How Not To Get 35 Years For Pot Possession
Smith County (East Texas) judges and juries have long had a reputation of meting out severe, some might say ridiculous, punishment for drug convictions. And Henry Wooten's case is no exception: the 54-year-old Tyler man was sentenced Thursday to 35 years in prison for possessing slightly more than four ounces of pot. Wooten actually got off easy -- the prosecutor asked the jury to give him 99 years. (We just hope TDCJ can free up room for this menace to society; maybe the state can release a child molester or serial arsonist to find a cell for Wooten.)
While the sentence may be asinine, we can't help but feel Wooten brought much of this upon himself -- mostly by choosing to be both a pothead and live in Tyler, when clearly that calls for an either/or scenario. But Wooten could have taken at least a few steps to minimize his chances of being busted so easily, and Hair Balls would like to lay out a few of these so that other lovers of the weed in Smith County can take heed.
1.) Don't smoke weed within 1,000 feet of a day care: According to the Tyler Morning Telegraph, "Tyler police officers were alerted to Wooten's location because of the smell of the marijuana."
Wooten was puffing near the Ebenezer Day Care Center, in what is known as a "drug-free zone." People in Smith County don't like that. So if you're driving along and you get a sudden urge to light up, take note of your surroundings: if you see lots of parents walking children into a building and then leaving without those children, you might be parked near a school or a day care. Do not, under any circumstances, pack your bowl there. Just go to the nearest liquor store, and you can bet you'll be outside a drug-free zone. Enjoy!
2.) Don't let people see you pull a bunch of baggies out of your pocket: Per the same article, Smith County Assistant District Attorney Richard Vance told the jury "Wooten pulled bag after bag from his pockets like one of those clowns you see..." (see Rule No. 3 for the rest of Vance's quote)
3.) Don't leave gear in plain sight in your care: "...and in the driver's seat of his car was a big bag and digital scales."
4.) Don't demand that a private lab test your weed: Although Wooten was perfectly within his rights when he asked a local lab to analyze his weed, we're guessing he probably annoyed the judge and the prosecutor, and in turn the jury, by this petulant ploy. It's pretty hard to mistake weed for anything other than weed. Did Wooten think the lab might screw up and report that the sticky green matter in the baggies was in fact spaghetti? Seriously, how fucking high was this guy?
We're not saying these are get-out-of-jail-free cards, but they're generally good rules of thumb. If you live in Tyler and you smoke weed, you might want to print this out and keep it in your pocket for future reference.
(Oh, and don't have two prior convictions on your record. Or, if you do, don't go doing what this guy did.)
That’s a lot of ganja! 34,000 lbs in fact. Mexico marijuana bust: Millions of dollars worth of pot seized
TIJUANA — A trailer that presumably transported cookies was apprehended with more than 34,000 pounds of marijuana at a Mexicali checkpoint, the Mexican Army said Tuesday.
“With this seizure we prevented the illicit marketing of more than 7 million of marihuana doses,” Alfonso Duarte-Mujica, commander of Baja’s Military Zone, said of the seizure that took place Sunday night.
The Army estimated the street value of the pot to organized crime at about 231 million pesos (U.S. $18 million).
The Mexican Army also confiscated the trailer and arrested the driver. He was identified as Mario Lopez Castro, 34. Lopez told Mexican authorities he was going to collect 50,000 pesos (U.S. $4,000) by delivering the truck from Mexicali to Ensenada.
The trailer, with no commercial signs, was detected at the El Chinerito checkpoint located on Federal Highway 3, between San Felipe and Ensenada. Inside the trailer, the weed was found in 1,435 brown packages behind cookie boxes.
Duarte-Mujica said that the pot was supposed to be delivered in Ensenada, but it is uncertain if the final destination was Tijuana by road or San Diego over seas.
Tania Navarro is SDNN’s Tijuana correspondent.
South Dakota Voters Could Legalize Medical Marijuana
Tuesday, thousands of signatures were submitted to South Dakota officials which could bring the issue of legalizing medical marijuana to a public vote in November. The South Dakota Coalition for Compassion turned in more than enough petitions to put the issue on the ballot. They've been collecting the petitions for over a year now with a door to door search for signatures as well as other methods.
Patrick Lynch is in support of legalizing medical marijuana and suffers from M.S., which can be treated by medical marijuana. His mother and sister also have M.S. and he's hoping the issue is on the ballot and passes. "The pros far out weigh the cons on the medical marijuana issue to where if people really truly understood it they would be more receptive of it"
There were around 32,000 signatures collected which is almost twice when compared to what's needed. The validation will be done by state officials with random sampling and if enough signatures are valid it will be on the November Ballot in South Dakota.
Darcy Jensen works with people dealing with drug addictions. She thinks that South Dakota would end up like other states when it comes to this issue and struggle to control is. She's also worried about other issues that come with smoking marijuana. "When we have a pill we can take and know exactly how much we'd be getting, why would we get smoking something when how people inhale it how much they put in the joint, what was the quality of it, we can't measure those things."
Synthetic Marijuana: Six things to know
Last week, we reported on a synthetic Cannabinoid compound called JWH-018, which is sold in herbal-incense blends at head shops around the Valley. Smoking this compound is said to have the same effect as smoking marijuana, which has led lawmakers in Kansas to seek a ban on the substance (check out this week's feature story about the substance and the proposed ban in our sister paper, Kansas City's Pitch Weekly).
