THCA seizures lead to settlement for Tennessee hemp businesses

Authorities in Tennessee will pay two hemp businesses $735,000 after seizing hundreds of pounds of what an attorney called “THCA flower.”

The settlement, which the state has yet to approve, is the result of a federal lawsuit filed in May by Old School Vapor and Sak Wholesale after a police raid that month.

According to the lawsuit, Spring Hill Police seized “hundreds of pounds” of “legal hemp products” valued at $1.35 million from a warehouse operated by Sak.

Police had search warrants, but they were for mushroom products, the Chattanooga Times Free Press reported.

In at least one instance, deputies from the Williamson County Sheriff’s Department declined to seize flower at an Old School Vapor store because it was not in their warrant, according to the suit.

Nobody was charged with a crime, but police also failed to return the hemp flower, which prompted the lawsuit and the plaintiffs’ request for damages of more than $1.3 million and attorney fees.

Smoke and vapor shops across the country are selling products with intoxicating levels of delta-9 THC on the basis that they’re legal under the 2018 U.S. Farm Bill.

Some more ambitious merchants are also selling intoxicating flower, claiming that because raw marijuana contains tetrahydrocannabinolic acid, or THCA, it’s in fact hemp under the Farm Bill.

Several states have adjusted or are trying to adjust their definitions of hemp and marijuana to account for THCA, which becomes intoxicating THC when exposed to heat.

Tennessee also has moved to close the so-called loophole in the Farm Bill, but new rules have yet to take effect – and advocacy groups for the state’s hemp merchants have sued to block implementation of tighter restrictions.