moonbuggy

see it here »

`Kevin Reed launched his medical marijuana business two years ago, armed with big dreams and an Excel spreadsheet.

Happy customers at his Green Cross cannabis club were greeted by “bud tenders” and glass jars brimming with high-quality weed at red-tag prices. They hailed the slender, gentle Southerner as a ganja good Samaritan. Though Reed set out to run it like a Walgreens, his tiny storefront shop ended up buzzing with jazzy joie de vivre. Turnover was Starbucks-style: On a good day, $30,000 in business would walk through the black, steel-gated front door.

Today, the 32-year-old cannabis capitalist is looking for a job, his business undone by its own success and unexpected opposition in one of America’s most proudly tolerant places. [..]’

`Today, Hacienda Napoles is in ruins, taken over by jungle foliage and bats. The sprawling Spanish-style mansion has been gutted, scavenged by treasure hunters looking for stashes of gold and cash buried under the floors. [Pablo] Escobar is long gone, cut down in a hail of police gunfire.

But the hippos are still here.

[..] Now the original four have multiplied to 16 and, far from starving to death, as some expected, they have learned to forage like cows.’

`Someone slipped a little something extra into a batch of cookies brought for a holiday party.

Earlier in the week, 15 workers at the Weyerhaeuser plant in Stayton were hospitalized after complaining of dizziness and light headedness.

Investigators determined that the illness was caused by employees eating homemade cookies they believe were intentionally baked with a foreign substance. They suspect the substance to be marijuana.

The Stayton police are offering a $500 reward for information that leads to an arrest in the case.’

with video.

`Imagine watching your cannabis-smoking son stab himself three times in the stomach right in front of you – and later having to deal with his suicide.

Imagine watching your beautiful daughter become a schizophrenic after using drugs and having to take over the job of caring for her baby.

Imagine realising you had a mental health problem and were seeking help, only to be turned away because the mental health service classified your problem as drug-related.

For years the parents of cannabis users have seen a link between their child’s use of cannabis and mental illness.

Now evidence is emerging that they are right.’

see it here »

`Officials with the Lafayette Police Department stand by their use of a Taser gun during a Sunday morning altercation with a nude, and allegedly combative, 29-year-old Carencro man, who would later die at a local hospital from unknown complications.

Officials are waiting on an autopsy report to determine the exact cause of Terrill Enard’s death.

According to Lafayette police Sgt. Mark Francis, police believe Enard was under the influence of some type of unknown substance. Francis said Enard was strong, aggressive, combative and unresponsive.’

`Soldiers trying to seize control of one Mexico’s top drug-producing regions found the countryside teeming with a new hybrid marijuana plant that can be cultivated year-round and cannot be killed with herbicides.

Soldiers fanned out across some of the new fields Tuesday, pulling up plants by the root and burning them, as helicopter gunships clattered overhead to give them cover from a raging drug war in the western state of Michoacan. The plants’ roots survive if they are doused with herbicide, said army Gen. Manuel Garcia.

“These plants have been genetically improved,” he told a handful of journalists allowed to accompany soldiers on a daylong raid of some 70 marijuana fields. “Before we could cut the plant and destroy it, but this plant will come back to life unless it’s taken out by the roots.”‘

`”She then took the crack from out of her mouth and placed it on the trunk of Deputy (Jeffery) Pedrick’s patrol car,” the police said.

The Deputy Pedrick warned Reaves that if the substance tested positive, she would be arrested.

After a test came back positive, Reaves said the crack was a poor mix of wax and cocaine and that the man who sold it to her should give her money back.

She was arrested and booked into the local jail on $US1,504 ($A1,922) bond, and has since been released.

Police also searched the man Reaves accused of selling her the crack, but found no drugs or money on him, they said.’

`For years, activists in the marijuana legalization movement have claimed that cannabis is America’s biggest cash crop. Now they’re citing government statistics to prove it.

A report released today by a marijuana public policy analyst contends that the market value of pot produced in the U.S. exceeds $35 billion — far more than the crop value of such heartland staples as corn, soybeans and hay, which are the top three legal cash crops.

California is responsible for more than a third of the cannabis harvest, with an estimated production of $13.8 billion that exceeds the value of the state’s grapes, vegetables and hay combined — and marijuana is the top cash crop in a dozen states, the report states.’

`The Federal Government wants to ban the sale of marijuana pipes and so-called “cocaine kits”.

