Revised January 14, 2005; July 29, 2005; January 31, 2008; July 31, 2009; and April 6, 2017.
Copyright 1998-2017 by John W. Allen

A page devoted to newspaper clippings, unusual articles some psilocybian mushroom trivia

NEWS ARCHIVES

Hello and welcome to our News archives. In this section you will find a wide variety of newspaper clippings regarding the visionary mushrooms. I Started to catalogue these clippings back in 1976.
They are arranged alphabetically by countries and newspapers and then Chronologically by dates.

CALIFORNIA

HONOLULU STAR-BULLETIN
Friday March 19, 1982. Page 4

Psychedelic Mushrooms Found By Firefighters. OAKLAND (AP). Firefighters battling an apartment house blaze stumbled onto a psychedelic mushrooms factory jammed with about 2,000 jars of spore cultures, police said yesterday.

"The whole apartment was turned into a mushroom growing factory. There was no room to sit or sleep in the place," said Oakland vice officer Chuck Holland.

He estimated that the 8 to 10 pounds of dehydrated mushrooms were worth aabout $100 an ounce. But he said Oakland police haven't had much experienc dealing with the "magic mushrooms."

(10) SIXTIES DRUG IS IN AGAIN

Crime: ‘Magic Mushrooms’ have made a comeback and police say they can be addictive or even deadly.

Ben Thomas put hallucinogenic mushrooms on his pepperoni pizza. He mixed them into Lipton tea, or ate the nasty-tasting drugs with loads of potato chips.

Source: Orange County Register.

Contact: letters@link.freedom.com.

Website: http://www.ocregister.com.

Pubdate: Thursday, January 7, 1999.

Author: Mai Tran – OCR

URL: http://www,mapinc.org/drugnews/v99.n046.a01.html.

SIXTIES DRUG IS IN AGAIN

Crime: 'Magic Mushrooms' have made a comeback,and police say they can be
addictive or even deadly.

Ben Thomas put hallucinogenic mushrooms on his pepperoni pizza. He mixed
them into Lipton tea, or ate the nasty-tasting drugs with loads of potato
chips.

"All I wanted to do was get high," said Thomas, 19, of Newport Beach, who
says he has been straight for almost a year. "All my friends were into it."

Like bell-bottoms and platform shoes, psilocybin mushrooms are making a
comeback with teens and young adults.

The so-called "magic mushrooms," popular in the 1960s and 1970s, these days
are a drug of choice at rave parties - all-night gatherings held secretly in
warehouses and other industrial sites, police say.

The strongest of hallucinogenic mushrooms, psilocybins have made their
biggest resurgence in the past two years, said Walter Allen, special agent
in charge of the Orange regional office of the state Bureau of Narcotic
Enforcement.

"A lot of these young kids are getting into it," Allen said. "But they don't
know what they're getting into. It's unfortunate."

In what is believed to be the department's largest mushroom bust in at least
12 years, Orange County sheriff's narcotics investigators in December seized
20 pounds of psilocybin mushrooms - with a street value of $80,000 to
$100,000, sheriff's Lt. Hector Rivera said.

Three people, from Fullerton and Mission Viejo, were arrested for allegedly
storing and selling the mushrooms.

The mushrooms have a street value of $40 for one-eight of an ounce, police
said, though the price fluctuates with supply and demand. The drugs are
chewed, sucked or placed in drinks. The "trip" lasts two to six hours.

Mushrooms, which are physically addictive, can cause nausea, vomiting and
distort comprehension of time and space. Use can lead to severe liver
dysfunction and failure, Allen said.

Moods, good or bad, are intensified. Experts say the trip depends on the
drug taker's mindset.

Sometimes, death can result.

"People try to do some impossible feats under the influence of the drugs,"
Rivera said. "Some try to jump off a building or stand in front of a car."

The mushrooms often come from the Pacific Northwest, though sometimes they
sprout up closer to home.

