Listen to article \u2022\u00a00:00 min<\/p>\n
Twelve people have been charged in connection with an alleged multimillion-dollar operation to sell high-potency marijuana products in stores across Pennsylvania \u201cunder the guise that they were legal\u201d using large distribution warehouses, including one in Bucks County<\/a>, state Attorney General Dave Sunday<\/a> said Monday.<\/p>\n Marijuana<\/a> products are being been sold at vape shops, convenience stores, and gas stations because of what has been described as a loophole in federal law<\/a>. This is separate from the laws passed by states, such as New Jersey, approving the sale of recreational marijuana with strict regulations.<\/p>\n In the Pennsylvania case, investigators traced about $18.7 million to the alleged illegal proceeds, Sunday said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have closed this operation by raiding the main source warehouse locations, three of them, and by removing products from those warehouses and many convenience stores or smoke shops across Pennsylvania,\u201d Sunday said at a news conference in Westmoreland County<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cThe defendants in many cases went from being renters of homes and apartments to owners of giant warehouses and lavish residential properties,\u201d Sunday said.<\/p>\n The investigation got its first \u201cbig break\u201d in January 2025, when authorities conducted a vehicle stop in Chester County<\/a> and discovered the driver was \u201chauling loads of THC products to these stores, illegal products, all being paid for with cash, and that was a tipping point,\u201d Sunday said.<\/p>\n \u201cSo our investigation showed that this criminal organization began as a small-town, small-time operation that grew into something massive,\u201d Sunday said.<\/p>\n A few months later in Westmoreland County, a related investigation was launched after authorities found that \u201ckids at school\u201d were consuming marijuana products sold from these stores, Sunday said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe know that these products can end up in the hands of children, but also adults who consume them, sometimes without knowing what they contained. The charged traffickers, however, knew what they were selling and they knew that the products were illegal,\u201d Sunday said.<\/p>\n Investigators then allegedly connected the statewide operation to three main warehouses, and search warrants were executed last September in Bensalem, Pittston in Luzerne County, and Plum Borough in Allegheny County.<\/p>\n \u201cThese warehouses were hubs for distribution to storefronts where the products were sold, and those transactions led to consumption by kids and adults alike. From those warehouses, we seized more than 40 pallets full of illegal products,\u201d Sunday said.<\/p>\n Hundreds of types of products were sold, including pre-rolled joints and candylike edibles, and investigators seized nearly 150,000 total items, Sunday said. Some were also legal products, such as snacks and sodas.<\/p>\n Sunday said some of the defendants owned stores where the products were sold.<\/p>\n \u201cThe storefronts were also scattered all throughout the commonwealth, but the pieces and the players were all working together,\u201d Sunday said.<\/p>\n Search warrants also were executed at some of the stores.<\/p>\n