ain't your mmate? You
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying. So here we're going back and
Speaker 1: I was like, well, I mean what you're saying. You know,
Speaker 1: I was just on that on that page, not trying
Speaker 1: to hear nothing. They sent me to the whole. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I was piste off. I was piste off more so
Speaker 1: because while I was in prison, I was watching TV
Speaker 1: and the news, and I'm watching everybody else on on
Speaker 1: on the you know, channel seven and eleven five and
Speaker 1: so on and so forth, and they're at their shops,
Speaker 1: behind their counters with the weed in their hand. And
Speaker 1: I'm like, ship, I'm in jail and they're doing the
Speaker 1: same thing I was doing exactly. But while I'm hearing
Speaker 1: why they out either we're all gonna be in jail,
Speaker 1: or nobody gonna be in jail. If it's letting you know,
Speaker 1: let's let's keep it fair. But I sat in jail
Speaker 1: watching all those people happy making money at their shops. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was piste off in virtual Let me ask you
Speaker 1: a question. What that being said. They brought up a
Speaker 1: great point. You got locked up. It is other people
Speaker 1: that was in the streets doing the same thing he
Speaker 1: was doing. They didn't look at that at all, obviously
Speaker 1: not because I did every bit of that six years.
Speaker 1: And it's almost like just the rules applying to certain people. Well,
Speaker 1: I didn't give If I'm sitting there doing ten fifteen
Speaker 1: years from marijuana, I don't give a mounting whatever. Once
Speaker 1: you legalize that, now you're holding me up under my
Speaker 1: will let me go up out of here. But if
Speaker 1: they did this right here, that's basically saying they wrong.
Speaker 1: You can come at him, you can sume and and
Speaker 1: here you are. But they don't want to do that.
Speaker 1: But what you call that that they make you sign
Speaker 1: the paper they let you out so you don't come
Speaker 1: back and sume exactly. Yeah, they actually sign your rights away.
Speaker 1: They signed any of your field rights or anything. You
Speaker 1: sign that a way, so you can't now they Um,
Speaker 1: it was just basically a done deal when they the
Speaker 1: judge made it very clear to me, uh that I
Speaker 1: was not going home and that he was gonna give
Speaker 1: me them seventy two months, you know. Um, and that's
Speaker 1: what he said, you know. Um he was you know,
Speaker 1: seventy two months was what he felt I deserve for
Speaker 1: owning legal shops license and legal shops. So you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: I missed three of my daughters graduations from high school. Um.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I was kind of piste off what you
Speaker 1: had the right to be. I think anybody would be,
Speaker 1: uh in that situation, especially when you're following the rules
Speaker 1: and ship you give me six years and you're telling
Speaker 1: me you ain't gonna let me go but then you
Speaker 1: tell me I don't give If you do got your
Speaker 1: license and ship, I'm still give you six years because
Speaker 1: you're a black man and you gotta do stuff. Should
Speaker 1: he not be successful? Should he not? If I was
Speaker 1: in there illegal? Like they got this one on Atlantic
Speaker 1: and uh drown in Atlantic? Trap? Shot? Oh that mother man.
Speaker 1: I watched them bang the door down, put everybody out,
Speaker 1: taking the jail before the police left. These motherfucker's coming
Speaker 1: right back and then open back up. Shot they come back.
Speaker 1: This time, they knock, they take the bar, door, the
Speaker 1: lights and everything outside of that motherfucker. That motherfucker opened
Speaker 1: right now in today now. But yeah, that's some that's
Speaker 1: some cold ship that that tell you I don't have
Speaker 1: no faith in the system because they're gonna do you
Speaker 1: how they wanted to do you, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: And I would have been trying to do some legal ship.
Speaker 1: How can I get out of this situation? We we
Speaker 1: interviewed a young man that broke out of prison, you
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying, because he wanted to be with
Speaker 1: his daughter. And you know some of us just sitting
Speaker 1: there and I'm gonna do this time, you know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying, but we got choices, didn't They didn't give
Speaker 1: you any No, they didn't give me any any choices.
Speaker 1: So at that point I knew that this was time
Speaker 1: that I had to do. But I was gonna do
Speaker 1: the time under my terms, not under the under the
Speaker 1: system's terms. So what I what I mean by that
Speaker 1: is that I rejected everything that the system had to
Speaker 1: give me, everything that the system wanted to do. They
Speaker 1: kick me out the drug program because I wouldn't conform,
Speaker 1: so I didn't get a year off. Oh well, um,
Speaker 1: you know there were when I when I say conformed,
Speaker 1: the system has a way, and I look at it
Speaker 1: as as petty pleasures. Come Thanksgiving, they want to give
Speaker 1: you this big turkey dinner, and you're supposed to be
Speaker 1: happy and smiling that they gave you a turkey dinner,
Speaker 1: but you locked up in prison. You know what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: Come uh New Year's or the fourth of July, you're
Speaker 1: getting barbecue ribs. You know I would every time those
Speaker 1: holidays came up, I walked in that child hall, look, hey,
Speaker 1: who want this handed to him? And walk out? I
Speaker 1: don't need y'all ship. I'm here under my I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm here cause y'all basically holding me hostage under my
Speaker 1: own free you know, this is against my own free will.