"Some hydroponic gardens are set up in garages or bedrooms," Anaheim police
Sgt. Joe Vargas said, referring to plants grown in nutrient solutions. "They
can easily be home-grown."

Police usually seize the drugs in small quantities during larger marijuana
and cocaine busts, Rivera said.

La Habra police stumbled onto the largest batch of cultivated psilocybin
mushrooms in the county last year when officers responded to a disturbance
call at an apartment complex.

Police seized 176 pounds of mushrooms - valued at more than $1 million -
being grown throughout the apartment, said La Habra police Sgt. Phil
Stufflebean, supervisor of the special enforcement unit.

A college student who learned how to grow mushrooms on the Internet was
arrested and has pleaded guilty to possession and cultivation, Stufflebean
said.

Mushroom users say the drug is preferable to LSD because it is cheaper and
easier to get, and the high isn't as intense or as long-lasting. And the
mushrooms don't show up during standard drug screening.

Thomas, who began taking the drug at 14, said he ate mushrooms nearly a
dozen times every month for three years.

He sold his compact discs or stole, even from his parents, to get $10 for a
quick high, he said.

"They're not that cool," he said.

Kelly Wilson, a drug recovery specialist, recalled taking mushrooms at a
party, after which, she said, the walls began to move in and out. She saw
the carpet lift from the floor. She watched as music come out of the
speakers.

"I felt connected to people, a lot of love for everybody," recalled Wilson,
35, who did drugs for six years until she stopped in the late '80s. "It was
a fun party thing to do."

But she and other former users also know the downside.

Once while high on mushrooms, Thomas fell and broke four front teeth and cut
his lips.

Thomas said getting drug counseling at the Hope Institute in Costa Mesa has
changed his life.

"I feel better about myself," said Thomas, who now attends Orange Coast
College and works at a coffee bar to pay for his new car and apartment. "I
got to buy my family presents for the first time ever this Christmas. The
only way for me is total abstinence."

fucking ridiculous - "He sold his compact discs or stole, even from his parents, to get $10 for a
quick high, he said." sounds like more serious drugs were to blame here, not mushrooms

http://www.drugsense.org/dsw/1999/ds99.n82.html#art10

Wireless Flash

Telegraph.co.uk.

5-3-2003.

TV writer held over 'magic mushroom'

By Hugh Davies, Entertainment Correspondent
Last Updated: 12:12pm GMT 05/03/2003.

AARON SORKIN, creator of the Channel 4 series, The West Wing, has been arrested at a Los Angeles airport for allegedly trying to take hallucinogenic "magic" mushrooms on to a plane bound for Las Vegas.

Sorkin, 39, writes most of the episodes of The West Wing, a drama about White House intrigues. The hard-working perfectionist had just finished the last of this season's 22 shows, which are being filmed this week for NBC. The producer used his own experiences with drug addiction to shape the White House chief-of-staff character, Leo McGarry, as a recovering alcoholic.

Palo Verde Valley Times - News
March 2, 2004

Valley Narcotics Task Force assists Highway Patrol in I-10 Freeway drug arrests.
Special to the Times

Palo Verde Valley Narcotics Task Force (PVVNTF) officers assisted the California Highway Patrol on Feb. 28, in a narcotics investigation that resulted in the arrest of a pair of suspects on drug charges.

CHP Officers stopped the suspect vehicle eastbound on the I-10 Freeway at Ford Dry Lake Rd. for investigation of driving under the influence.

The driver, Johnny Lundstrom, was arrested for driving under the influence of an intoxicant. During the course of the investigation, CHP officers discovered several gallon sized plastic bags of Psilocybin mushroom in the interior of the suspect vehicle.

A further search of the vehicle revealed a total of 1,186.5 grams of mushrooms and 679.5 grams of marijuana with an estimated street value of over $13,500.

Officers also seized a large quantity of cash.

Mark William Case, 37 of Santa Cruz, Calif., is being held at Riverside County Jail, Blythe on $7,500 bail for possession of marijuana for sale, transporting marijuana and possession of hallucinogenic mushrooms.

