MARIJUANA: Fake targets U.S. Attorney's Office, media, officials say

A group protesting the federal government's crackdown on medical marijuana claimed responsibility Tuesday for emailing news outlets two hoax press releases that appeared to be from the U.S. attorney's office in San Diego, according to a post on the organization's page on Facebook.com.

Neither phony release was published by the North County Times.

The first hoax press release reached the North County Times at 7:05 a.m. Tuesday. Its format resembled legitimate press releases from the U.S. attorney's office, and claimed the U.S. attorney's office was closing local pharmacies because of "high rates of pharmaceutical drug abuse and high property values of targeted pharmacies."

A second email, also resembling a press release from the U.S. attorney's office, reached the North County Times at 8:50 a.m. The press release said the first press release was a hoax, and the U.S. attorney's office was taking no such enforcement action.

A legitimate email from the U.S. attorney's office reached North County Times at 10:12 a.m. The email said both press releases were hoaxes, and the office had not sent either of them.

Several media companies were fooled and reported the false information about pharmacy closures.

Kelly Thornton, a spokeswoman for the office, confirmed the authenticity of the third email. She said U.S. Attorney Laura Duffy answered questions about the hoax at an 11 a.m. press conference in downtown San Diego.

Duffy said the office was investigating the source of the phony emails. She said the office was also investigating whether the perpetrator of the hoax committed a crime, which could include impersonation of a law enforcement officer.

The San Diego-based group called the Federal Accountability Coalition later claimed responsibility for the hoax in a post on the coalition's Facebook.com page.

The post said the coalition sent the phony press releases "in retaliation against U.S. Attorney Laura Duffy for her insubordination against the Obama Administration and Government of the United States of America."

The coalition described the "insubordination" as the office's "use of federal power to target medical marijuana dispensaries with asset forfeiture," despite what the coalition described as pledges by President Barack Obama and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder that "federal resources would not be used to shut down medical marijuana dispensaries operating in compliance with state law."

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