The U.S. Department of Justice plans to give back $1.1 million in legal marijuana proceeds to an armored car company after its vehicles were stopped by sheriff’s deputies in San Bernardino County, California, last year.
As a result of the settlement, Empyreal Logistics – which does business in 28 states and acts as a cash courier between many marijuana businesses and their banks as well as for mainstream industries – will drop its federal lawsuit against the DOJ, the FBI and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, The Orange County Register reported.
The settlement ends the government’s forfeiture enforcement against Empyreal, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office told the Register.
But Empyreal’s lawsuit against the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department remains active.
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That suit alleges that law enforcement officers engaged in “highway robbery” from Empyreal vehicles by seizing cash they knew came from state-legal marijuana businesses.
Beyond the California issue, an Empyreal driver was stopped in October in Kansas while transporting cash from a Missouri medical marijuana dispensary to a financial institution in Colorado.