Johnny Murrel Lundstrom, 33, also of Santa Cruz, Calif., is being held at Riverside County Jail, Blythe on $7,500 bail for possession of marijuana for sale, transporting marijuana and possession of hallucinogenic mushrooms.

Both suspects were arrested after the drugs were found in the vehicle they occupied. Both suspects were transported and booked at the Riverside County Jail, Blythe where they were arraigned on March 2.

March 1, 2007 - Daily Nexus

Hippie Hill Is a Haven
S.F. Park Is a Secular Progressive Experiment

By C.K. Hickey / Columnist

Published Thursday, March 1, 2007

Issue 85 / Volume
"Buying drugs is a chore, a proverbial thorn in one’s backside. Can you find a seller? Will they have anything the next time you come calling? Nobody likes this part.

So picture a place instead where you’re offered the kindest of bud, chocolate-covered mushrooms, and crystal meth the moment you arrive. People all around you are lighting up fatty jays and beating drums and wandering around with a dazed look on their faces that would land them a night in the Santa Barbara County Jail.

Is this some dark, urban dungeon on skid row? Nope, it’s in a beautiful public city park swarming with tourists. What else could it be but San Francisco’s fabled Hippie Hill?

In Bill O’Reilly’s latest book, Culture Warrior, he argues that our country is currently engaged in an ideological war between those standing for traditional moral values and “secular progressives” wishing to model the country after Western Europe. If such a war exists, then San Francisco must be the Manhattan Project of secular progressivism. Traditionalists look with scorn at what they call “San Francisco Values,” but I prefer to think of the city as Diet Amsterdam - an opportunity to see how well leftist policies work in the land of the free and home of the brave.

Enter Hippie Hill, perhaps the ultimate secular progressive experiment. Yes, Mendocino and Humboldt are swarming with drug abusers, but that’s different - nobody lives there. Over 700,000 people live in San Francisco.

There are a couple of reasons why a city of this size gets away with it. Many of the people sparking in the park are card-carrying medicinal users, so they have the state law on their side. Also, as of last year, adult marijuana offenses in San Francisco are the lowest priority for law enforcement. This ordinance was passed 8-3 by the Board of Supervisors, an overwhelming majority. So yeah, it can be pretty damn easy to score some ganj. The last time I visited Golden Gate Park, a grimy looking woman dressed like the “feed the birds” lady from “Mary Poppins” walked up to me and asked, “You wanna smoke some herb?” like it ain’t no thang. I hadn’t even made it to Hippie Hill yet.

Proponents of Hippie Hill will argue that the people mean no harm, and wish only to play their bongos, burn some fern and perhaps share some of the wealth with others. Because it’s, like, all about peace, love and understanding, man. Far out. What if it were this easy to buy pot at my high school? The mind wanders.

It’s tough to determine from Hippie Hill whether it is indeed possible to have an area that openly embraces drug use without compromising the safety of youngsters and tourists. Children? Forget about it. A better name for this place would be Hobo Hill. And while these guys may generally be pretty laid back in comparison to other parts of the city, you still occasionally run into the mentally unstable intransient under the spell of drugs far more powerful than ‘shrooms and sticky.

That won’t stop the older tourists, though, because the entire surrounding Haight-Asbury district these days is a sanitized commercial enterprise with a Gap outlet and a Ben and Jerry’s. A friend of mine at UC Santa Cruz, who uses Hippie Hill as his one-stop cannabis supershop, complains that the pot is overpriced and of generally inferior quality to the stuff grown here in the Santa Ynez Mountains. I’ve seen this mentioned in the pages of this paper before, so maybe it’s true. Hippie Hill a tourist trap? Gasp! Sob!