Speaker 1: And that's how I took my time and dealt with
Speaker 1: my time. But I stayed thinking about what I was
Speaker 1: gonna do. When I got home and they asked me,
Speaker 1: like my last week, two weeks, you know, I'm walking
Speaker 1: the track with a couple of cats, and they say, man,
Speaker 1: what you're gonna through? Said ship, Well, what you think
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying? You do? You ask elect
Speaker 1: Electrician that he'd been in the game thirty years during Electrician,
Speaker 1: you know, as electrician, what you're gonna do when you
Speaker 1: get He going back to what he know his profession.
Speaker 1: And so when I hit the when I hit the ground,
Speaker 1: the first thing I did was made sure I jumped
Speaker 1: back into the industry. I got politically involved and connected
Speaker 1: once again, and I started crafting policy for the city
Speaker 1: of Los Angeles. I brought the whole industry together, and
Speaker 1: I did this crazy as it sounds, I did this,
Speaker 1: Uh as Snoopze compound. He don't even know that because
Speaker 1: my office was in his compound. When I got home,
Speaker 1: it was me and Donnie and and and I was
Speaker 1: using snooze office. I mean his compound as where my
Speaker 1: office was, so I would go there every other day
Speaker 1: or whatnot. I brought the whole industry, all the heads
Speaker 1: of of of presidents of each organization within the cannabis industry.
Speaker 1: I bought him under that roof and said, this is
Speaker 1: what we gotta do in order for us to make
Speaker 1: sure that what happened to me and others in the
Speaker 1: industry don't happen again. Y'all with me, They say, we
Speaker 1: got you. I said, all right, y'all, just follow my
Speaker 1: league and I guarantee you I'm gonna take you over
Speaker 1: the finish line. Eighteen months later, I passed Measure M
Speaker 1: in the City of Los Angeles at eighty point four
Speaker 1: eight point four percent. That's unheard of. Now. What the
Speaker 1: kicker is It was done on the off election. That
Speaker 1: ain't never been done in the history of America. So me,
Speaker 1: a black man who brought all of these white organizations
Speaker 1: together to make this push for the city of Los Angeles.
Speaker 1: But I'm always keeping the back of my mind. The
Speaker 1: reason I'm on the in the front of this line
Speaker 1: is because I'm representing for us. You see what I'm
Speaker 1: saying So my whole goal is to get everybody to
Speaker 1: support me so I can open up some doors for us. Right,
Speaker 1: So I created the program called Social Equity. Social Equity
Speaker 1: is a program to make sure that people of color
Speaker 1: can participate in the cannabis industry, regardless of your cannabis felony,
Speaker 1: a misdemeanor. Right, So I'm thinking of a real player,
Speaker 1: like I'm thinking that the casts out there, Ship City,
Speaker 1: we grew up in ship Damn, they have everybody up
Speaker 1: and they got a felony or missing meter. So if
Speaker 1: I allow that to happen, that's knocking my whole city
Speaker 1: out of the box. Can't have that. So how do
Speaker 1: I strategically put myself in position align everybody to make
Speaker 1: sure that I take care of my people at the
Speaker 1: end of the day. And by the grace of God,
Speaker 1: I did it. And that's why social equity exists in
Speaker 1: the City of l A. Right. Exactly, you have to
Speaker 1: be able to, you know, switch the game on him.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying, to change and turn that
Speaker 1: you know that piste off mentality and something that's just
Speaker 1: gonna slap him on fuer right back in the face
Speaker 1: with that reality. Exactly. You know not to cut you off,
Speaker 1: but that story is just crazy for you to go
Speaker 1: through all that. Please tell me at the end of
Speaker 1: the day somebody from some higher court came and says
Speaker 1: they had to take care of you and compensates you. No,
Speaker 1: absolutely not, absolutely not nobody, um, not even an apolishy No.
Speaker 1: I still I still have it on my record, except
Speaker 1: for my state charges. I wouldn't have those expunged because
Speaker 1: of course when I did my time, I went to
Speaker 1: fire camp. And if you do any selfless act for
Speaker 1: the state, if you do any any selfless act for
Speaker 1: the state, uh, they will uh expunge your record. They
Speaker 1: will allow you to uh apply and have your record
Speaker 1: expunge and and uh doing uh um um the uh
Speaker 1: fire camp. That's what That's what that was. So um yeah.
Speaker 1: But Noine, nobody was gonna come to me and and
Speaker 1: and say or tell me or do anything for me.
Speaker 1: That was not gonna happen under no circumstances. So um yeah, no,
Speaker 1: it um to to really come at that question direct.
Speaker 1: I didn't expect nobody to do nothing for me. I
Speaker 1: ain't never expected nobody the system, damn. So don't expect
Speaker 1: them to do nothing for me. I always expect them
Speaker 1: to do something to me, but never something for me.
