Conservative Representative Allen Peake Is Using a State Loophole to Distribute CBD Oil in Georgia
The state legislator is gifting CBD to get around a law that allows for the use of cannabis oil, but not the cultivation or purchase of the low-THC medicine.
In America’s deep south, legal weed is still just a pipe dream. But in a few states below the Mason-DIxon line, lawmakers have given into the will of their constituents and passed limited medical marijuana legislation that allow for the use of low-THC, high-CBD oils to treat ailments like epilepsy and Parkinson’s disease. The laws seem progressive, but without systems in place for cannabis cultivation or import, patients are left without any avenues to legally obtain the cure-all medicine. That’s where Georgia Rep. Allen Peake comes in.
According to a new report from the Associated Press, Peake, a conservative Republican lawmaker from Macon, GA who was instrumental in passing the state’s limited medical marijuana program, has been helping those in need get around the state’s strict regulations by distributing free CBD oil to registered patients across the Peach State.
Every month a nondescript cardboard box filled with bottles of CBD oil shows up at Peake’s office. The box comes from Colorado, but in an effort to comply with local and federal laws, Peake says he has no clue where it actually comes from or who brings it into Georgia.
Peake has a Georgia medical marijuana ID card, so it’s perfectly legal for him to possess the oil, and there is no provision in the local law that restricts gifting the oil between registered patients – so when the CBD makes its way across the state to Georgia’s over 1,000 registered patients, as long as no money is exchanged, everything is entirely above board.
"We're going to do whatever it takes to be able to help get product to these families, these citizens who have debilitating illnesses," Peake told reporters from the AP.
The state Representative has a network of medical marijuana patients throughout the state that help him distribute his oils, and, thanks to some generous donations that Peake has made to a foundation that supports cannabis oil research in Colorado, gifted boxes of cannabis oil just keep showing up at his office door.
The network of caregivers all work within the law by giving the CBD oil only to those who are registered in the state’s system, and never accepting payment. The system is doing wonders for Georgians in need, but is still far from perfect.
Peake and his allies in the Georgia State House are currently in the process of expanding the state’s medical marijuana program to add more qualifying conditions, but he admits that they’re a long way from local grow-ops and dispensaries. For Peake and his team, though, a real form of distribution is necessary.
"It shouldn't be this way," Shannon Cloud, one of the MMJ patients helping Peake distribute the oils in Atlanta, said. "You shouldn't be meeting at a gas station or a Target parking lot to get medicine to somebody. You should be going to the place where it is produced and tested to get it dispensed to you in a regulated manner, but this is what we're forced to do."
And until Peake can convince his peers to significantly upgrade Georgia’s medical marijuana program, that’s what they’ll be doing, helping sick neighbors get help, by any means necessary.
