After the passage of the 2018 U.S. Farm Bill, more than 50,000 acres were approved to grow hemp in Kentucky for the 2019 season.
On one of those acres in Princeton, Kentucky, newly licensed grower Tradewater Organics LLC planted and harvested, by hand, 750 hemp plants of five different strains and variants. Less than a month later, a few hunters noticed the hemp crop drying in what looked to be an otherwise vacant barn.
The hunters alerted the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife, which then alerted the Kentucky State Police. The law enforcement agency later seized and destroyed the crop, causing a monumental loss for the new business in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, according to a claim of negligence filed with the Kentucky Board of Claims.
Tradewater Organics argues KSP mistakenly thought its hemp crop was marijuana and destroyed it without checking with the Kentucky Department of Agriculture, where the agency would have found the registered GPS coordinates of the storage barn.
Kevin Imhof, representing Tradewater Organics alongside Brad Keeton at Louisville’s Stoll Keenon Ogden PLLC, said the claim was initially filed in November 2020, but the process has been delayed as the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife, which alerted KSP to the location of the hemp, was added to the claim.
Tradewater is seeking damages of no less than that wholesale market value. Prices for CBD oil — specifically Rick Simpson Oil that Tradewater planned to produce — have fluctuated since the claim was filed in November 2020.
Source:
https://www.wlky.com/article/kentucky-hemp-company-sues-state-police-crop-destroyed/39398842