But the Parliamentary Secretary for Health, Christopher Pyne, admits he faces an uphill battle.

His demand for a ban follows a meeting of the National Cannabis Strategy Group six months ago which called for “closer and more appropriate regulation of drug paraphernalia”.

He said he was concerned regular display of such equipment in shops reduced public concern about the impact of drugs on young people and sent a tacit signal the Government approved of drug use.’

`Actress Natasha Lyonne, the star of American Pie accused of threatening to sexually molest a dog, turned herself in at a New York court today. [..]

In the court complaint, Lyonne’s former roommate claimed Lyonne trashed their apartment and then banged on a neighbour’s door, rushed into that apartment and picked up her dog, telling the woman: “I’m going to sexually molest your dog.”‘

`It had been years since Jeremy (not his real name) had touched a basketball.

Living with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), Jeremy feared contamination from dirt and germs which prevented any part of his body from touching the ground, save for the soles of his shoes.

But whilst taking part in a small clinical study to investigate the effects of psilocybin, the hallucinogenic compound found in ‘magic’ mushrooms, on people with OCD, Jeremy’s bare feet lay on the floor and he expressed a willingness to engage in an activity, playing with a ball, that just hours before he would have been considered abhorrent.’

Hooray for psilocybin. 🙂

`It’s the generation that came of age in the permissive 1960s and ’70s, part of the counterculture revolution that embraced the mantra “turn on, tune in, drop out.”

Now they are graying — but some are still having a hard time breaking away from or resisting marijuana, cocaine and other illegal drugs.

A national drug survey by the federal government, for example, has found that between 2002 and 2005, use of illegal drugs fell 15 percent among teenagers, but increased 63 percent among people in their 50s.’

🙂

see it here »

`Marijuana is not a “gateway” drug that predicts or eventually leads to substance abuse, suggests a 12-year University of Pittsburgh study. Moreover, the study’s findings call into question the long-held belief that has shaped prevention efforts and governmental policy for six decades and caused many a parent to panic upon discovering a bag of pot in their child’s bedroom.

The Pitt researchers tracked 214 boys beginning at ages 10-12, all of whom eventually used either legal or illegal drugs. When the boys reached age 22, they were categorized into three groups: those who used only alcohol or tobacco, those who started with alcohol and tobacco and then used marijuana (gateway sequence) and those who used marijuana prior to alcohol or tobacco (reverse sequence).

Nearly a quarter of the study population who used both legal and illegal drugs at some point – 28 boys – exhibited the reverse pattern of using marijuana prior to alcohol or tobacco, and those individuals were no more likely to develop a substance use disorder than those who followed the traditional succession of alcohol and tobacco before illegal drugs, according to the study, which appears in this month’s issue of the American Journal of Psychiatry.’

`A father who gave his two daughters amphetamines to teach them about the dangers of drugs has been sentenced.

Colin Moyse, 50, of Gorleston, Norfolk, admitted to giving Class B amphetamines – known as Speed – to his daughters between December 2005 and January 2006.

He was given a conditional discharge of two years.

Norwich Crown Court heard that Moyse wanted his daughters, aged 13 and 12, to know what the drug tasted like in case somebody spiked their drinks.

Moyse, said to be “anti-drugs”, put some amphetamine on his fingertips and told the girls to taste it.’

`These drugs aren’t mine! I’m merely helping someone close to me overcome a drug problem, so I had to take them away, and then I had to drive down the highway as fast as I could to get away from him, but it’s impossible to get away from him, because that someone is me.’

`This unusual ad for a set of Hummer tires was spotted on the Phoenix Craigslist. I wonder if the photo on the bottom right implies that the seller would be willing to trade the tires for a rock. Click image for a better look.’

`A man who was attacked by an alligator this morning was naked and smoking crack at the time, Polk County deputies who rescued him said today.

The alligator had the man in his jaws when deputies arrived at Lake Parker in Lakeland about 4 a.m. today. They were called by nearby residents who reported hearing a man yelling for help. [..]

Apgar, 45, of Polk City, suffered a broken arm, partially amputated left arm and trauma to his left leg. Doctors are trying to reattach the arm at Lakeland Regional Medical Center, where was listed in critical condition. [..]

Judd said Apgar told deputies he was smoking crack-cocaine at the adjacent park, but it was unclear why he was naked or why he was attacked by the alligator.’

