A chain of Maine medical marijuana dispensaries that is planning to open a location in Presque Isle was subject of the first-ever patient advisory issued by state cannabis regulators last week after products sold in its Waterville store tested positive for pesticides.
Strains of five concentrates sold by MarijuanaVille, which operates 12 medical dispensaries mostly in central Maine, were found to contain dangerous levels of eight different pesticides in testing conducted by the Maine Office of Cannabis Policy.
One product, named “Sexy Sally,” was found to have more than 190 times the acceptable amount of the insecticide bifenthrin.
Other pesticides found include chlorfenapyr, cypermethrin and pyridaben, which can cause respiratory irritation, neurological effects and flu-like symptoms when inhaled in cannabis, according to the cannabis policy office.
The Presque Isle City Council approved a marijuana license in November for MarijuanaVille and its owner, businessman Frank Berenyi, to open a dispensary in the former NAPA Auto Parts building at the corner of Main Street and Riverside Drive.
Berenyi did not respond to a request for comment Tuesday, but said in a series of videos posted to his Facebook page over the weekend that the products had been pulled from shelves.
“We felt like we wanted to get ahead of this, so we are now testing all of our product coming in, period,” Berenyi said.
In the videos, Berenyi said the concentrates were not produced by MarijuanaVille and were instead purchased from “licensed Maine labs” as white label products for the company to put its branding on.
He said he is personally testing other dispensaries in the Waterville area for pesticides, and claimed that there are products with the chemicals in them available in hundreds of stores.
“We follow OCP guidelines to a T,” Berenyi said in another video. “How did [the pesticides] get to us? It failed at some regulatory level, I don’t know.”
Unlike recreational-use marijuana products, the Office of Cannabis Policy does not have the authority to issue recalls of products sold under the state’s medical use program.
Office Director John Hudak acknowledged that reality and other regulatory differences in a letter published the same day as the advisory and cited it as the reason the office warned consumers about the products.
“The limited inventory recordkeeping requirements in the medical program hinders
OCP’s ability to identify sources of contamination and/or other registrants who may be in possession of the affected products,” Hudak said.
The office tested MarijuanaVille’s products because of a complaint from a patient who reported having an “adverse health reaction,” the advisory said.
MarijuanaVille has expanded its business rapidly in recent years, becoming one of the state’s largest medical dispensary chains. It operates locations in Augusta, Alfred, Bangor, Gardiner, Lewiston, Orland, Newport, Readfield, Unity, Waterville, Wilton and Winslow. The Orland and Lewiston locations each opened in the latter half of 2025.
It’s unclear when the Presque Isle dispensary could open. When it does, it would become the city’s 10th cannabis business, rivaling or besting the marijuana scene of some of Maine’s major cities on a per capita basis.
Aroostook County’s largest municipality has been one of the few in northern Maine to embrace the legalization of cannabis, but in approving the license in November, city councilors questioned whether it was time to review Presque Isle’s marijuana ordinance.
They are expected to consider a moratorium on new dispensary licenses at their February meeting.
