Opinion | There were no winners in appeals court ruling on AMCC

Want to know why we still don’t have medical marijuana flowing to patients? 

Allow me to demonstrate. 

Earlier this week, several media outlets reported on a ruling from the Alabama Court of Civil Appeals that appeared to be a victory of some sort for the Alabama Medical Cannabis Commission. The Appeals Court had dismissed the AMCC from a lawsuit filed by Jemmstone LLC., one of the many companies that have filed suit against the Commission over its bungled licensing process. 

The Court ruled that the AMCC, as a state agency, had immunity in the specific filing and was due to be dismissed. But it left standing the issue of the temporary restraining order that has prevented the AMCC from awarding licenses. That TRO was granted because it appears that the Commission violated the Alabama Administrative Procedures Act, and other laws, by establishing a licensing process that didn’t adhere to basic laws and rules of the state. 

But regardless, the AMCC was certainly happy to let people know that the ruling last week was a victory, and comments from an AMCC spokesperson made it seem as if we were somehow moving closer to the day when medical weed would start to flow to those who need it. 

It was all BS. 

In reality, that Appeals Court ruling was nothing more than the end of a months’ long exercise in thumb twiddling. It didn’t change the status of anything. It didn’t move the process forward at all. It was yet another in a long line of stalling tactics played out by the AMCC and its attorneys.

The reality is this: The AMCC and its commissioners and staff still face the same lawsuits from the same companies over the same issues, and we are no closer to resolving anything. 

That opinion from the Appeals Court was the result of a filing that challenged Jemmstone naming the Commission, instead of naming the individual commissioners and staff, in the lawsuit. It was one of several appeals sent up for review – all of them in an effort to pick away at the companies’ lawsuits and delay for as long as possible the Montgomery Circuit Court from initiating discovery – gathering depositions and documents – in these cases. 

This specific challenge was a particularly petty one. Because it accomplished essentially nothing, and it could have been filed months ago. 

The basic issue here is that many of the lawsuits against the AMCC name it, instead of the individual commissioners, because state statute requires that the state agency be named in certain types of legal action. However, there’s a known conflict, because the Alabama constitution expressly forbids the state and its agencies from being sued, granting them all immunity. 

In a 2018 opinion, Alabama Appeals Court Judge Scott Donaldson wrote of the conflict:  “… it is a strange procedure indeed if a plaintiff must name both the state agency (knowing it is immune and not subject to suit) and at least one state official for the trial court to have subject-matter jurisdiction ….”

See? It’s a stupid, time-wasting, technical issue.

As a matter of fact, after learning earlier this year that the AMCC might go down this road, other plaintiffs that have filed suit against the AMCC decided to remedy it before anything happened. They voluntarily dismissed their cases and then immediately refiled, naming some commissioners as part of their lawsuits. 

The lawsuits are still the same. They still argue the same points. They still make the same claims. The AMCC still didn’t follow the law when crafting its licensing process. The restraining order will stay in place. 

We’re going to be running up on four years since the Alabama Legislature passed the bill allowing medical marijuana in the state. And still we sit idle, absolutely held hostage by a bungled process and a bunch of bunglers who refuse to correct the obvious problems and get it right. 

And everyone is losing.