So what’s the verdict? Would an open drug bazaar like this hippiest of hills work in the land east of the 580 freeway? Or will we never be able to tell because the data is masked by some of San Francisco’s infamous quirks? You know, the ones Bill O’Reilly blames on the city’s “secular progressivism,” like the number of homeless people and rampant number of … er … friends of Dorothy. But I’ll leave whether that’s true or not for another column. In the meantime, go ahead and visit if you want, but for God’s sake, be careful about sitting on the grass - wouldn’t forty-some years of hippies make you at least consider a beach blanket?

Daily Nexus of the U of California at Berkleley.

UC Briefs

News from campuses throughout the UC system

Published Monday, March 5, 2007

Issue 87 / Volume 87

UCPD Says Hallucinogenic Mushrooms May Have Had Role in Freshman’s Fall From Window

UC Berkeley Daily Californian: March 2, 2007 - Police are currently investigating whether controlled substances contributed to an incident Wednesday night when a student fell from a third-story residential hall room.

UCPD Assistant Chief Mitch Celaya said four students were examined by Berkeley Fire Dept. officials, who suspected the students may have ingested psilocybin - a hallucinogen found in some mushrooms.

Witnesses said they found freshman Jesus Aguilar was naked and covered in blood after his fall shortly before 8:30 p.m. Wednesday. Several other students covered him with clothing and a sleeping bag while awaiting paramedics. Celaya said the student was transported to Highland Hospital in Oakland, and that the facial and head injuries he sustained are not life-threatening.

According to Celaya, three other students were also examined by Berkeley fire officials and are also suspected to have ingested mushrooms. Two were transported to Alta Bates Hospital for treatment while the other student sought medical care independently.

Police are not releasing the students’ names because of the ongoing investigation. Celaya said he did not know whether any of the students were still hospitalized.

Police suspect that Aguilar was alone in the room at the time of the incident, Celaya said.

http://www.insidebayarea.com/oaklandtribune/localnews/ci_6129516
Man had half-pound of 'shrooms, cops say

Concord suspect, 40, faces seven felony drug charges; cops had been looking for marijuana

By Malaika Fraley, MEDIANEWS STAFF
Article Last Updated: 06/13/2007 05:21:39 PM PDT

CONCORD — In the world of narcotics enforcement, seizing cocaine, methamphetamine and marijuana is a daily chore. But it's rare for authorities to come across psilocybin mushrooms — the so-called 'shrooms of the psychedelic'60s — as Concord detectives did recently.

Sidney Wayne Bishop, 40, was loudly strumming his electric guitar in his Colfax Street home on April 21 when he was surprised by a search warrant from officers looking for marijuana.

In addition to 86 marijuana plants, Lt. Keith Whitaker said Bishop was growing psilocybin mushrooms in short Mason jars stacked like strawberry preserves in a dark, temperature-controlled room.

Officers seized 46 jars containing psilocybin mushrooms weighing, in total, two pounds wet and a half-pound dry, Whitaker said. Over 300 more jars seized were either empty or contained mushroom spores in early stages of cultivation.

One-eighth of an ounce of psilocybin mushrooms, enough for multiple users, has a street value of about $40, according to online sites.

"It's not shocking to occasionally come across psilocybin mushrooms, people possessing them in small quantities for use," Whitaker said. "I can't remember if we've ever come across mushrooms for cultivation. It was unusual, and we stumbled across it."

It was so atypical in Contra Costa County, drug crimes prosecutor Dana Filkowski said she had to manually enter the charge for psilocybin mushroom cultivation, which indicates no such cases in years.

"It's not like medical marijuana, where it's found a place in mainstream society," Filkowski said. "I think it's still associated with a counterculture, or alternative lifestyle."

Bishop faces seven felony drug charges of cultivation and possession for sale that, if convicted, could result in more than six years in prison, Filkowski said.

An articulate new grandfather with multiple facial piercings and an abundance of colorful body art, Bishop pleaded not guilty before a Contra Costa judge on Monday dressed in a tan suit. His hair, which falls below his shoulders, was pulled back in a low ponytail.