Speaker 1: Do you know what I'm saying? So as long as
Speaker 1: I don't trick myself, and the way I didn't trick myself,
Speaker 1: I watched a lot of casts tricked themselves up in
Speaker 1: that that that that situation, in that system. I watched
Speaker 1: a lot of casts tricked themselves. I never got caught
Speaker 1: up in that. How do you do They bought into
Speaker 1: the system a lot. I'm bought into the system in
Speaker 1: so many different ways for so many different reasons. But
Speaker 1: I did not allow myself to buy into the system
Speaker 1: like you got cats in there who look at what
Speaker 1: they did and felt what they did was wrong. He
Speaker 1: was trying to feed your family. What's wrong about that?
Speaker 1: You was trying to eat like everybody else? What's wrong
Speaker 1: about that? You? These were the tools that was given
Speaker 1: to you because you weren't given the same avenues as
Speaker 1: as Johnny was given. You know what I'm saying, So
Speaker 1: you can't trick yourself into believing I never felt I
Speaker 1: did anything wrong. To this day, I haven't done nothing wrong.
Speaker 1: Why did because you re licensed me? I got re
Speaker 1: licensed when I got home by the city in the state.
Speaker 1: So then what did I do wrong? Because so it
Speaker 1: just confirmed my belief to start with, you went to
Speaker 1: jail and had license, but when you got out, he
Speaker 1: was able to google get the same license you had.
Speaker 1: I was re licensed under the new ordinance. Keep in
Speaker 1: mind I played the and creating that ordinance too. But
Speaker 1: I got licensed under the new ordinance by the city
Speaker 1: in the state of California as a convicted felon so
Speaker 1: to speak, which I don't even carry that title, as
Speaker 1: someone that that really was taken away from his family
Speaker 1: and locked up ship to a slave for the state
Speaker 1: for six years exactly. And just to say all that,
Speaker 1: because the laws of course are so different now thanks
Speaker 1: in part the sacrifices like brothers like you. Unfortunately, but
Speaker 1: they can't get away with this ship man. They did, ye,
Speaker 1: I applaud him because I would be. So you know,
Speaker 1: that's six years is gone, that's right, and they just
Speaker 1: get the skate off. It's kind of You can either
Speaker 1: either go after and try to fight them, which that's
Speaker 1: your long as battle, or you can pick up where
Speaker 1: you left off say funk that I didn't did it,
Speaker 1: and then had him in chatting that you had and
Speaker 1: say I'm going to create it did right here right
Speaker 1: damn yea they laugh from it's a done deal. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and and always look at it. You deal what you
Speaker 1: could do. You shot your shot, You got that off.
Speaker 1: But guess what, I'm back. You know what I'm saying
Speaker 1: right now, because he was in sort of in so
Speaker 1: many ways, he was the we're gonna make an example
Speaker 1: out of this motherfucker yeah type of you get me,
Speaker 1: even though it's the other cats in the motherfucking business
Speaker 1: doing anything. He's the black man from Compton. You know,
Speaker 1: we know about what's going down, so we can't have that.
Speaker 1: You know that happens at the time anybody's successful of
Speaker 1: our color ship. But you gotta you gotta remember one thing.
Speaker 1: They took me out the game for six years. It
Speaker 1: allowed Madman to come in the game. It allowed all
Speaker 1: these cookies to come in the game. It allowed these
Speaker 1: other bigger businesses to come into the game, and all
Speaker 1: of the all of this other corporate money to come
Speaker 1: into the game while I was gone for six years.
Speaker 1: So had had just let's just say they didn't take
Speaker 1: me away, I'd be the biggest thing in the industry rightly.
Speaker 1: I man Man wouldn't even be able to eat my lunch,
Speaker 1: uh scraps off my table because I'd be running everything.
Speaker 1: I had six stores in two thousand five six locations.
Speaker 1: How many of you think I would have had had
Speaker 1: I stayed in the game. Oh, I'd have tried to
Speaker 1: eat up everything that was in my way. It's sort
Speaker 1: of like it was a motherfucking plan. You can get me,
Speaker 1: Like they got a plan because they know other motherfucker's
Speaker 1: is on the come up or want to get into
Speaker 1: the business. So we gotta stop that. We gotta stop
Speaker 1: him because we know Virgil is on the rise right now.
Speaker 1: It's just like the pharmacies mans trying to out and
Speaker 1: and and then do yours because there's big money that,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. So you know you have
Speaker 1: to be careful, which you didn't see it coming, you
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying. Here, I am. I got all
Speaker 1: my licenses and ship up here, everything they need if
Speaker 1: they walk in this motherfucking daughter, but still I get handcuffed.
Speaker 1: All these other motherfucker's got the same ship here. They
Speaker 1: got drown out, but they go back into their shops.
Speaker 1: I'm the only motherfucker to go to Jim, you don't
Speaker 1: see the bullshit in this Yes, bullshit and hypocrisy, you know.
