Four-minute read
Asbury Park Press
EATONTOWN - Meet the newest member of the business community here, famed racecar driver Randy Lanier, who spent 27 years in federal prison for smuggling marijuana during the 1980s.
Fast forward to today and Lanier, grateful for a second chance on life, is the CEO of Denver Cole Farms of New Jersey. The company received the green light to open a cannabis cultivation business in a warehouse on Industrial Way West owned by Ron Wollner.
"I can't tell you how glad I am that out of all the municipalities I looked at, all the possible cultivation facilities, it worked out here. The municipality, the Borough Council have been great to work with. We're going to great things here in Eatontown and we're going to help people," Lanier said.
Lanier was born to tobacco famers in Lynchburg, Virginia, before moving to South Florida as a teen in the late 1960s. He rose from relative obscurity in the racing world to win Indy 500 Rookie of the Year honors in 1986.
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However, shortly thereafter he was nabbed by FBI and DEA agents for trafficking marijuana and sentenced to life in prison. All told he smuggled over 600,000 pounds of marijuana.
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But in 2014, with the legal and cultural prohibitions on cannabis loosening, Lanier was released from prison by the Obama administration in a move to alleviate overcrowded prisons by freeing nonviolent, first-time offenders.
Lanier found new purpose in prison, counseling those who tried or considered suicide. He now also spearheads an organization called Freedom Grow, which helps those still behind bars for nonviolent cannabis crimes by providing support to the prisoners and their families.
Through their fundraising, Lanier said they buy Christmas gifts for their children, get them necessities in prison and pay for their phone calls and emails.
"I've been through that struggle. It took me 27 years to overcome it," said Lanier, who lives in Davie, Florida, and is a proud grandparent these days to twin 8-year old boys.
Last year, Lanier was awarded a lucrative social equity cultivation license for New Jersey. The marijuana that he used to drive his boat from Florida to Colombia to purchase in bales and smuggle into the country can now be grown legally in many U.S. states, including New Jersey.
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Lanier's background also turned out to be key piece for Jeffery Larson, owner and founder of Denver Cole Farms, which is headquartered in Chicago. Larson was looking to expand the cultivation business and needed a person like Lanier to qualify for the social equity cultivation license, which is awarded to people with a prior cannabis conviction.
Larson learned about Lanier after watching a Netflix documentary series "Bad Sport." Lanier's life was the subject of Season 1, Episode 2 called "Need for Weed."
"I found him on Instagram. I reached out to him. He got back. We ended up talking for three hours on the phone," Larson said.
The final piece was Wollner. Wollner owns a 56,000-square-foot warehouse on Industrial Way West. Lanier said he looked at 18 other facilities before he was introduced to Wollner, who had just what he needed — a warehouse with 25-foot clearance to the rafters and a location on major transportation routes.
"I really liked the guys. They approached me. I visited Jeff's location a number of times; it's a real clean-cut operation. And between the three of us, we got this across the finish line," Wollner said.
The front of the warehouse is leased by Wollner's former computer data solutions company, which he sold about four years ago. Their plan is start the cultivation in the back of the warehouse, using about 26,000 square feet, which includes mezzanines. In that space they will have flower rooms, dry rooms, trim rooms, seed rooms and fertilizer rooms. Larson said it will cost about $8 million to get up and running.
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It's enough space to grow 6,000 pounds of cannabis a year, which is equal to about $18 million at New Jersey's current wholesale market prices. According to its cannabis ordinance, the borough would collect a 2% tax on all cultivation sales.
Larson said they will grow their Denver Cole Farms brands but are developing a couple of new strands of cannabis for Lanier called "Octane" and "Blue Thunder," from his racing days.
Larson expects they will produce about 40 new full-time jobs and more than a few of those jobs to be taken by people with prior cannabis convictions. Cultivation should start in about six months to a year.
"It's going to be a state-of-the-art facility," Larson said.
When Jersey Shore native Dan Radel is not reporting the news, you can find him in a college classroom where he is a history professor. Reach him @danielradelapp; 732-643-4072; [email protected].
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