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Our Firm Obtains Dismissal of Felony Marijuana and Gambling Charges in Lee County Smoke Shop Case

Written by Tom Church on October 23, 2025. Posted in Cannabis, Criminal Defense, Forfeiture and Seizures, Georgia Crimes, Hemp, Marijuana, Our Cases & Results, Uncategorized.

Last week, our firm obtained a dismissal of felony marijuana and gambling charges that were brought against the owner of a smoke shop, his wife, and his employees in Lee County, Georgia. This case is just the latest in a long line of cases in which law enforcement officials have falsely charged a hemp business with selling illegal marijuana instead of legal hemp products. As in those cases, we used our unique expertise in marijuana cases to win.

In an unusual twist, this case also involved allegations of illegal commercial gambling through the smoke shop’s operation of several coin-operated amusement machines (COAMs). The police alleged that our client’s store was engaging in illegal gambling by giving cash awards to COAM winners rather than in-store gift cards, in violation of Georgia’s COAM regulations.

Based on our expertise in Georgia’s hemp laws and our firm’s aggressive approach to defending our clients, we were able to convince the prosecutor to dismiss all of these charges against our clients and agree to seal their arrest records. We did so by providing lab tests from our client’s suppliers, identifying weaknesses in the State’s lab results, and obtaining impeachment evidence that would have discredited the lead investigator in the case and other State’s witnesses.

Police raided our client’s Smoke Shop based on unreliable test results of hemp products they purchased “undercover.”

Earlier this year, police raided our client’s smoke shop, seized cash and thousands of dollars of hemp inventory, and arrested our client, his wife, and several of his employees. The raid came after Lee County officers conducted a year-long investigation where “undercover” officers bought products from the store and then tested them. The officer would also play the COAM machines at our client’s store and request his winnings in cash, which our client’s employees allegedly gave him.

The “undercover” purchases in this case are common in smoke shop cases, which are built on test results of products obtained from the smoke shops. Of course, “undercover” investigations are totally unnecessary in these cases since smoke shops are allowed to openly sell legal, intoxicating cannabis products to police officers and members of the public alike.

The State ultimately filed an Accusation alleging multiple felony counts of Sale of Marijuana under O.C.G.A. § 16-13-30(j)(1) and Violation of Gambling Prohibition under O.C.G.A. § 16-12-35. The marijuana charges were based on allegations that certain products purchased at our client’s store tested over the legal limit of THC and that our client knew they would when they sold them.

In 2019, the Georgia legislature legalized specifically excluded hemp and hemp products from the definition of marijuana, setting the legal limit at 0.3% total delta-9-THC concentration. This legalized a broad variety of cannabis products that look and smell like marijuana. Hemp and marijuana also contain the same “cannabinoids,” like CBD and THC, but in different quantities.

The problem with the State’s case was that their testing methods, especially the field tests they used, are not capable of distinguishing marijuana from certain hemp products, namely the THCA flower that the officers purchased in this case. The State also did not make an effort to preserve the seized cannabis for reliable testing, allowing compliant hemp to “decarboxylate” and degrade into a non-compliant product.

As for the State’s gambling-related charges, the State relied on a misreading of the law. The State initially tried charging our client with illegal commercial gambling. Providing cash payouts for COAM winners is a violation of Georgia’s COAM laws, however, not illegal commercial gambling. After we pushed for a hearing on the charges, the State reduced the charge to a misdemeanor to avoid a hearing before eventually dismissing them altogether.

All charges were dismissed after our firm filed motions challenging the State’s test results, the constitutionality of the search and the charges, and the State’s failure to distinguish between marijuana and hemp.

Fortunately, our client turned to us after the raid of his store and the arrest of his employees and his family. We prepared an aggressive defense distinguishing illegal marijuana from the hemp products that they sold, which were backed up by lab results from his vendors showing that the seized products were actually “hemp” under Georgia law.

We challenged the State’s search of our client’s store as unconstitutional under the Fourth Amendment, as the officer had not disclosed to the judge who issued the warrant that the hemp products in question were indistinguishable from marijuana without reliable testing.

We challenged the language in the State’s charging papers as legally inadequate for not distinguishing between hemp and marijuana as cannabis. And we challenged Georgia’s marijuana laws as “unconstitutionally vague” as applied to our client’s products, given the State’s rapidly changing hemp laws. When the State refused to produce evidence that the defense was entitled to, we challenged that too by filing a motion to compel evidence.

