$10 million verdict in Missouri marijuana ownership fight

By Jason Hancock | Editor-in-Cheif

Good morning,

Missouri’s marijuana industry has long had an ownership problem. The names on state records don’t always tell you who is actually running — or profiting from — a business.

That issue was on full display in a St. Louis courtroom this week, where a jury sorted through years of deals, side agreements and competing claims involving six cannabis licenses.

The case also arrives just as state regulators are proposing new rules aimed at giving them more authority over who can control a marijuana business.

by Rebecca Rivas

As jurors deliberated, Missouri cannabis regulators filed proposed rules that would change how the state handles the kinds of complicated ownership arrangements exposed during the trial.

In this episode of Missouri on the Record, Jason Hancock looks back at the Eric Schmitt he covered in Jefferson City, the moments that shaped his rise and what his evolution says about ambition, ideology and the incentives driving American politics.

by Mark Markuly

I once witnessed a remarkable example of Missouri’s Show Me character at a town hall with U.S. Sens. Thomas Eagleton and John Danforth.

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