Nevada Cannabis Regulators Reject Testing Lab’s Bid to Dismiss Disciplinary Action

The Nevada Cannabis Compliance Board (CCB) on Tuesday voted unanimously to reject the motion to dismiss disciplinary action by a cannabis testing laboratory accused of intentionally manipulating testing results to inflate THC levels, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reports. Lettucetest LLC, formally known as Cannex Nevada LLC, now faces disciplinary action and could lose its business license and be prohibited from operating in the industry for a decade. 

The facility first faced a complaint from regulators in January 2021, including more than a dozen violations, the report says. The board found that the testing company also passed samples tainted by microbial contaminants in addition to misreporting THC levels.  

“Rather than protecting consumers through accurate and honest testing, Cannex implemented testing processes that were designed to protect the monetary assets of their clients without regard for consumer safety.” — CCB in the January complaint 

Lettucetest had argued during a special board meeting earlier this month that the charges should be dropped due, in part, to a technicality that since the violations occurred prior to the board’s formation, it doesn’t have the authority to charge them, the report says.  

The facility has previously been suspended twice in 2019 and 2020 when it was discovered it had passed tainted products which were then sold at retail dispensaries. The Nevada CCB complaint indicated it found 232 instances of unapproved retesting of products that had initially failed testing for microbials. 

The company could also face a $62,500 fine.