The final nail in the coffin in this case was when we provided the District Attorney’s Office with copies of independently sourced lab results from accredited labs and invoices from legitimate vendors, all showing THC concentrations below the legal limit. Rather than fight us in court, the State dismissed all of the charges and agreed to seal our client’s arrest record.

Call our firm if you have been charged with felony marijuana offenses.

We were proud to obtain the best possible outcome for our client, his employees, and his business. The result in this case reflects the aggressive playbook we have fine-tuned through winning many similar cases involving cannabis and our aggressive representation of smoke shops that have been wrongfully accused of selling marijuana.

If your hemp or COAM business has been targeted by law enforcement, contact us. Our firm has extensive experience in these kinds of cases and will fight for you.

Legal Victory for South Fulton Smoke Shop: Criminal Charges Dismissed, Assets Returned

Written by Tom Church on May 7, 2025. Posted in Criminal Defense, Forfeiture and Seizures, Georgia Crimes, Our Cases & Results.

Left: Air Freshener Depot, City of South Fulton

Right: Police officers during the raid of Air Freshener Depot in May 2024

Last week, our firm was able to close out the final cases stemming from law enforcement’s raid of a South Fulton smoke shop in 2024. A year after the smoke shop’s employees were arrested and charged with selling illegal marijuana, we convinced prosecutors to dismiss the charges.

On May 1, 2024, police officers executed a search warrant at “Air Freshener Depot,” a smoke shop in the City of South Fulton, based on a mistaken belief that the business was selling illegal marijuana and THC products. As a matter of fact, the products at issue were actually legal “hemp products,” and Air Freshener Depot and its employees had lab results for the products showing they were compliant under federal and state law.

The police ended up seizing over $20,000 in cash and inventory, the store’s business license was revoked by the City of South Fulton, and the store’s employees were arrested on felony drug charges. Things looked bleak for the business and its employees.

Fortunately, Air Freshener Depot turned to our law firm to represent its business and employees in their various civil and criminal cases, and we delivered. We prepared an aggressive defense distinguishing illegal marijuana from the cannabis products that they sold, which were backed up by lab results showing that the products were actually “hemp” under Georgia law.

As we’ve discussed in a previous blog, we started by filing a civil lawsuit against the Chief of Police and convincing a judge to issue a temporary restraining order prohibiting the South Fulton police department from conducting further raids of the store. The judge also granted our request for an order prohibiting the City from shutting down our client’s business.

Next, we filed a claim for the seized property on behalf of our client’s business and convinced the District Attorney’s Office to return all of the cash that the police had seized rather than pursue civil forfeiture. Regarding our client’s business license, South Fulton’s city council voted to revoke our client’s license, but their license was ultimately reinstated after we filed an appeal in superior court challenging the council’s decision.

All that remained in this case up until last week were the pending arrest warrants against three of Air Freshener Depot’s employees, who had no prior criminal history and had relied on vendors and accredited lab reports assuring them that they were selling legal products. These hardworking young people were charged with serious felonies, felony marijuana distribution, that carry significant prison sentences under Georgia law.

Last week, we were able to convince the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office to dismiss these charges against the employees and seal their arrest records. Our client’s employees will go back to being able to live their lives without the cloud of a criminal case hanging over their heads. Our client’s store will continue serving its loyal customers in South Fulton.

We are proud of the work we did in this case, which involved aggressively representing the client and its employees in multiple civil and criminal cases, each one involving a different set of interests and legal issues. Our firm’s experience in these kinds of cases proved invaluable to winning all of their cases. If your hemp business has been targeted by law enforcement, contact us. We will fight for you.

Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals - Atlanta, Georgia

Court Overturns 6-Year Sentence After The Church Law Firm Proves Prosecutors Breached Plea Agreement

Written by Tom Church on April 25, 2025. Posted in Appeals, Our Cases & Results.

The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals on Forsyth Street in Atlanta, Georgia

Last week, the Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, which covers federal appeals in Florida, Alabama, and Georgia, ruled in our client’s favor and overturned his 6-year prison sentence. The Court found that the federal prosecutors had breached the plea agreement they signed when our client agreed to plead guilty.

The Court’s order vacating our client’s sentence adopted most of the arguments we made in our briefs, in which we argued that the prosecution breached the plea agreement by introducing allegations of uncharged offenses at our client’s sentencing even though the allegations were contradicted by facts that the government had stipulated to in the agreement. Now, our client will be re-sentenced by a new judge, and the prosecutors will have to honor their word this time.

It can be difficult to prove that a prosecutor has breached a plea agreement, as many federal judges are deferential to prosecutors and do not want to accuse them of breaking a promise. But that’s exactly what happened in this case.

