Drug Legalization

Ozarker · Sep 21, 2002

He was probably just a local. Lots of weed around here but law enforcement is up to it's ears in today's "Moonshiners", the meth cookers, and little time to worry about a joint or two. Unfortunately, southwest Missouri seems to have become the meth capitol of the US. Lots of places in them thar hills to hide and cook meth.

Here's a humorous story about meth. Up the road from me is a family that has a long history of petty violations, run-ins with the law and even a few felonies. They don't do anything that you can notice for a living and are the stereotype of backwoods folk.

One of them decided that there might be a little profit in cooking meth so he set up an operation in a shack on the place.

Apparently, he cheated one of his customers one day and the customer came back with a gun to shoot up the place a little. So what does the moron do? He called the Sheriff to report the shooting. Of course, if you call the sheriff about a shooting he is not just going to take a statement over the phone. He is coming out to investigate........and guess what he found during his investigation?

Kind of dumb to invite the sheriff to investigate a shooting at your meth lab over a drug deal. But that isn't the dumbest thing that happened. The dumbest thing is the judge threw out the charges because the Sheriff didn't have a warrant to go into the shed while investigating the shooting. It doesn't matter that the shed had bullet holes in it and all he was doing was looking to see what might have been damaged inside. He didn't have a warrant and didn't asked for permission to search the shed so the evidence was tossed out.

Anonymous Poster · Sep 22, 2002

That's almost too crazy to believe. You better check out Snopes and see if that's true. Just kidding. They call it dope for a reason. /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

DUMBDOG · Sep 22, 2002

The one who called in to report the shooting cannot be any more dumber than some of the laws that we have.

Wingnut · Oct 1, 2002

Thought of this thread when I read the papers yesterday. Local guy sentenced to serious jail time. Ran a stop sign, t-boned a car and killed the driver (middle aged mother) and seriously injured her passenger (daughter).
Article stated that tests showed that he was not drunk but had recently smoked marijuana.

pete

cstocks · Oct 1, 2002

Just curious, Wingnut. Did the article say how recently? Thirty minutes? Four hours or four days? You know you have to sift and sort through what the media says and read between the lines sometimes.

The word recent would be important in determining how much the marijuana use could actually be blamed for being a cause of the accident. Thirty minutes would definitely make it relevent. Four hours would be doubtful unless the guy had smoked some exotic, extra potent weed and four days would sound more like the media's attempt to villify the offending driver just because it could.

I am not defending the driver or yea-ing or nay-ing marijuana use. I am just skeptical of any and all reporting I get from the mainstream news media.

Wingnut · Oct 1, 2002

I'll have to take a look, but it was just a short blurb in the crime blotter section. This newspaper (local) is not known for sermonizing in this section .... dry facts ... just the way I like it.
I'll take a look and see if there's more data available. I do remember that it said the blood test showed that "fact" .... how long is it detectible?

Trev · Oct 1, 2002

Any Tom Clancy fans here? Ever read "Clear and Present Danger"? Interesting read. Of course this is fiction, but he takes the stance that drugs present a "clear and present danger" to the country, and outlines what a *real* war on drugs might look like.

Bob