In the spirit of journalistic research, we smoked several brands of herbal incense over the course of a month leading up to the news short linked above. And while JWH-018 is still legal in Arizona, there are a few other things you should know about smoking it:
1. Not all incense blends are created equal. There are dozens of herbal-incense blends containing JWH-018 on the market right now, and each one has slightly different herbal ingredients, ranging from damiana root and molasses to Siberian motherwort and honey. The herbal blend doesn't matter compared to the amount of JWH-018 in the blend, and while no brands list the exact amount of the compound in their incense, some herbal incense blends seem to be more potent than others. The strongest blends we tried were Serenity Now, Puff, and Spice.
2. JWH-018 is more expensive than real pot. Most of the herbal-incense blends containing JWH-018 are sold in one-gram bags, for about $25 each. The street value for potent strains of marijuana ("chronic") is about $14 a gram.
3. Herbal incense blends are harsh. These herbal aromatherapy blends with JWH-018 are not marketed as something to smoke, which might explain why they all taste like crap. But the effects on the throat and lungs are worse than the dirt-and-dung flavor. Granted, smoking anything is not good for one's respiratory system, but smoking herbal incense can make your throat burn and your lungs ache, hours after the last hit.
4. JWH-018 does not mix well with alcohol. Most drugs don't mix well with alcohol, but having a glass or two of wine with JWH-018 can exacerbate hangovers and cause headaches at the base of the skull that last for hours.
5. It doesn't give you "the munchies." While some smokers have reported getting extremely hungry after puffing JWH-018, others (us included) didn't have any urges to cram cupcakes into their faces. Marijuana's known for inducing the munchies, but JWH-018 doesn't seem to feed the need for Cheetos.
6. The high last no more than 30 minutes. The effects of smoking JWH-018 don't last long -- probably an average of 10 minutes, or half an hour at best for the more potent herbal blends. It doesn't seem to take much more than a hit or two off a pipe to trigger JWH-018's heady high, but the feeling won't last beyond a single episode of South Park.
Mother and Son Busted With 66 lbs. of Pot
If a family that plays together stays together (or is it "prays together"? Whatever), what are we to make of a family that's caught holding 66 pounds of marijuana?
That can be asked of Cynthia F. Bruckner, 62, and her son Scot A. Christensen, 42, who were arrested Wednesday near Lincoln, Nebraska, after police allegedly found 66 pounds of marijuana in their vehicle.
Psychotic Skunk?
New research in marijuana cultivation has pointed to a link between the absence of the cannabidol compound (CBD) in certain strains of skunk weed and the development of psychosis. The elimination of CBD through selective breeding increases the THC content, which may play a key role in the development of psychosis. Studies on the role of these two compounds have shown that "pure synthetic THC causes transient psychosis in 40 to 50 percent of healthy people. In stark contrast to THC, CBD appears to have an anti-psychotic effect."
iGrow
The One-Stop-Weed Shop - Now that medical marijuana is legal in California, people are jumping on the band wagon.
Jesus Christ.
A marijuana bust along the U.S.-Mexico border revealed 30 pounds of the drug stuffed into framed pictures of Jesus Christ, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency said Wednesday.
"This is not the first time we have seen smugglers attempt to use religious figures and articles of faith to further their criminal enterprise," said William Molaski, port director of the agency's office in El Paso, Texas, in a statement.
"What some might find offensive or sacrilegious has unfortunately become a standard operating procedure for drug smugglers. This would include using religious symbols, children and senior citizens in their attempts to defeat the CBP inspection process."
Authorities said a 22-year-old woman in a Jeep from Juarez, Mexico, told federal border patrol officers that she had nothing to declare besides the framed art. The officers checked out the vehicle with Cesar, a federal drug-sniffing dog, who alerted them to three framed pictures of Jesus in the vehicle.
The officers pulled the backing of the pictures and found numerous bundles, authorities said. The woman was arrested.
The bust was one of three marijuana seizures made Tuesday at the El Paso point of entry. Officers said they seized 214 pounds of marijuana in the two other busts.
MI cops shoot unarmed, 20-year-old marijuana activist
A 20-year-old university student in Michigan is hospitalized and in serious condition after police shot the man Wednesday while serving a drug warrant. He was unarmed, investigators said.
Coming through an apartment’s back door, an Ottawa County deputy allegedly shined a flashlight into the student’s face, causing him to raise his right hand in front of his eyes.
The officer, whose name was not released, fired a single bullet into Derek Copp’s chest. the 20-year-old Grand Valley State University student, who survived the shooting, said he had no idea the man was an officer.
“He never even had a chance to even see who was coming at him, with a bright flashlight in his face,” said Sheryl Copp, Derek’s mother, in a 24 Hour News 8 report. “He had no clue. He heard someone knock on his door, and he had no clue.”
Copp’s parents insist their son is not a drug dealer. however, he appears to be a marijuana activist, stating on his facebook page he likes to “SMOKA DA BOLSKI” (smoke a ‘bowl’) and on his YouTube page, in a video titled ‘Hippie Lunchtime Hour,’ he makes references to baking marijuana-infused brownies. In another, he plays the fictional role of an acid dealer whose friend goes on a psychedelic journey through clich colors.
Copp’s parents were not notified of the shooting by police, reported CelebStoner. They allegedly found out six hours later.
743 pounds of marijuana found in septic tank truck
(CNN) -- In a messy drug bust this week, investigators uncovered more than 700 pounds of marijuana stuffed in a septic tank truck full of human waste, Arizona police said Friday.
And the search of the truck was as awful as it sounds.
"Yeah, that really does suck," Arizona Department of Public Safety spokesman Bart Graves told CNN. "It's a long way to go to make a bust."
Hidden in the holding tank of the truck were 743 pounds of pot, worth about $409,000 on the street, police said in a news release.
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