Attorneys Logan Jones and Eric Brown are accused of conspiring with out-of-state interests to set up illicit cannabis grow operations in rural Oklahoma.
In a press conference Thursday, Attorney General John O’Connor announced charges against Logan Jones and Eric Brown, who operate a law office – Jones Brown Law Firm – based in Tulsa.
Law enforcement officials say the pair would work around the state’s requirement that the majority of operations be owned by Oklahoma residents by creating so-called ghost owners. Those ghost owners often worked at their law firm and were given a fee to put their name on a medical marijuana business license.
Jones and Brown are each charged with one count of conspiracy to cultivate a controlled dangerous substance (marijuana), six counts of offering false or forged instruments for recordation, three counts of cultivation of a controlled dangerous substance (marijuana) and one count of pattern of criminal offenses.
Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics agents raided farms in Garvin, Major and Mayes Counties as part of the investigation and seized more than 20,000 plants from those locations.
Jones and Brown are hardly alone in the selling and trafficking of cannabis grown in Oklahoma and shipped out of state, said Donnie Anderson, Director of the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics.
“We have hundreds of cases going on as we speak,” Anderson said. “We will continue these investigations.”
“Let these charges send a loud and clear message to anyone engaging in criminal operations in Oklahoma – your actions will not go unnoticed,” O’Connor said.