Outside the Martinez courthouse, Bishop, who is being represented by a public defender, declined to comment on the charges against him in light of the early stages of the case. He said he's back at home, where neighbors who heard of his legal troubles gave him $200 cash to support him after he was freed from county jail in lieu of $95,000 bail last month after serving several days.

Bishop said he served 66 months in a federal prison after he was convicted in his native Iowa in 1988 for distributing LSD. Bishop challenged federal sentencing guidelines that combines the weight of the LSD with its carrier medium (in that case, blotter paper) in the calculation of the total weight of the drug. The conviction was affirmed by an appeals court before it was denied consideration by the U.S. Supreme Court, records show.

Bishop said Justice Thurgood Marshall wrote a scathing argument of why it should be heard.

Under the federal schedule of controlled substances, psilocybin mushrooms are in the same class as marijuana, LSD and peyote. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency's San Francisco field office, which polices California from Bakersfield to Redding, sees about one to two mushroom cultivation cases a year, said Special Agent Casey McEnry. Typically, it's found in the possession of mid- to low-level poly-drug traffickers who are selling other drugs such as ecstasy and marijuana, McEnry said. It's difficult to seek out cultivators, because mushrooms can be grown so discreetly.

"It's still out there, but on a much smaller scale as it was 40 years ago," McEnry said. "But if we're still seizing them, it's still being used, and there's still a market for it in the Bay Area."

Psilocybin mushrooms grow naturally all over the world. In urban areas, they are commonly found in landscaping. In nature, they grow on animal dung. While the general consensus is they are not addictive, they are illegal almost everywhere and can be dangerous to people predisposed to mental conditions, Campbell said.

He stressed that many kinds of wild mushrooms are poisonous and can result in death.

"(Psilocybin mushrooms) aren't for casual identification. If you don't know what you're eating, you should not be eating it," Campbell said. "It's like a game of Russian Roulette."

"No government or drug enforcement agency could rid the world of them," he said. "They would have to destroy the ecosystem to get rid of the mushrooms, because mushrooms are an integral part of the ecosystem, and they occur naturally."

1st Response to Above Post Article:
6-13-2007

The reporter wrote on advice from police that:

One-eighth of an ounce of psilocybin mushrooms, enough for multiple users, has a street value of about $40, according to online sites.

1/8th of an ounce is a dose. Something the police are apparently unaware of.

Also, another comment which is incorrect is this one from Special Agent McEnry [of what?] who does not know what he is talking about

Forty years ago [1967], no one was growing shrooms except a few scientists in University projects and only the Anarchists cookbook had a recipe for growing shrooms and that was rare and published later.

This agent does not know what he is talking about, so I am going to write them as I usually do when they aremisinformed and/or misrepresent the truth.

mj

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

2nd Response to Post Article.
Cube-it quoted from the article:

David Campbell, president of the Mycological Society of San Francisco, a nonprofit group since the 1950s that hunts and studies mushrooms for research and hobby, said the history of psilocybin mushrooms dates back thousands of years to shamans, and other religious leaders would ingest them for spiritual reasons.

Psilocybin mushrooms grow naturally all over the world. In urban areas, they are commonly found in landscaping. In nature, they grow on animal dung. While the general consensus is they are not addictive, they are illegal almost everywhere and can be dangerous to people predisposed to mental conditions, Campbell said.

He stressed that many kinds of wild mushrooms are poisonous and can result in death.

"(Psilocybin mushrooms) aren't for casual identification. If you don't know what you're eating, you should not be eating it," Campbell said. "It's like a game of Russian Roulette."

"No government or drug enforcement agency could rid the world of them," he said. "They would have to destroy the ecosystem to get rid of the mushrooms, because mushrooms are an integral part of the ecosystem, and they occur naturally.

David Cambell is the president of the San Francisco mycology department, only speaking in defense of his organiszation by what he says, but he is wrong. they were never used in San Francisco 40 years before for spiritual use or religious use. Only the Westerner's who came to Mexico in the early to later 1960s used them to look for god or talk to god.