Speaker 1: And it's just like like I'm sitting up here literally, man,
Speaker 1: I'm mad for you and I'm upset because they do
Speaker 1: him like that. That means that anytime they can go
Speaker 1: grab one of us worse our sons, it's almost like
Speaker 1: you to no win situation. That's why the just system
Speaker 1: as a whole just needs a a massive overhaul because
Speaker 1: that wasn't that was kidnapping. Yeah, because it's been designing
Speaker 1: the funk us over. That's the problem. The system has
Speaker 1: always been designed to suck us over, especially us of color,
Speaker 1: who in the situations of you know, we can calmed
Speaker 1: and we've long be so central wherever we from. I
Speaker 1: think it was a business thing where you probably ask
Speaker 1: some people needed to get you out of the way
Speaker 1: and spent a lot of money to get you out
Speaker 1: of the way so they can implement some of the
Speaker 1: ship that they had implemented. Gender Well, it was the
Speaker 1: people that was glad I was gone, and that's for
Speaker 1: sure because I was You keep in mind Compton to
Speaker 1: the Valley, so I got six stores at one on Compton,
Speaker 1: at one on Crenshawn hundred forty one. I had one
Speaker 1: on forty seven in Crenshaw. I had one on Uh
Speaker 1: sixteenth in Maple in downtown. I had one on Western
Speaker 1: and Maplewood in Koreatown. And I had one on some
Speaker 1: Povid and Sherman Way in the valley. So I was
Speaker 1: covering a line going from Compton to the valley, and
Speaker 1: people would stay shopping in between my locations because they
Speaker 1: know one at the best weed, at the reasonable price
Speaker 1: and great customer service. So I provid I did everything
Speaker 1: that other shops didn't think to provide. You know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying. When you came in my shop, it was
Speaker 1: very different. So I had I would I went to
Speaker 1: and how I did this As I went to other
Speaker 1: people's shops, and I watched how they did, they think,
Speaker 1: and I saw the things that I didn't like. I
Speaker 1: saw the things that people didn't like, and I made
Speaker 1: sure I didn't do those in my shop. So that's
Speaker 1: what made me better. UM one year into my business,
Speaker 1: less than one year into my business, I was named
Speaker 1: as a number one store in southern California, the Compton Store,
Speaker 1: which was my goal to try to do that. I
Speaker 1: can be somebody from Compton and do it better than
Speaker 1: anybody in the industry, you know what I'm saying, because
Speaker 1: they don't. They don't think we can right there. That's
Speaker 1: why they had to get him out the way because
Speaker 1: you just you just heard it, and he represents everything
Speaker 1: they fear. He's a dude from the community. Right then
Speaker 1: the community like Mexican other whatever, they would come and
Speaker 1: support because it's right because the community and dollars right there.
Speaker 1: So yeah, it was a massive conspiracy of the league,
Speaker 1: man that you just think like this to it. Like
Speaker 1: you said, it was a lot of us probably spending
Speaker 1: money and the people spending money to give me. Now
Speaker 1: when you you know, that's just like motherfucker when you're
Speaker 1: making the records or some ship when you can sail
Speaker 1: to us. But when you start going over to that
Speaker 1: pop side, motherfucker boy, you you hit another level. You
Speaker 1: got you got, you got a cracking and you really
Speaker 1: got the motherfucker when you got the motherfucker other people.
Speaker 1: Let me tell you something, might have more white folks
Speaker 1: coming to the confant than the courthouse, you know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying, The court coming down and they feel they're
Speaker 1: getting some official Let me ask you this, man, because
Speaker 1: you were around your brother man for you to rebound
Speaker 1: from what you did. Man, I said, Lucas, this is
Speaker 1: a beautiful location. How did you get started talking about Yeah? Yeah, yeah, absolutely, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's open book. Um. I started selling out the liquor store,
Speaker 1: my Daddy's liquor store on a Hunted twenty four for Wilmington. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. So, um, that's where I started.
Speaker 1: And with that, I begin to expand my territory because
Speaker 1: we had the Rose Cran store, we had the Compton store.
Speaker 1: And I'm a I'm a neutral cat to get along
Speaker 1: with everybody, So I had I had all sides of Compton.
Speaker 1: I had Joe neighborhood. You know what I'm saying, everybody
Speaker 1: over there that was selling me, Spanky Jews Clip, everybody.
Speaker 1: All the cats they know, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: I had all the cats over man. You know, I
Speaker 1: was versed in retail, so it just made sense to
Speaker 1: me because it was what I was already doing, but
Speaker 1: it was in something that I really wanted to do,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. So between those two liquors stores,
Speaker 1: I was able to touch a lot of people and
Speaker 1: then you gotta keep in mind we're talking late eighties
Speaker 1: all the way through the nineties and then into the
Speaker 1: two thousand's. So if we look at that era, game
Speaker 1: banging was on the rise in the nineties, crack selling
Speaker 1: was on the rise in the nineties, and then ninety
Speaker 1: two was the l A l A Riot, So you
Speaker 1: gotta keep in mind what the volatility was going on
Speaker 1: around there. And I was still functioning through every community
Speaker 1: I'm talking about it. You can't name a spot that
Speaker 1: sold we Nord uh Street, Uh the earthquake sounds uh,
Speaker 1: stripe on wheelm me to. You can't name a spot
Speaker 1: or a hood that I did not have weed selling
Speaker 1: it because that was my goal. I was always kind
Speaker 1: of joked with myself, like Frank White said in the
Speaker 1: King of New York, if a nickelbag has sold in
Speaker 1: Central Park, I won't like the nickel was sold in Compton,
Speaker 1: I won't then. And because dope selling was the thing
Speaker 1: to do back then, crack all the d boys came
Speaker 1: to see me because guess what when they go bounce
Speaker 1: out of town at Denver, the Oklahoma and all the
Speaker 1: places they need we because they can't get no good
Speaker 1: out there, so they come to me. So I'm talking
Speaker 1: about all the heavyweight players in Compton through those eras,
Speaker 1: and y'all know them. They all came to that story
Speaker 1: when you move that way, but when you got legit.
