Politics & Government
Scofflaw List Adds Walnut Creek Resident
Added to state tax delinquency list is Abraham Volstein Norton, who led a Hayward marijuana dispensary raided by the feds in 2007.
The state's new list of top delinquent taxpayers has added a Walnut Creek resident who owes almost a million dollars from an alleged money laundering and medical marijuana dispensary conspiracy that has been the subject of federal court action for four years.
On the list from the state Board of Equalization is Abraham Volstein Norton of Walnut Creek with a tax balance of $951,876 — the same amount owed as his brother, Winslow Lazer Norton, listed with an Emeryville address.
The Norton brothers were partners in the Compassionate Collective of Alameda County in Hayward, which was raided in 2007 by the Drug Enforcement Agency. The brothers were charged with conspiracy to distribute more than 1,000 kilos of marijuana and money-laundering offenses.
The Nortons have become something of a cause celebre in the movement to legalize marijuana. The Nortons said in an interview with the San Francisco Bay Guardian a year ago that they ran a "squeaky clean" operation and that it was ironic the feds were picking on them because they might have been the first medical marijuana outlet to voluntarily pay sales tax.
The state's top 100 list of tax delinquents adds up to more than $419.5 million in owed taxes, which is more than the amount the California State University system is asking to restore to its budget, according to a California Watch article.
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