Our client hired us after he was indicted for wire fraud and violating the conditions of the term of supervised release that he was serving for a prior federal case. By being aggressive in pursuing our discovery rights and preparing for trial, we were able to secure a favorable plea offer from the government. Specifically, our client agreed to plead guilty based on the prosecutor’s promises to agree to certain facts regarding our client’s offense and take certain positions regarding our client’s recommended sentence under the Guidelines.

Under the terms of this agreement, and memorialized in writing in an email from the prosecutor, our agreement bound the government to recommend a sentence of time served and a minimal financial penalty. These terms were put in writing in the “plea agreement” that was filed by the parties when our client entered his guilty plea.

After our client pleaded guilty, but before the sentencing hearing, the assigned prosecutor’s supervisor took over the case and immediately broke the government’s promises. Despite being aware of the plea agreement between the parties, the new prosecutor fed the probation officer misleading information that led to a presentence investigation report recommending a much higher sentence for our client than the government had promised to recommend in the plea agreement.

We filed a motion to enforce the plea agreement and litigated the motion aggressively, including cross-examining the probation officer and the government agent who fed the officer misleading information. Unfortunately, the judge misinterpreted the case law governing how courts must interpret plea agreements in criminal cases, as well as the terms of the plea agreement itself. Based on the distorted view of the case that the prosecution presented, and which the judge accepted, our client’s time served plea offer turned into a six-year prison sentence.

While our client can’t get that time back, he has been proven right and can now fight for vindication, with the Court of Appeals finding that the government broke its promise and that our client is entitled to be resentenced in front of a different judge. The proper standard for interpreting a plea agreement, which is essentially a contract between the prosecution and a defendant, requires that a court consider the defendant’s reasonable understanding of the agreement, rather than apply a “hyper-technical” or rigid reading of the agreement.

Here, based on the plain language of the agreement and our client’s reasonable expectations, the Court found that there was a clear breach when the government alleged facts that sentencing that were inconsistent with the facts it stipulated to in the plea agreement.

Click here to read the Court’s opinion.

Contact our firm if you or a loved one need an experienced federal appellate attorney to handle an appeal from a criminal conviction or sentence.

Our Firm Secures Time Served Sentence for Restaurant Owner Falsely Charged with Labor Trafficking and Alien Smuggling

Written by Tom Church on September 4, 2024. Posted in Federal Human/Labor Trafficking, Our Cases & Results.

Estela Gonzalez (middle) with Paraletal Emily Brooks and Attorney Tom Church

Estela Gonzalez (middle) with Paralegal Emily Brooks and Attorney Tom Church

For the past year and a half, our firm has been part of a joint defense team representing Efrain and Estela Gonzalez, the husband-and-wife owners of a popular Mexican restaurant, Sabor a Mexico, who were falsely accused of labor trafficking, alien smuggling, and other offenses under federal law. The Government initially charged the Gonzalezes in a 16-count indictment alleging that they brought in illegal immigrants from Mexico, made them work under brutal conditions and for no pay, threatened them with deportation and harm to their family, and sexually assaulted and harassed some of their employees.

From the beginning, the Gonzalezes adamantly maintained their innocence of these charges. In fact, Efrain and Estela had become aware of the government’s investigation well before their arrest, as there had been rumors that a group of disgruntled former workers from Sabor, most of them illegally here in the U.S., were making false allegations against the Gonzalezes in order to gain legal immigration status that the federal government grants to illegal immigrants who are victims of crimes.

In fact, the rumors were true. Our firm was retained by the Gonzalezes prior to their arrest, and we conducted a vigorous defense investigation that exposed the scheme against them. We interviewed dozens of witnesses, obtained hundreds of pages of financial records, reviewed thousands of text messages, Facebook messages, and found pictures and videos from the social media accounts of the alleged victims. This evidence showed that the alleged victims had been well paid, enjoyed a positive environment at work, and had the opportunity to live the American dream while at Sabor, as evidenced by their vibrant social lives outside of work.

We also filed a motion to depose favorable defense witnesses who knew the alleged victims (and that the alleged victims were lying) but were scheduled to leave the U.S. once their visas departed. That motion was granted, and we had the unusual opportunity to depose witnesses in a criminal case.

Fortunately, we were able to conduct a thorough investigation in this case despite the fact that both of the Gonzalezes were denied bond, something that makes defense investigations much harder. Their pretrial incarceration also gave the Government leverage–a client out on bond is more likely to elect to go to trial, while an incarcerated client may be more willing to cut a deal if it gets them out of jail sooner.