Speaker 1: But see, the thing was is that my name wasn't
Speaker 1: my name. I wasn't who I was when you walk
Speaker 1: into the liquor store. You couldn't approach me talking about
Speaker 1: Oh I hey man, I heard you got that bud Yeah,
Speaker 1: I do bud Light, bud wise, Yeah, doing number five.
Speaker 1: There you go. You know what I'm saying. But you
Speaker 1: couldn't approach me with that foolishness because I don't know
Speaker 1: what you're talking about. Homie. Ain't nothing popping like that here.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying. And so the with that,
Speaker 1: I began to create a different atmosphere for myself. My
Speaker 1: goal was to deal with who's running this spot, who's
Speaker 1: running this hood. That's who I need to talk to,
Speaker 1: That's who I need to be dealing with. And because
Speaker 1: I I went to Lynnwood, I grew up in Compton,
Speaker 1: then moved into Lynnwood. For a while it I was
Speaker 1: known all over. I was, like I say, number one
Speaker 1: athlete quarter Millar and Hurdler, So a little popularity was
Speaker 1: there running my daddy's liquor store. Then I begin to
Speaker 1: start familiarizing myself with every neighborhood in Coompting, not just
Speaker 1: some of the hoods, every neighborhood, you see what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: And so getting to know who was running, who was
Speaker 1: shaking and moving in those neighborhoods, who was the the
Speaker 1: headballer over there? I may that my business to to
Speaker 1: to build relationships. Uh in Wat's all three projects and
Speaker 1: made it my business. Broadways, Main Streets, Avalons sixties eight seven.
Speaker 1: I'm telling you it was my goal to make sure
Speaker 1: that I covered as much territory as I could. And
Speaker 1: because if this is what I'm gonna do, one thing,
Speaker 1: my mama told me, whatever you do, you be the
Speaker 1: best at it. If you're gonna be a clown, you
Speaker 1: be the best clown. Well, I made it to be
Speaker 1: the best weed shaker and mover on the east side
Speaker 1: back in its lovely Yeah. So how many shops you
Speaker 1: got down? Have three shops? Yes, three shops? I want
Speaker 1: to talk about your excellent product here? Okay, what's this?
Speaker 1: Because you know, for all those out there not TV.
Speaker 1: I thought, you know, I thought I smoked the best
Speaker 1: weed our life the week. Whatever. I've been telling you
Speaker 1: this right here? What if I've been telling this right
Speaker 1: here and I'm gonna tell you the thing I like
Speaker 1: about it. I'm nice and high, but I don't feel
Speaker 1: out of control like I'm telling you. Know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: I called you know what I mean, and it's you know,
Speaker 1: it's excellent for the back pain some kids. I'm doing
Speaker 1: this experiment, so you know this is you know, this
Speaker 1: is for test research purposes. I had the research that
Speaker 1: you know, and I don't thinate everything. So something that's
Speaker 1: unique about your situation. I noticed your retail. You have
Speaker 1: your ownline and you do distribution to it if I'm correct,
Speaker 1: correct cultivation. Um, it took a lot to go. You
Speaker 1: know you don't that's like, that's a lot of agriculture
Speaker 1: involved and all kind of others. You gotta know your ship.
Speaker 1: You gotta know your ship. This is just not like, um,
Speaker 1: the logistics to go into something like this is just
Speaker 1: you know, you put this together despite being knocked down
Speaker 1: for six years. Yes. Um, one thing they could do
Speaker 1: is they could take away your freedom, but they can't
Speaker 1: take away your mind. And so what I made sure
Speaker 1: is that my mind stayed sharp while I was in prison.
Speaker 1: I still uh did study, and I still stayed abreast
Speaker 1: on what the industry was doing. I made sure I
Speaker 1: had advocates sent me a lot of information to keep
Speaker 1: me up to date on what was going on in
Speaker 1: the cannabis industry. So I never fell off of my
Speaker 1: craft and what I do. And mentally, I knew what
Speaker 1: I was coming home to do. You see what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: And so you gotta keep you You take advantage of
Speaker 1: every opportunity to sharpen your skills and your tools. Well,
Speaker 1: for me, it was to think was to sit back
Speaker 1: and plan what my next move is once I'm released.
Speaker 1: Always said, all they got to do is open that
Speaker 1: door and I'll show you what I can do. You know,
Speaker 1: the thing is is I'm good at what I do.