David Cambell, as a head of a local mycological society group is providing false information to the press abnout the dangers in identifying psilocybine containing mushrooms, because as such, his position in a local mycological society, he is well aware that the psilocybian species stain blue when damgaed or witrh age, thus making their identification easy for those looking for them.

For someone that prominent to misrepresent the truth of the matter to the reporters about the dangers is not good mycology.

mj

Thus another letter I will send off to him too.

Subsequent emails, both to the reporter and to David Campbell, resulted in no responses to my inquiries about their comments in the above news item.

Californiashroom8-19-2007

Hallucinogenic mushroom use, transport on the rise in Shasta County

By Ryan Sabalow (Contact Friday, August 17, 2007

MANY PICS IN LINK

http://www.redding.com/news/2007/aug/17/mushroom-boom/

here's fungus among us.

That's the message local drug enforcement leaders have for Shasta County residents.

Drug agents and officers say they have been finding an increasing number of people transporting, selling and using hallucinogenic mushrooms.

They say the point was illustrated July 2 when a Carlsbad man was pulled over in a traffic stop on Interstate 5 near the Fawndale exit.

According to documents filed in Shasta County Superior Court, sheriff's deputies brought a drug dog to the stop and the dog sniffed out a baggie of marijuana in the van's passenger-side floorboards.

The officers looked around the van and found about 18 pounds of psilocybin mushrooms wrapped in sealed 1-gallon baggies in the cargo area, the documents show.

Dan Callahan, the task force commander for the Shasta Interagency

Narcotics Task Force, called it the largest mushroom bust in recent memory.

"That's the most I've ever seen," he said.

It was enough mushrooms to cover an 8-foot table Thursday inside the Shasta County sheriff's evidence lockup.

The driver, Kenneth Ian Rosner, 40, was arrested and booked into the Shasta County jail. He was being held Thursday on $300,000 bail on suspicion of possessing and attempting to sell a controlled substance.

Curtis Woods, the deputy district attorney prosecuting Rosner, said it was likely the suspect was just passing through.

After the arrest, officers served a warrant on Rosner's Carlsbad home and found a host of drugs including cocaine, marijuana, LSD and hashish, Woods said.

Rosner was in court Wednesday to contest his arrest.

His Redding attorney, Joe Gazzigli, argued that the deputies violated his client's 4th and 14th Amendment rights guaranteeing fair search and seizure, according to court documents.

The judge denied the motion. Rosner's trial date is set for Sept. 11.

Gazzigli did not return a call seeking comment left at his office Thursday.

Regardless of Rosner's legal troubles, drug officials say people need to be alarmed at the rise in hallucinogenic mushrooms.

"We're looking into it more; we're trying to educate people more and investigate why we're seeing it more," said Vic Lacey, special agent supervisor of the state's Bureau of Narcotic Enforcement in Redding. "We pretty much didn't see a lot of it for many years."

Callahan agreed, saying that for years, his agents rarely found mushrooms. Task force records show that agents didn't seize a single gram from 1998 to 2005. But in 2006, agents seized 55 grams.

Sheriff Tom Bosenko said his deputies have been finding more offenders carrying mostly small amounts of the drug on them or along with other drugs.

Lacey said agents in Northern California, especially along the north coast, also have tracked an increase in people growing the fungus themselves.

It's a dangerous trend, said Susan Libonati, a Shasta College instructor and fungus expert who teaches a course on mushroom identification.

She said the mushrooms grow naturally in the north state, often in and around manure piles.

Though many think the drugs are harmless, she said, the risks aren't worth a potential high.

She said the hallucinogenic species look almost identical to other deadly mushrooms that grow locally.

"People eat them, and they kill themselves by mistake," she said. "The other major danger is that during the state of hallucination, they think they can fly, or they think they can breathe under water" or other such altered states of thought and judgment.

She said the worst case of mushrooms turning deadly was in July 2005.

Police said 20-year-old Calvin Huffmaster was speeding on Highway 273 in Redding in excess of 100 mph when he blew through a red light and broadsided a car, killing four people and himself.

