Posted on 08/31/2002 3:15:57 AM PDT by chance33_98
Booby-Trapped Pot Injures Three Drug Agents
A booby-trapped pot plant left two national guardsmen and one agent from the Alcohol Beverage Commission with non life-threatening injuries when it exploded. The explosion happened during a routine marijuana eradication conducted by the Governor's Task Force.
At 2:00 p.m. Thursday afternoon, three drug agents found roughly 30 plants in a secluded Maury County pot patch. Suddenly, there was an explosion near the three agents.
"They cut a plant and a device detonated."
Maurice Hobbs, a special ops sergeant with the Tennessee Highway Patrol, rushed to the men who suffered injuries, including ringing ears and cuts from flying shrapnel.
"It was very loud. There was a crater in the dirt indicating, it was some kind of high explosive. It blew a log in half."
Thankfully, no one was seriously injured, but blast experts said had the men been standing directly in the path of the blast wave, the situation could have been much more serious.
"There were enough explosives there to cause extensive damage."
Bomb experts asked News 2 not to disclose how the booby-trapped pot plant was triggered, but agents did tell us it was powerful, sophisticated, and there for a purpose.
"More than likely it was for law enforcement personnel."
"He's taking time to plant marijuana, taking time to build a device for us, hoping to hurt us or kill us."
News 2 spoke to the TBI coordinator for the Governor's Task Force on Marijuana Eradication. He said to date, his men have seized around 400,000 plants across the state, with each plant valued at close to a $1,000. Money is a prime reason some growers booby-trap their crops. If you have any information on who made the bomb, call the Tennessee Highway Patrol.
Obviously an important part of the war on terrorism.
[sarcasm]
The criminal element will no longer be involved in marijuana if the crop is both legalized and untaxed. If taxed, the same old criminal element will still be involved, although maybe not as violently since the profit margin would be lower (expect same in cigarettes soon).
In this case, at least, the 'folks' seem to be pretty dangerous people. They need to be removed from the trade and society in general. I detest bombers, they're usually cowards who care not whom they kill or maim.
Suppose you, or maybe one of your children, were hiking down a secluded trail and were blown apart by someones booby trap? Would you still be defending 'These guys' as just trying to protect their own private property? I doubt it.
From the article, I see no indication that it was on private property or property they owned. Just a secluded area. Law enforcement trying to find out who set the bobby trap would indicate that it was definitely not on their own property. If the growers were using public land, or land owned by another party than themselves, then their crop could in no means be considered 'private property'. In fact, it was a direct violation of the property rights of the owners that you indicate you are in favor of.
Those lazy potheads are finally showing some initiative!
Is that what they are doing these days?
Well, the national guardsmen are there because they are involved in "The War On Drugs". The operative word is WAR which justifies their presence.
Far be it that national guard be used to guard our borders to stem the invasion by millions of unauthorized aliens. You see, there is no war against invasion by unarmed "combatants" that could have access to arms once they enter the country. These people are just looking for a better way of life and if in the process they break a few laws, rape, rob and use all our medical and educational facilities free that law abiding citizens have paid for, that's ok. After all they bring us the diversity we sorely need and we should be grateful to them and do our best not to disrespect them ;-)
Does not compute. Why would anyone booby trap a legal crop? Is this something new? Are corn farmers now booby trapping their fields? If so why?
I agree with that. Seems like weed is kept illegal for about the same reasons alcohol is kept legal. The establishment makes big bucks form both situations. Had they figgured out how to do this with alcohol back in the 20's, alcohol might still be illegal. The only ones making big bucks on booze back then were the criminals.
Maybe you, or the lawyer types on FR can explain how the National Guard is any different than the regular military when it comes to a violation of the Posse Comitatus Act.
BTW, calling something a "war" does not a war make.
My comments are about the violence which frequently accompanies illegal, lucrative pursuits. People who commit such acts of violence need to be removed from society for a very long time.
Sursum Corda
My comments were made in jest with heavy emphasis on sarcasm indicated bt the "winky face" ;-)
What some to fail to admit is...if you don't like the laws, work to change them. But do NOT think that 'taking the law into your own hands' is going to be applauded. If anything, this is the ultimate in some form of pseudo intellectual self-delusion, imo.
What if this HAD been a child who accidentally detonated the device? Or not even a child...just a citizen NOT in LEO. The point is....a device was planted to do harm. How is this any different than a terrorist planting a device to harm others?
These armchair constitutionalists who advocate violence as a means of breaking laws they disagree with are no different, imo, than terrorists. They just use a document to justify their illegal, immoral, inflated faux-flag-waving sense of self-worth.
Um, so you would agree that Washington, Jefferson, Adams,etc were terrorists? They sure didn't agree with the Kings laws, advocated violence of breaking those laws and they didn't even have a document to "to justify their illegal, immoral, inflated faux-flag-waving sense of self-worth."
There were plenty of self-rightious establishment butt-kissers who criticized them in their day, too.
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