Speaker 1: You know, Um, I don't know anybody that that move
Speaker 1: is much weed and covered as much territory in the
Speaker 1: areas that I've been in, Like I was in the
Speaker 1: roughest areas. And look at me, I ain't no billy
Speaker 1: badass you on some low key ship, you know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying. And so like and and you know when
Speaker 1: I talk about the neighborhoods that I moved through, like
Speaker 1: l A castaid, I was dealing with im like, hey man,
Speaker 1: won't you know, hey man, I need to grab some
Speaker 1: suss up. I'll be at the liquor store. Come to
Speaker 1: the stuff. Man, we ain't coming to Compton over there.
Speaker 1: L A Cash were not want to come over there
Speaker 1: to Compton, not on a hund four from Wilmington. They
Speaker 1: didn't want no parts of it. Right. I used to
Speaker 1: tell them, I said, man, you good. Just tell them
Speaker 1: you're coming to see me, and they like you sure,
Speaker 1: I see yeah, Man, just tell them you're coming to
Speaker 1: see me and you're good. And you know people will
Speaker 1: hit them up in the parking. I'm the company Sea
Speaker 1: Bird And that was good. No where can people find this?
Speaker 1: You said, you've got six locations at three three vocations.
Speaker 1: So I have one on seventy four and Crenshaw seventy
Speaker 1: four fifteen Crenshaw Boulevard. And then I have one uh
Speaker 1: sixteen o one South Soto Street in Boil Heights, Uh,
Speaker 1: the old Sears Building. I'm right next to the Old
Speaker 1: Sears building off of Soto and Olympic. And then I
Speaker 1: have one off of mail rolls. Uh six five four
Speaker 1: North Manhattan place, just right off of mail Rolls in
Speaker 1: Western We got to create against the chronicles discount codes
Speaker 1: they come in there. Absolutely absolutely absolutely, And so you know,
Speaker 1: I beg you're talking about your bringers. These are cultivated
Speaker 1: by you. Yes, sir, did you have right there in
Speaker 1: this one right here? That's a hybrid And then the
Speaker 1: straining is on the back. How many different do you have?
Speaker 1: Your own? And everything to my own pens. So I cultivate,
Speaker 1: so I grow the flower a manufacturer, which means I
Speaker 1: extracted my own oil, which means I have a pens,
Speaker 1: have edibles, um, anything on the concentrated level. I have shatter, wax, crumbles, sauce.
Speaker 1: This is all the stuff that all the dabbers and
Speaker 1: the dad heads and the concentrate consumers understand. Uh. And
Speaker 1: then also have my apparel, which is California Cannabis Apparel.
Speaker 1: I'm a complete brand. I'm one that does everything from
Speaker 1: top to bottom. Um and I created that is because
Speaker 1: I wanted to make this a desirable brand. I wanted
Speaker 1: this brand to be for everybody. I wanted to be
Speaker 1: for the soccer mom. I wanted to be for the hippie,
Speaker 1: the beach bum uh, the gangster and from the city
Speaker 1: I'm from, which they had it way before everybody else did,
Speaker 1: because California cannabis. I've been providing that long before the
Speaker 1: name you know what I'm saying. So um, you know
Speaker 1: in the city. So you can't you can't name uh
Speaker 1: and and and my man Nate. No, you can't name
Speaker 1: a rapper. And Compton didn't come by weed from me
Speaker 1: coolioh uh dj quid um uh. And he really didn't
Speaker 1: even smoke weed. He was more of a drinker at
Speaker 1: easy Dre, Dre stir and b G knock days all
Speaker 1: coming to Dre, all of them, uh back in the
Speaker 1: end of w eight days. And then even I was
Speaker 1: I was going up to death Row. Legend your servants
Speaker 1: that I was serving death row. You know, snoops, first
Speaker 1: purple cush came from me, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: So that's when he first signed with death Row. Um.
Speaker 1: And you know I was coming through there all the time,
Speaker 1: can damn studios. I was dipping through the d dipping
Speaker 1: right back out, you know what I'm saying. You know
Speaker 1: that's why I would just creep in and creep out
Speaker 1: because I was there. I wasn't one of those that
Speaker 1: you would see hanging out. That wasn't my thing because
Speaker 1: at my pager, Oh, it was blowing up every time.
Speaker 1: I had too many people that wanted to see me.
Speaker 1: So I would come handle my business and then I'm out.
Speaker 1: Do you know what I'm saying. No, I don't need
Speaker 1: to meet nobody. No, I don't need to see you.
Speaker 1: I don't need to know who you are. Thank you,
Speaker 1: have a good day. I'm gone. It was it was
Speaker 1: just that with me when it came to that, and
Speaker 1: I didn't been to shift. Damn. There every studio in uh,
Speaker 1: Southern California, Larry North Larby South Echo Sounds. You name
Speaker 1: a studio, I can promise you I hadn't been there
Speaker 1: and dropped off weed to some artists. Right, you know misconception.
