Notably, the federal prosecutor on the case was not from the Central District’s Narcotics Division. San Luis Obispo’s budget includes federal program funds, hence the interest. Not understood by some, the feds have broad jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute cases at the local and state level-so long as there is a “federal interest.” Bribery of a state or local official is a federal crime where the locality or the state has received in excess of $10,000 for any federal program (which could be food stamps or even highway reconstruction money).
#Helios dayspring san luis obispo free#
It was because Dayspring acted “corruptly” by using money, cannabis and free food, to influence a local public office holder. But it was not cannabis that put the authorities on the scent. Why did the feds in this vast Central District, home to 19 million inhabitants and covering 40,000 square miles, single out Dayspring? They were investigating corruption, not cannabis.Įven though cannabis production and distribution is legal in California, it remains illegally federally. RELATED: Q: What’s a Cannabis Operator to Do to Get Ahead Without Getting Indicted?ĭayspring’s cannabis corruption machinations were discovered after federal authorities began a multi-year investigation into local government corruption up the California coast.Ĭalifornia’s “Central District” federal prosecutors oversee the most-populated federal district in the nation covering some 40,000 square miles and 19 million inhabitants. He had previously attempted suicide in March 2020, on the same day the FBI searched his home and his office in the county government building.California’s coastal “King of Cannabis,” Helios Dayspring, owner of a San Luis Obispo cannabis cultivation site, supplier to many licensed California dispensaries, and founder of Central California’s Natural Healing Center dispensary, was sentenced to a 22-month prison sentence, in a downtown Los Angeles federal courtroom May 27.ĭayspring was also ordered to pay almost $3.5 million in back taxes to the IRS from years of unreported cannabis business income.ĭayspring, over a three-year period starting in 2016, bribed a San Luis Obispo county supervisor with money, free cannabis, and fancy meals, so that the local government official would vote in favor of policies which favored Dayspring’s San Luis Obispo cannabis farm and his Grover Beach, California retail outlet. Hill died by suicide in August 2020 after taking a leave from the board to seek mental health treatment. Natural Healing Center was awarded one such permit, though the mayor did not accept the $100,000 Dayspring had offered as a bribe.
In 2017, Dayspring also attempted to bribe the then-mayor of Grover Beach to obtain two retail dispensary permits. In his plea agreement, Dayspring admitted that from 2016 to 2019, he gave cash and gifts to Hill in exchange for his support when the San Luis Obispo County Board of Supervisors voted on permits and land use regulations for growing cannabis, including votes that allowed Dayspring’s farms to operate before they obtained final permits. After his guilty plea, he transferred ownership of the dispensaries to his girlfriend, Valnette Garcia, who sold three of them earlier in May to Glass House Brands, a Carpinteria-based cannabis company, for $22.6 million in cash and stock. “To accomplish that goal, he would not let anything get in his way, including the law.”ĭayspring, 36, owned and operated multiple cannabis farms as well as retail dispensaries under the Natural Healing Center name. Attorney’s Office.ĭayspring pleaded guilty last year to bribery and filing false income tax returns, admitting to paying the late Supervisor Adam Hill around $32,000 in bribes in exchange for Hill’s votes on permitting cannabis growing operations and related matters at the county level.ĭayspring “had one goal: build a cannabis empire,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum.
Dayspring has also paid $3.4 million to the IRS as restitution for the tax crime, which is the approximate amount he underpaid his federal income taxes between 20, according to a news release from the U.S. Helios Dayspring, who also goes by “Bobby,” was sentenced on May 27 by U.S. The cannabis grower who bribed a San Luis Obispo County supervisor has been sentenced to 22 months in federal prison.
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