Oklahoma Attorney General Assembles Team of Lawyers over Marijuana Rules

Oklahoma’s attorney general says he’s assigning a team of lawyers to advise him on matters surrounding the Board of Health’s decision to insert last-minute restrictions on the state’s new medical marijuana industry.

Attorney General Mike Hunter announced his intentions in a letter sent Monday to the Oklahoma Department of Health’s Interim Commissioner Tom Bates.

Bates asked for Hunter’s advice after the agency was the subject of two separate lawsuits over the board’s decision last week to adopt last-minute changes that ban the sale of smokable marijuana and require a pharmacist at every dispensary. Bates noted that the nine-member board adopted the two policies against the recommendation of its own attorney.

Hunter says he hopes to publicly release findings and recommendations on the issue by the end of the week.