DEA RAIDS 11 POT CLUBS POLICE CHIEF SAYS DISPENSARIES PREY ON TEENAGERS.

Byline: RACHEL URANGA Staff Writer

The Drug Enforcement Administration raided 11 medical marijuana dispensaries across Los Angeles on Wednesday, including five in the San Fernando Valley.

The raids came a day after Los Angeles Police Chief William Bratton denounced the storefront medicinal clinics as crime magnets that have begun to prey on teenagers -- including passing out fliers at Grant High School in Van Nuys this past summer -- and called for a moratorium on the facilities.

``(These) enforcement operations send a message to these drug traffickers,'' said Sarah Pullen, a DEA special agent. ``The DEA will continue to conduct these enforcement operations and keep our community safe by enforcing federal drug laws.''

Under a 1996 state ballot measure, the clinics can distribute doctor-prescribed marijuana to relieve anything from anxiety to nausea to acute pain. But federal officials consider all marijuana use illegal.

The number of clinics has exploded from five in 2005 to 143 by the end of last year. Bratton said many of the clinics are lucrative operations aimed at recreational users.

Bratton and Councilman Dennis Zine have backed rules banning dispensaries within 1,000 feet of any school, day-care facility, church or other house of worship.

While several medical marijuana activists support some regulation, they say the federal raids unfairly harm patients.

``It's disgusting in this day and age, when cities and counties are moving to regulate medical marijuana, that the federal government would still be busting people,'' said Don Duncan, Southern California coordinator for the Americans for Safe Access, a national medical marijuana advocacy group.

This week, the Los Angeles Police Commission released a report that found about half of all the city's marijuana clubs were in the Valley. The report found increased robberies and aggravated assaults around clubs near Van Nuys and more citizen complaints.

rachel.uranga(at)dailynews.com

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