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There is one chair in the room, and they sit him in it. He pulls out his wallet. He's looking for a number. A phone number, an address. That is why he is here. Fernando the lawyer. Fernando the drug trafficker. He's got a load of marijuana, and they want it.Fernando thinks he's in the company of friends. He thinks this man standing in front of him, this Lalo, is going to deliver the marijuana for him to New York. That's what the numbers are for. They are contacts. They are the people Lalo will call, the people who are...

A 15-year-old boy shot his mother and sister multiple times soon after calling cops to say he was going to kill someone while having a “bad reaction” to “a bunch of edibles,” according to police. The suspect took the marijuana edibles on Saturday night with another teenager and an adult when he began to have physical issues and called an ambulance in a panic, according to police in Houston, Texas. He then grabbed a gun when the two others started to laugh at him — and called the cops threatening to kill himself or someone else, ABC 13 reported. When...

Joe Biden has issued a record-breaking clemency grant that benefits fraudsters, drug traffickers, cartel leaders, and crack dealers, court records show. The lame-duck president’s list of convicted criminals includes nearly 1,500 individuals who will have their sentences commuted. On Thursday, Biden announced he would commute sentences for individuals “who were placed on home confinement during the COVID-19 pandemic and who have successfully reintegrated into their families and communities.” However, the list of commutations released by the White House includes several high-profile and dangerous criminals. One individual, Francesk Shkambi, was initially sentenced in July 2014 to 27 years in prison. According...

Attorney Stanley Cohen, who has defended Osama bin Laden's son-in-law and the leader of Hamas .. SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- Stanley Cohen, a prominent lawyer who has represented political activists and terrorism suspects, among them Osama bin Laden's son-in-law, pleaded guilty this morning in Syracuse to obstructing the IRS. ... Last month, Cohen was the lawyer representing Osama bin Laden's son-in-law in a high-profile New York City criminal trial. Sulaiman Abu Ghaith was convicted of conspiring to kill Americans and of other terrorism charges. ... Assistant U.S. Attorney John Duncan wrote that Cohen failed to file tax returns from 2005 through...

In Saint Helens, Oregon near Portland high school principal Dr.Katy Wagner accused of covering up sexual misconduct... At Mar-a-Lago tonight Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg... A Ukraine-wide air raid alert declared Thursday morning...Ukraine claiming a major Russian attack... The Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson says he wants a Chinese merchant vessel to return to Swedish waters as the probe... The US Food and Drug Administration okaying a clinical trial of marijuana as a treatment for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder... The Biden Administration urging Ukraine to lower its draft age... Music mogul Sean "Diddy" Combs denied bail for a third time......

BY THE OREGONIAN/OREGONLIVE (Compiled from news accounts, court records, public notices) Last week's arrest of a long-sought accused eco-saboteur pushed the spotlight back on a tight-knit cell of radical environmentalists responsible for a $48 million run of firebombings and other crimes across the West in the 1990s and early 2000s. Six men and five women prosecuted in Oregon received sentences ranging from three years to 13 years. They were arrested starting in 2005 in what the FBI called "Operation Backfire," a task force that tracked down the suspects with the help of an informant deep within the underground group....

Russell Bentley, a self-described “Donbass Cowboy,” joined Russian forces soon after they created a proxy state in eastern Ukraine in 2014. He quickly became one of Russian propaganda’s favorite Americans, receiving a Russian passport and a gig with state-run Sputnik TV. On April 8, the 64-year-old Austin native better known under his call sign “Texas” was detained by Russian soldiers in the city of Donetsk, occupied by Russia for the past decade, according to his wife. Eleven days later, he turned up dead. He is the latest in a string of figures involved in Russia’s 2014 takeover of parts of...

Image by SerenityArt from Pixabay ======================================================================== Researchers from the Nanjing Agricultural University (NJAU) Academy of Science say they have found a crucial gene that directly impacts the number of flowering sites on a Cannabis sativa plant. Dubbed CsMIKC1, the gene was found to drive inflorescence development when overexpressed and hinder development when overexpressed. The team also found that adding ethylene increased the gene’s expression. Together, the discoveries could directly impact the commercial Cannabis industry. “Through gene editing and functional analysis, the researchers demonstrated the gene’s impact on flower production, highlighting its potential to transform agricultural practices,” explains the NJAU press...

In a social media post this morning, Republican presidential nominee and former president Donald Trump threw his weight behind a Florida ballot initiative that would legalize recreational marijuana for adults, although he said the state legislature needs to pass laws prohibiting public use. Trump, a Florida resident, had teased for several weeks that he would announce his position on Amendment 3, a proposed constitutional amendment going before Florida voters this November. In a post on Truth Social this morning, Trump wrote: In Florida, like so many other States that have already given their approval, personal amounts of marijuana will be...