That’s what happened in this case. Last week, we helped secure Estela’s release from federal custody pursuant to a plea deal with the government that required the government to dismiss all of the original charges and allow Estela to receive a time served sentence after she pleaded guilty to hiring illegal immigrants at her restaurant. By all accounts, this was a major win, as it is any time a client or a client’s loved one is released from custody. This outcome was especially notable since the government had flown down a specialized lawyer from the Department of Justice’s Human Trafficking Unit in Washington, D.C. specifically for this case.

To be clear, however, this was not a case where we got a “sweetheart” deal for our client based on some technicality. Rather, we forced the government to abandon its initial case by conducting a defense investigation that blew up the government’s case.

The evidence the defense obtained was credible, uncontroverted, and painted a much different picture than the government’s allegations–our investigation exposed the group of disgruntled former employees who were deliberately making false allegations of labor trafficking and exploitation against the Gonzalezes. Due to a shoddy investigation by the government’s agents and the absence of any due diligence, these alleged victims succeeded in fooling the government and obtaining legal immigration status normally reserved for actual victims of crimes. They then used the promise of legal status to recruit others to join in their false allegations against the Gonzalezes.

Confronted by this evidence, and knowing that they would not be able to win their original case at trial, the prosecutors in this case agreed to allow Estela to plead guilty to a much more minor offense–hiring illegal immigrants rather than exploiting them–and be released from custody. She is now back home with her family, where she belongs. Efrain has also accepted a deal to plead to the lesser charge and will be sentenced likely later this year.

The case was covered extensively by the media, which initially parroted the government’s false claims about the Gonzalezes. Fortunately for the Gonzalezes, our firm was able to respond forcefully to the false allegations through interviews with outlets like Univision, which granted Attorney Tom Church an exclusive interview to discuss the case. Of course, much work remains to clear the Gonzalezes’ names, and the next step is to bring Efrain home as soon as possible.

If you or a loved one has been charged with labor trafficking, alien smuggling, or other similar federal offenses, call our firm to speak to one of our experienced, compassionate attorneys. We are ready to fight for you and your family.

DEA Proposes Downgrading Marijuana to Schedule III; GA Governor Signs New Hemp Regulations

Written by Tom Church on May 1, 2024. Posted in Federal Crimes, Georgia Drug Crimes, Uncategorized.

Cannabis leaves

April 30, 2024, was a landmark day for the cannabis industry and cannabis consumers in Georgia and throughout the rest of the country, as government officials announced major changes to the federal and state laws that govern cannabis, including marijuana and hemp.

At the federal level, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) announced its proposal to reclassify marijuana as a Schedule III controlled substance. As it currently stands, marijuana is a Schedule I controlled substance under federal law, just like heroin and methamphetamine, meaning the federal government does not recognize any medicinal applications. Federal criminal laws also carry harsh penalties for possession and distribution of Schedule I substances, including long mandatory minimum prison sentences.

As a Schedule III controlled substance, marijuana will be treated like Tylenol with codeine and other prescription medication. That might resolve a dispute between the DEA and Georgia pharmacies that wish to sell medical THC oil. Reclassification to Schedule III will also increase research into the medicinal benefits of marijuana. And finally, marijuana companies will have an easier time accessing banking services.

Critically, possessing and distributing marijuana will still be a federal crime even if marijuana is reclassified to Schedule III. Rather than facing a mandatory minimum of ten years in prison, however, ten years would be the maximum. As such, we will likely see far fewer federal prosecutions for marijuana offenses, which have already been declining for several years now as the DEA has targeted other drugs.

Marijuana will also remain illegal in the states where it is currently illegal, though little is expected to change in states that have legalized recreational or medical marijuana. While the DEA’s new proposal is not quite a revolution, it is a substantial reform, though it is unclear at this time whether President Biden will follow up with additional pardons and sentence commutations for people convicted of marijuana offenses.

On the same day, Georgia Governor Brian Kemp signed SB 494, a bill creating a regulatory framework for the purchase and sale of consumable hemp products like Delta-8, Delta-10, and other hemp-derived cannabinoids. The legislation is significant as it creates rules and regulations for a market of cannabis products in Georgia that are psychoactive. Essentially, it is legal to get “high” in Georgia with these products, even as marijuana remains illegal in the state. Our firm has covered the biggest changes coming in SB 494.

If your or a loved one has been charged with felony offenses relating to the distribution or sale of marijuana or hemp products, contact our firm. We’re ready to fight for you.