Tag Archives: cannabis

Feb 21 2020

Play)A(Skool Co-Founder Found GUILTY, Faces 32 Years

In 2017 we brought you the news that Play)A(Skool co-founder Scott Pack had been arrested in Colorado.

Founder of Play)A(Skool Indicted After Major Drug Trafficking Bust

The case is now complete, and the verdict is GUILTY on 6 felony counts.

Source: Westword

From CBS Denver:

Scott Pack, 41, was convicted of six felonies — two counts of pattern of racketeering and conspiracy (under the Colorado Organized Crime Control Act), a first-class drug felony, conspiracy to cultivate marijuana, and two counts of securities fraud.

Pack, who now lives in California, faces up to 32 years in prison. He scheduled for sentencing on April 6.

According to Brauchler’s office, Pack was at the top of the business, Harmony & Green. Although it was a legally licensed marijuana business, Harmony & Green never produced any marijuana that was legally sold, never reported legal marijuana sales, and never paid marijuana-related taxes.

Pack also sought and obtained millions of dollars from investors to back the operation. Prosecutors called it a scam.

Senior Deputy District Attorney Darcy Kofol said, “This defendant thought he could avoid prosecution by having subordinates do all the dirty work. He thought he left no trail. He told them, ‘If anything happens to you, I have the money to hire the attorneys. So none of this can touch me’. He was wrong.”

The ring allegedly shipped pot to Arkansas, Illinois, Minnesota and Missouri.

Among the others charged as a result of the investigation is Renee Rayton, a former Pitkin County Sheriff’s Office deputy. Pack allegedly hired Rayton away from her position with the state‘s marijuana enforcement team where her responsibilities included inspecting marijuana warehouses for compliance.

The story at Westword has some further details about the operation:

 Investigators discovered 845 marijuana plants weighing 2,535 pounds worth more than $5 million...the beginning of an investigation that uncovered a major drug trafficking organization…illegally cultivating, processing and distributing marijuana and marijuana products to at least five states. The DTO [drug-trafficking organization] produced well over 300 pounds of marijuana each month at sites in Denver, Elizabeth and Colorado Springs. The distribution was arranged and executed throughout Arapahoe, Douglas and Elbert counties, and other locations along the Front Range.”

Read the full story at Westword.

Sentencing is scheduled for April 9 2020.

Pack is on the right. Image: 9news.com
Nov 30 2017

Sufis, Drugs, Terrorism, and Prohibition

Report by Terry Gotham

After the horrible attack on a mosque in Egypt, in which more than 300 Sufi Muslims lost their lives at the hands of Daesh, I decided it was time to explain the connection between Sufism, drugs, spirituality, rebellion, and of course, prohibition. We’d like to think that drug use in the classical Islamic period of 700 AD doesn’t have anything to do with the attack last week by almost 30 ISIS militants, but history paints a different story. Many members of Sufi orders throughout history have been persecuted for their substance use, especially as a pretext by conservative rulers to shutter coffee houses, opium dens, brothels, bars, and other meeting places of potential insurrectionists.

Muslims invented the coffee house as we now know it, and were responsible for coffee finding its way into Christian Europe. But when coffee first made its way from Ethiopia into Yemen and up the Arabian Peninsula, some Muslims challenged its appropriateness. It was clear to early observers that coffee had an effect on people, but legal thinkers had to decide whether these effects qualified as intoxication. More threatening than coffee’s impact on the body, however, was the drink’s social consequence. Like wine drinkers, coffee drinkers tended to assemble in groups. Could the coffee house invite the same troublesome activities that surrounded taverns? Moreover, coffee appeared to assist Sufis in their all-night gatherings, leading some to consider that prohibiting coffee would also aid in the suppression of controversial religious practices and subversive teachings.
~Confession of a Muslim Psychedelic Tea Drinker, Michael Muhammad Knight (VICE.com)

Continue reading →

Oct 24 2017

Cannabis, Decommodification & Brake Lights: Gifting in 2017

Column by Terry Gotham

While the Best Coast has just about legalized the growth & sale of cannabis from the Mexican to Canadian borders, us poor unfortunate souls stuck in New England, the Mid-Atlantic, and what’s traditionally thought of as the Deep South, remain mired in drug reform purgatory. In New York state, medical cannabis laws allow for purchase of concentrates, edibles and, non-plant matter containing products that have THC/CBD, but dispensaries are few & far between, and there is a steep fee to obtain an MMJ license. In Massachusetts, cannabis became legal a full year before dispensaries are allowed to open, providing legal cover to people who can already access the stuff, while propagating the same patterns of arrest and harassment of gray/black market channels as before the law was passed. We’ve seen similar patterns of arrest for dealers who don’t play by the “tax stamp” rules in Colorado, but Washington DC takes the cake when it comes to cannabis market dysfunction.

“Thank you and here’s a gift for you to have as a souvenir.”
~Legal loophole in DC creates bizarre pot bazaar, Ashraf Khalil – Associated Press 9.28.17

In Washington DC, cannabis was legalized, but a congressional committee gets to review all laws the District of Columbia passes. Some asshole named Andy Harris, an anesthesiologist member of the “Freedom Caucus” who opposes the cannabis legalization, got a rider passed that prohibited DC from spending cash on figuring out how to tax or regulate pot. So, it remains legal to possess, but illegal to buy or sell. While this is one of the dumbest things you’ll hear all month, that hasn’t stopped DC. Businesses all over the city have started selling mugs, t-shirts, calendars, and tons of other swag with “a little something.” With DC police in no hurry to stamp out anything but the most in your face abuse of this system, we’re starting to see what happens when something that starts as Mutual Aid or gifting, turns into a market economy.

Continue reading →