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Americans’ views of the effects of marijuana have worsened over the past two years, as slim majorities now say it negatively impacts both society as a whole (54%) and most people who use it (51%). This contrasts with Gallup’s findings from 2022, when the public was about evenly divided in its assessments of marijuana’s effect on society and more likely to say the effect on most users was positive (53%) rather than negative (45%).

Joe Biden's pitch to voters is increasingly reminding me of a used car salesman desperate to stop a prospective buyer from leaving the lot. "Sure, this ride may not sound great. It's slow and runs inconsistently, and it definitely has a few more miles on it than you'd like, but if you buy it we'll throw in Supreme Court reform free of charge. And have I mentioned that we'll expunge the records of anyone convicted of marijuana possession just as soon as your check clears (and we have the votes)?" President Biden @POTUS I'm making sure no one goes to...

“No one could have foreseen that a single hit of marijuana that night would have caused Ms. Spejcher to have a total psychotic break from reality, certainly not Chad and certainly not Ms. Spejcher. In light of these facts, I do not believe that further incarceration of Ms. Spejcher is appropriate,” Judge David Worley said in court. He sentenced her instead to two years of probation and 100 hours community service, educating the public on the dangers of THC.

The new research is more evidence linking cannabis to an increased risk of mental health disorders, including schizophrenia, anxiety and depression, particularly in adolescence. Teenagers who used cannabis within the last year had a dramatically higher rate of developing a psychotic disorder, according to a study published Wednesday. The study, led by researchers from the University of Toronto, found an 11 times higher risk of developing a psychotic disorder among teenagers who used cannabis compared with those who did not. When the analysis was limited to just emergency room visits and hospitalizations, there was a 27-fold increase in psychotic disorders...

Gov. Kathy Hochul’s administration quietly ended a $200 million program aimed at helping disadvantaged entrepreneurs open cannabis dispensaries, amid allegations of predatory lending practices. The Social Equity Cannabis Investment Fund, which was overseen by DASNY, came under fire last month after a report by local nonprofit news outlet The City alleged that DASNY entered into an agreement that allowed a private equity firm to provide $50 million to the fund at a 15% interest rate.

WASHINGTON — The Biden administration will take a historic step toward easing federal restrictions on cannabis, with plans to announce an interim rule soon reclassifying the drug for the first time since the Controlled Substances Act was enacted more than 50 years ago, four sources with knowledge of the decision said. The Drug Enforcement Administration is expected to approve an opinion by the Department of Health and Human Services that marijuana should be reclassified from the strictest Schedule I to the less stringent Schedule III. It would be the first time that the U.S. government has acknowledged its potential medical...

Chinese gangs have set up thousands of illicit weed farms across the US as they begin to challenge Mexican cartels for supremacy as America's cannabis kingpins. Authorities in Oklahoma, Oregon, California, New Mexico and Maine have all been battling a surge in Chinese weed farms, with some thought to be linked to criminal gangs known as 'triads'. The spread is seemingly uncontainable, with police in Penobscot County, Maine, last week arresting three Chinese nationals at a weed farm and seizing 40 pounds of the drug alongside $4,700 in cash. It is thought to be one of around 270 illegal weed...

The news is breaking today that the person who walked into Lakewood Church in Houston on Sunday afternoon and opened fire was transgender. I have been waiting for more information about this shooting, as a Houstonian, and as a media observer. When the shooting was breaking news, one aspect of the story didn't sit well with me. It seemed as though local law enforcement and the media were not transparent with all they knew. It seemed like they were holding back. Frankly, I was waiting for the shooter to be identified as an illegal alien. It turns out it is...

A California woman who stabbed a man she was dating 100 times and killed him, before turning the knife on herself and her dog, has been handed 100 hours of community service. Bryn Spejcher, 32, was given the astonishingly low sentence following psychiatrists' ruling that the tragedy was '100 percent' caused by cannabis-induced psychosis, which she suffered after taking two hits of the victim's bong. The judge ruled that Spejcher 'experienced a psychotic break from reality' and 'had no control over her actions' when she killed Chad O'Melia, then 26, on Memorial Day weekend 2018. She will spend the 100...

PORTLAND, Maine — Illegal marijuana grows run by Chinese nationals have sprung up all across the state of Maine, and residents say law enforcement isn’t doing enough to stop their spread. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) identified 270 suspected Chinese illegal marijuana grow operations in the state that could be making an estimated $4.37 billion in revenue, which are often used for more criminal activities or are sent back to China, the DCNF exclusively reported in August.

President Joe Biden took major action ahead of the holiday and pardoned all Americans arrested, prosecuted, or convicted on federal charges for marijuana use, following through on his 2020 campaign promise to expunge cannabis use offenses. Biden signed a proclamation Friday that forgives U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents caught by law enforcement for possessing the drug and charged, going far beyond the sweeping actions he took last year for thousands of people convicted of possession. The new action includes "additional offenses of simple possession and use of marijuana under federal and D.C. law," the White House said in a...