Move afoot to review Ohio’s medical marijuana business licensing process

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One of Ohio’s medical cannabis companies and some state lawmakers are calling for an investigation into how MMJ cultivation license applications were scored after it was revealed one of the judges had a felony drug conviction.

As the owner of one-man firm iCann Consulting, Trevor Bozeman won part of a $150,000 state contract in June to score MMJ business license applications, according to the Portland Press Herald and the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

CannAscend – an Ohio MMJ cultivation company that didn’t win one of the state’s 24 business licenses – revealed that Bozeman had a 12-year-old felony conviction and said the application scoring process should be reviewed, according to the Plain Dealer.

Meanwhile, Ohio’s lieutenant governor said no more licenses should be awarded until it’s determined how Bozeman was allowed to become a judge, and a state senator said the licensing process should be redone without Bozeman.

At issue is Bozeman’s felony drug conviction in 2005, according to the newspapers.

As a 21-year-old college student in Pennsylvania, Bozeman was arrested with roughly seven ounces of marijuana. He pleaded guilty to one federal count of manufacturing, delivering and possessing marijuana, paid a $2,100 fine and served three years of probation.

He later joined the cannabis industry in his native Maine, where he is a lab manager at Canuvo, a licensed dispensary.

Ohio regulators are standing by Bozeman, as is Canuvo co-owner Glenn Peterson, who hired Bozeman.