`The Drug Enforcement Administration agents were near the Philip Burton Federal Building at 1:15 p.m. when a man passed them on the 400 block of Turk Street carrying a cardboard box. The box, emblazoned with the logo of a common brand of hydroponics equipment, reeked of marijuana. [..]

The narcotics agents stopped the man and asked what was in the box. He showed them about 1.5 pounds of marijuana, 12 ounces of hashish and an electronic scale.

Then, in a move that apparently stunned the 20-year-old Eureka resident, the agents took his pot away. While his crime was too minor to prosecute under federal law, the federal government does consider marijuana to be contraband, McEnry said. [..]

Realizing the DEA did not intend to return his stash, the man then called 911 on his cell phone to report the incident to San Francisco police.’

`U.S. Coast Guards have seized a submarine carrying 3.5 tons of cocaine in the Pacific Ocean off Costa Rica and arrested three Colombians on board, the Costa Rican Coast Guard said on Sunday.

The submarine appeared to be a makeshift vessel unlike military submarines or those used by oceanographers. It could only submerge 6 feet under water, Costa Rican Coast Guard spokesman Jose Antonio Fallas told Reuters.

The 45-foot-long vessel was found last Wednesday near the remote Coco Island, southwest of the Central American mainland, and had traveled hundreds of miles from Colombia on its way to the United States.’

`Heroin should be prescribed to drug addicts to curb crime, the deputy chief constable of Nottinghamshire has said at a drugs conference.

Howard Roberts told an Association of Chief Police Officers’ conference in Manchester the idea should be assessed.

He said the treatment would cost £12,000 a year per addict but added that drug users steal property valued at an average of £45,000 a year.’

`Many people on the rundown northwest Atlanta street where Kathryn Johnston lived fortify their windows with metal bars and arm themselves for protection. Johnston, 92, was no exception. She was waiting with her gun on Tuesday night when a group of plainclothes officers with a warrant knocked down her door in a search for drugs, police said. She opened fire, wounding three officers, before being shot to death, police said.

Assistant Police Chief Alan Dreher called the killing “tragic and unfortunate” but said the officers were justified in returning fire.’

`A dog may be man’s best friend. But one dog, Lady, decided she needed more friends — and she found plenty in the knot of toads living at the local pond. A suburban family’s secret struggle with an uncommon addiction comes to light in this personal essay by NPR’s Laura Mirsch. [..]

“We couldn’t keep our dog’s addiction a secret any longer,” Laura Mirsch says. “The neighbors all knew that Lady was a drug addict, and soon the other dogs weren’t allowed to play with her.”‘

`A methadone-addicted mother stopped for a cigarette while attempting to resuscitate her baby as instructions were relayed on the phone from a triple 0 operator, a Supreme Court jury was told yesterday.

The mother, who cannot be named, sobbed in the dock during a harrowing replay of the emergency call, made from the Londonderry home of Michelle Sava on January 16, last year.’

‘Authorities in northern New Mexico have stumbled onto what appears to be classified information from Los Alamos National Laboratory while arresting a man suspected of domestic violence and dealing methamphetamine from his mobile home. [..]

Police alerted the FBI to the secret documents, which agents traced back to a woman linked to the drug dealer, officials said. The woman is a contract employee at Los Alamos National Laboratory, according to an FBI official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the case.

The official would not describe the documents except to say that they appeared to contain classified material and were stored on a computer file.’

`The Bexar County Sheriff’s Office Internal Affairs Unit is investigating a complaint of two deputies who allegedly forced two men to eat marijuana, KSAT 12 News reported. [..]

Martinez and Sandoval said the deputies were looking for a woman when they found their marijuana during an search of their apartment Sept. 29.

“They … put it on the counter and the cop came back up to me,” Martinez said. “(He) told me, ‘Well I’m going to watch you and your roommate eat it. And you all (expletive) better eat it or not …”

Martinez said the main deputy ordered them to wash the marijuana down with water.’

`The drug lords at war in central Mexico are no longer content with simply killing their enemies. They are putting their severed heads on public display.

In Michoacan, the home state of President-elect Felipe Calderon, 17 heads have turned up this year, many with bloodstained notes like the one found in the highlands town of Tepalcatepec in August: “See. Hear. Shut Up. If you want to stay alive.”

Many in Michoacan’s mountains and colonial cities are doing just that: They are tightlipped, their newspapers are censoring themselves and in one town, 18 out of 32 police officers quit saying they had received death threats from drug smugglers.’