{"id":110659,"date":"2015-07-29T14:48:17","date_gmt":"2015-07-29T20:48:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/judge-stops-pot-event\/"},"modified":"2015-07-29T14:48:17","modified_gmt":"2015-07-29T20:48:17","slug":"judge-stops-pot-event","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/judge-stops-pot-event\/","title":{"rendered":"Judge stops pot event"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"In
In this Nov. 19, 2012, photo, two women smoke marijuana together at a home near the small Rocky Mountain town of Nederland, Colo.<\/span>The Associated Press<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

District Court Judge Todd Plewe issued a restraining order on July 22 to bar the 32nd annual Colorado Invitational Bong-A-Thon marijuana competition from taking place next weekend near Stoner.<\/p>\n

Plewe\u2019s 14-day order against bong-a-thon organizer Chris Jetter and Montezuma County business partners Frank McDonald and Ted Clark essentially prohibits the marijuana competition from taking place as planned from July 31 to Aug. 2. It also grants law enforcement authority to use reasonable and appropriate means to enforce the court\u2019s decision.<\/p>\n

\u201cBased upon what the county has presented . and their exhibits, I\u2019m going to find that there is a basis to enter a temporary restraining order,\u201d said Plewe, citing the defendants\u2019 failure to comply with land-use codes.<\/p>\n

Security was tight as Montezuma County Sheriff Steve Nowlin dispatched six extra deputies to the hearing on Wednesday, July 22. After the 20-minute hearing, a relieved Nowlin said he would post a deputy on the bong-a-thon site during the days scheduled for the event to notify ticket holders that bong-a-thon had been canceled.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe won\u2019t be searching any vehicles,\u201d said Nowlin.<\/p>\n

Hearing recap<\/p>\n

Initially set in a first-floor courtroom, Wednesday\u2019s injunction hearing was moved to a larger courtroom on the second floor after nearly three dozen people arrived.<\/p>\n

Jetter was never officially served with the injunction, but Montezuma County attorney John Baxter said officials made multiple efforts to notify him of the injunction request. Neither Jetter nor his attorney attended Wednesday\u2019s hearing.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe emailed (Jetter) a summons,\u201d said Baxter, clearing the way for the proceeding.<\/p>\n

Durango attorney Ryan E. Brungard, who represented McDonald and Clark, requested that his clients, unaffiliated with the event, not be included on the injunction. In response to the Montezuma County Board of Commissioners request for the injunction, Brungard said his clients had been clear in announcing that the event wouldn\u2019t take place on their private property.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf the court feels that it is still necessary to issue a temporary restraining order, we would just ask that they issue it against defendant Jetter,\u201d Brungard said via telephone.<\/p>\n

Baxter disagreed, arguing that all three should be included on the restraining order.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur concern is, what if they still have this?\u201d Baxter posed to the court.<\/p>\n

Brungard countered, stating the legal test to issue an injunction required immediate and irreparable harm.<\/p>\n

Baxter then pointed to the county\u2019s affidavit, which included threats from McDonald that the event would go on with or without the county\u2019s approval of a land-use permit.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith those threats, it\u2019s not unreasonable to be safe,\u201d said Baxter.<\/p>\n

Brungard explained that McDonald\u2019s perceived threats were made in the heat of the moment, but he eventually conceded that he wouldn\u2019t challenge the court\u2019s decision to include McDonald and Clark on the injunction.<\/p>\n

Those in attendance at the hearing included neighbors of the proposed bong-a-thon site, and Baxter asked that they be allowed to address the court. Plewe rejected the request.<\/p>\n

\u201cI will only hear from the parties involved with the case,\u201d said Plewe. \u201cThis is not a public meeting.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bong-a-thon 101<\/p>\n

Last month, Montezuma County commissioners denied a land-use permit for organizers to hold North America\u2019s oldest marijuana event outside Stoner. Officials opted not to approve the permit, citing an incomplete application and lack of time to notify the public.<\/p>\n

According to the bong-a-thon website, ticket holders will be notified of the event\u2019s new location, within a 2.5-hour drive of Denver, via email. For the past six years, the annual competitive bong event was held in South Park, Colo.<\/p>\n

Project Stoner Colorado, an effort of McDonald\u2019s to create a cannabis-conscious community in Montezuma County, remained listed as a bong-a-thon sponsor as of Wednesday.<\/p>\n

The bong-a-thon competition includes individual and team events. Guest tickets were available online for $80, and Golden tickets were sold for $420.<\/p>\n

For more, visit www.bong-a-thon.com.<\/p>\n

tbaker@cortezjournal.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sheriff will post deputies at site<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":110660,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6363],"tags":[1548,188,13,237,1610],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-110659","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ds-news","tag-court-administration","tag-dolores-star","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-montezuma-county-government","tag-recreational-marijuana"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110659","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110659"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110659\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/110660"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110659"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110659"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110659"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=110659"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}