Internal Fraud and Theft Risk in the Cannabis Industry
Some of us can recall back in 2014, Colorado’s grand scheme to become the center of the legal, recreational marijuana industry, a virtual Napa Valley of Cannabis. Tax revenue from retail sales was going to solve every municipal problem for the town of 112,000. The streets would be paved with Gold, and the schools would be the finest in the land. Early returns were promising; The Wall Street Journal reported, “The day after legal recreational use arrived in Pueblo, Colorado, in 2014, fifty people were camped out in front of one of the first dispensaries, waiting for the doors to open.” The two shops licensed at the time “rang up a combined $1 million in sales the first month, sending $56,000 in taxes to the county.” Pueblo was on its way to becoming not just the national center of cannabis commerce but a tourist destination for connoisseurs of recreational marijuana.