Medical Pot Collective Closes Under City Pressure

The second medical marijuana group the city waged a legal battle against agreed to close down today.

The Temecula Caregivers Collective, which rented a storefront at 27911 Jefferson Ave., agreed to a permanent injunction, court records show.

“Basically, they just agreed to close down,” said Peter Thorson, the city’s attorney today.

The city filed a complaint against the organization April 4, and a judge granted a temporary restraining order the next day stopping the group from dispensing marijuana, the records show.

The group operated a dispensary despite a city ordinance banning it. Also, it lacked a business license and certificate of occupancy, according to the complaint.

The collective is not a dispensary, said Jeff Lowe, one of the heads of the collective during an interview last month.

The organization buys marijuana from members who grow it and sell it to other members on a not-for-profit basis, he said.

The city asked the judge to fine the three defendants, including Lowe, Petar and Rosy Marovic, up to $25,000. It also asked the judge to have everything inside the storefront sold off, and if the revenue from the sale doesn’t pay for the efforts of cleaning the building out, to sell the building to pay for it. Also, it asked the court to close that suite down for a year and the defendants pay the city a year’s worth of fair market rent.

Nobody came to the door earlier today and the phone number went unanswered today.

This suite is the second the city filed against a medical marijuana organization. The city is fighting to close down , which runs in a storefront at 28900 Old Town Front St.

A judge granted a restraining order against organization stopping it from dispensing marijuana. The group then violated the restraining order by selling marijuana to an undercover deputy, according to court records.

If the group is unable to prove it didn’t sell to the deputy during a hearing this Tuesday, it will be ordered to pay $14,000, court records show.