Speaker 1: I think that it's just hood people coming in and
Speaker 1: degenerates coming in buying marijuana. How right is the range
Speaker 1: of people? Is that your service? Um? To be honest
Speaker 1: with you, I have more middle aged and elderly that
Speaker 1: are in my patient base, uh, and then my customer
Speaker 1: base more than anything. We're talking thirty five and up
Speaker 1: is my larger uh consumer population. Youngsters are not as uh,
Speaker 1: they're not as as big as consumers, at least not
Speaker 1: in this legal space than the elderly in the middle
Speaker 1: age people are aged people, thirty people, uh, late twenties,
Speaker 1: mid twenties. Those are the people I see as far
Speaker 1: as anybody like twenty one, I rarely get, you know,
Speaker 1: young young young people coming through like that. It is.
Speaker 1: It's been coming out too because you know me, I
Speaker 1: didn't starts probably trying to experiment we a little bit
Speaker 1: to his past year because of the need in back pain.
Speaker 1: And my partner QT down to Texas he's been smoking,
Speaker 1: was still here and you know, you just gonna smoke
Speaker 1: some weeds instead of trying on her bullshit. Man. Now
Speaker 1: I started working with the cd D flower of absolutely well,
Speaker 1: cb D has your medicinal properties. Uh so does uh
Speaker 1: the th A C. Because people think that cb D
Speaker 1: is just cb D by itself, and no, it's cb
Speaker 1: D with t A C. No has small traces and
Speaker 1: small levels of cb D I mean of th A
Speaker 1: C within the cb D and it wouldn't be active.
Speaker 1: It can't activate. In other words, those properties healing properties
Speaker 1: cannot activate without t A C. This is what people
Speaker 1: don't understand. C B G C B and cb d
Speaker 1: uh and th A C and all of the components
Speaker 1: um to that molecular structure of the T A C
Speaker 1: plan all have to work in unison, all have to
Speaker 1: work together. It's like me taking both arms and legs
Speaker 1: off of you and then say go function. That's not
Speaker 1: gonna happen, right, And so you can't extract and pull
Speaker 1: one thing out and think that it's gonna work in
Speaker 1: its entirety. God made that plant to work in unison
Speaker 1: the way it is in this perfect form. Uh. So
Speaker 1: the's a misconception that when people say, oh, this is
Speaker 1: straight CB D no T A C. No, it's there
Speaker 1: is a small trace of T A C exactly. May
Speaker 1: not be detectable if you take a test or whatnot
Speaker 1: that will come out in a field drug tests or
Speaker 1: whatnot or whatnot, but just know it is there. Uh.
Speaker 1: They're small traces and they have to be there for
Speaker 1: the plant to activate. It works, Oh, it definitely does.
Speaker 1: They're going around because I actually heard it that market
Speaker 1: what's going to be a rising market because more people
Speaker 1: are moving away from them peels and everything. But the
Speaker 1: unfortunate and part, and I'm glad you said that, is
Speaker 1: that we are not participating in this industry as we should.
Speaker 1: There are a hundred eighty eight shops licensed in the
Speaker 1: city of Los Angeles, only four black owners. They're in
Speaker 1: the state of California. In the state of California, you
Speaker 1: have two in Oakland. You got four down here. You
Speaker 1: see what I'm saying. Our numbers are Graham and Desmo.
Speaker 1: Because so there is only six black owned Marijuanna shops
Speaker 1: absolutely in the whole state of coming in the whole
Speaker 1: state of California. Yeah. Yeah, So this is this is
Speaker 1: what what people end up missing. They'll see black faces
Speaker 1: behind the counter, They'll see black faces doing this and
Speaker 1: that Latino faces and they think, oh, that's black owner,
Speaker 1: that's Latino. You see how many black folks up in cookies.
Speaker 1: Cookies ain't known by not one black person. Show me one,
Speaker 1: name me one. You know what I'm saying. When you
Speaker 1: look at these shops that we gravitate to and go
Speaker 1: spend our money with, they're not us and they're not
Speaker 1: doing anything for our community. What is cookies done for
Speaker 1: our community except for sale? Weed up in there, take
Speaker 1: our money and going back, going back to the valley
Speaker 1: where they came from, in the Bay area where they
Speaker 1: came from. You understand what I'm saying. I ain't mad.
Speaker 1: You know, they jumped at an opportunity and did business.
Speaker 1: But we as consumers have to understand where we need
Speaker 1: to be putting our dollars. These are black owned businesses
Speaker 1: within the cannabis industry, very few. Why are we not
Speaker 1: supporting those? And those only the same product I grow
Speaker 1: my I grow products. I've been growing longer than Cookie
Speaker 1: has been growing. You know what I'm saying. I've been
Speaker 1: I've been around longer than met Man been around. He
Speaker 1: got his ideal of multiple locations from casts like me,
Speaker 1: because before he was even thought of in two thousand
Speaker 1: and four, I had six of them. It was looking
Speaker 1: to buy Folk Mob. Before I got arrested. I was
Speaker 1: already in the deal to buy four more stores and
Speaker 1: have Tien and my goal was to send on them
Speaker 1: tim for about a year and then start buying up
Speaker 1: other folks. So we have to understand that we need
Speaker 1: to take control of the business aspect of certain things
Speaker 1: that uh exists within our community. And that's what we
Speaker 1: have not done in the cannabis industry. And our numbers
Speaker 1: will always be low and we will then begin to
Speaker 1: complain about the keeping us out of the industry. Well,
Speaker 1: a lot of it is we're not getting involved to
Speaker 1: get that type of information. For those out there that
Speaker 1: may be interested in this trade, well they can always
Speaker 1: reach out to me UM my my email addresses VG
Speaker 1: at California Cannabis WC for West Coast dot com. Um.
