Southern Investigative Reporting Foundation:  Roddy Boyd, the author of “Tinkerer, Lawyer, Hustler, Lies: One Man’s Path to a Dope Fortune” wrote an April 17, 2014, Medbox article for the Southern Investigative Reporting Foundation.  All Medbox shareholders and people involved with Arizona medical marijuana dispensaries that used Medbox’ services should read the article.  Here are some quotes from the article:

Rishi Patel is on a mission: He is taking a hard look at business opportunities in the wake of Arizona’s decision to permit the sale of medical marijuana in dispensaries across the state. . . .

Patel had come across an ad from Prescription Vending Machines, a company helping folks like him get into the medical marijuana business, and in short order he was in a running dialogue with the company’s founder, an agreeable and talkative fellow named Vincent Mehdizadeh. From there, it wasn’t long before Patel and a pair of friends had struck a plan to help Prescription Vending Machines land a dispensary permit in Arizona.

Just before he wrote a very large check—his father was staking him the capital—Patel did a background search on Mehdizadeh.

After getting the report, Patel was astonished to see a laundry list of crimes and lawsuits; one more serious than the other, all of which Mehdizadeh was at the center. . . .

[Mehdizadeh] tells Patel that there has been a mistake, and that something somewhere is terribly wrong since he hasn’t been repeatedly sued or arrested. . . .

To correct the record, Mehdizadeh e-mails Patel a scan of his driver’s license and another background report. 

Shortly after the call ended, Patel opened up the files. As promised, the documents belonged to Pegah Vincent Mehdizadeh, a man from California whose spotless criminal record was the polar opposite of Pejman Vincent Mehdizadeh. . . .

And then in July 2011 Patel got his dispensary and within minutes knew that everything was wrong. The furniture was used, the location wasn’t what they’d bargained for, and even the vaunted dispensary system they’d been promised didn’t do what was advertised.

The quotes above are a small part of a very lengthy and troubling story.