Speaker 1: They can reach out to me and I can provide
Speaker 1: them with all of the information regarding this industry. If
Speaker 1: you want to get involved, being cultivation, manufacturing, distribution, retail
Speaker 1: or delivery, UM, I can point you in the right
Speaker 1: direction because I've done them all. Like I did before
Speaker 1: there was a transportation or uh distribution license. I was
Speaker 1: going to humblet to Humbolt to Compton. See I'm back
Speaker 1: in those days. My connect was direct, so I growers
Speaker 1: in humble that I was driving twelve hours up, twelve
Speaker 1: hours back to go get my product and bring it
Speaker 1: to Compton and sell out in three days. I couldn't
Speaker 1: keep enough weed around were smoking weed and man, for real,
Speaker 1: we had some of the number one spots. And that's
Speaker 1: what I say. There would not be an industry to
Speaker 1: a day for corporate America to even think about considering
Speaker 1: if it wasn't for players like me keeping the clientele
Speaker 1: flowing in our cities the way we did. I used
Speaker 1: to see white folks come up in Compton all day
Speaker 1: to hit all of them spots that's up in Compton,
Speaker 1: baby over there in the pockets over there on North Street,
Speaker 1: the grandees in their hood, they on that side of
Speaker 1: the town. I've seen them coming through the trees and
Speaker 1: the fruits when I was over there. I mean, I
Speaker 1: just they was coming through because when when dre put
Speaker 1: out the Chronic, people wanted to know what what Compton
Speaker 1: was like with that week. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: In the place I fucking toward motherfucker's would be like,
Speaker 1: you brought some of that chronic bullshit, you know, because
Speaker 1: everywhere else you go they got that, they got the
Speaker 1: dirt bulls bullshit. And then I'm telling you that was
Speaker 1: the first thing the motherfucker would ask when they would
Speaker 1: see us breaking the down on the table, they would
Speaker 1: be like, what the is that that ship? And they
Speaker 1: think they hit that ship and they just be floating like,
Speaker 1: oh God, I gotta get I think it'll be ready
Speaker 1: to take a trip just to come and get some motherfucker.
Speaker 1: I'm telling you, man, well, man, this has been one
Speaker 1: of the most interesting, enlightening episodes that were formative. It's
Speaker 1: just like very informative thing. And we can sit up
Speaker 1: here and talk all night. Man. You got incredible story. Man,
Speaker 1: it's incredible about what you've got going on. Now. I
Speaker 1: think it's good because we're lucky that we're finding these guys,
Speaker 1: these brothers, get these these hell of a stories. And
Speaker 1: nobody would have ever knew your story if we wouldn't
Speaker 1: hear you know what I'm saying down Everybody don't understand
Speaker 1: this was straight double jeovity bullishit. Damn if I do,
Speaker 1: Damn if I don't, we want you. We're gonna get you,
Speaker 1: regardless if you're not guilty or not. We can make
Speaker 1: you guilty type of bullish it here. And it took
Speaker 1: six years from a brother for them to do that
Speaker 1: and not give a funk, not offer no money, not
Speaker 1: offer nothing on the Yeah. So man, it's just a
Speaker 1: lesson to all of us that we all got to
Speaker 1: be careful and like you said earlier, we gotta start
Speaker 1: supporting our our people. And you know we can't blame
Speaker 1: nobody but ourselves because we don't go into stoes and
Speaker 1: do what we do. Yeah, you exactly right, man. What's
Speaker 1: your website? So the website is, uh www California Cannabis WC.
Speaker 1: Dot com media social media's uh California Cannabis WC. You
Speaker 1: can you can just hit me on on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Um,
Speaker 1: you can see me on all of those when you
Speaker 1: see the uh the double c's for California Cannabis with
Speaker 1: the heart. But everybody, just so y'all know, there's always
Speaker 1: a double untanger with them what I do, double C
Speaker 1: City of Compton, you know what I'm saying. I put
Speaker 1: it all in the mix with with my logo. I
Speaker 1: made this logo. De green represents cannabis, the gold represents
Speaker 1: the Golden city, I mean the Golden state California, and
Speaker 1: the heart for the love of what I do in
Speaker 1: the cannabis industry. And I created that logo, not a
Speaker 1: marijuana leave for a bud or nothing like that, is
Speaker 1: because I want my stuff to sit in best Buy,
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, in in the commercial places Target, Walmart.
Speaker 1: And so that's a soft and friendly logo, but it
Speaker 1: represents what it represents. Supporting his brother product and he's
Speaker 1: doing some big things and he's one of us for sure.
Speaker 1: And that's it. We'd like to thank you for tuning
Speaker 1: into this episode Against the Chronicles again. Subscribe, download the
Speaker 1: I Heart Act for Sure Apple Podcast, leave us comment,
Speaker 1: We out of here, Jill, Thank you, thank