A special toxicology performed by the Shasta County coroner's office determined he had hallucinogenic mushrooms in his system.

Police said the high from the fungus may have elated Huffmaster so that he was speeding "just for the thrill of it."

"Young people see that stuff and they think because it's natural, it can't be that bad," Lacey said. "But it can have horrible consequences."

CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLAGE

Photo by Mike Greener / Record Searchlight

SHROOM IN HAND: Josh Rodine, who manages seized property at the Shasta County sheriff’s evidence lockup, holds a handful of hallucinogenic mushrooms seized in a traffic stop last month. Drug enforcement officers say more people are eating the illegal fungus.

Reporter Ryan Sabalow can be reached at 225-8344 or at rsabalow@redding.com.

Photo by Mike Greener / Record Searchlight

HEAPS OF FUNGUS: Shasta County sheriff’s Sgt. Alan Gilman and Josh Rodine, who manages seized property at the sheriff’s evidence lockup, on Thursday lay out 18, 1-gallon bags of hallucinogenic mushrooms, seized last month during a traffic stop.

Redding.com

Oroville Mercury-Register Online

Oroville, California

November 2, 2007

http://www.orovillemr.com/news/ci_7334800

Teen gets nine years for naked assault on Berry Creek woman

By TERRY VAU DELL/MediaNews Group

Article Launched: 10/31/2007 08:23:46 PM PDT

Calling the crime "vicious and callous," a judge Wednesday handed down the maximum nine-year, prison term to a young man who while naked broke into an elderly woman's Berry Creek home and beat her into unconsciousness.

The 84-year-old victim, who was hospitalized two months due to the extent of her injuries, told a judge that at one point her suffering was so great, she asked her doctors to let her die.

The victim reportedly got off two pistol shots before she was tackled into a wall and her face "pounded" into the floor by her admitted attacker, Logan Duane Hursh, then 18.

In urging a lesser sentence, his attorney argued Wednesday the teen was in a "disassociate state" due to the ingestion of some hallucinatory mushrooms, which Hursh claims he was induced to take with an abusive family member as part of a "spiritual cleansing" process.

When police responded to the victim's 9-1-1 call, they found the naked intruder in a back bedroom, watching TV, as the elderly victim lay unconscious in a pool of blood on the floor of a front room.

The prosecutor Wednesday submitted photos of the woman's bloody face and the extensive damage to her home caused by the assailant.

Reading from a prepared statement, the frail woman recounted how she was awakened about 4 a.m. on the morning of April 3 by her two dogs barking.

She said she was confronted by a large naked man breaking through her window.

She fired her gun at the suspect, but as not experienced with firearms, and both shots went into the ceiling.

The next thing she remembered was waking up in an ambulance in a great amount of pain.

During her lengthy hospitalization, she contracted pneumonia and a blood clot to one lung and experienced a loss of hearing, and double vision. Though her health has improved, she still has a surgical plate implanted in her jaw.

Once a capable and independent woman, she told Judge James Reilley Wednesday she still has nightmares of the attack, and now has to ask others to help her do chores which she used to perform herself.

In her prepared statement, which she was unable to finish — so overcome with emotion and tears— she thanked several neighbors who took care of her animals and property while she was in the hospital.

The victim told Hursh Wednesday he's lucky he didn't break into the mobile home of three neighbor men more experienced with firearms, who likely would have killed him.

"This man violated the sanctity of her home and terrified this victim and the entire community of Berry Creek," deputy district attorney Kelly Maloy said at the teenager's sentencing.

Calling it a "particularly heinous crime," the prosecutor told the judge the maximum sentence, if nothing else, would ensure the victim "nine years of peace."

Though it did not amount to a complete mental defense to the charges, Hursh's attorney Jodea Foster, pointed out that a doctor who examined the assailant, concluded he likely was "suffering from a psychotic or disassociate state" from a drug which he had never taken before.

That was borne out, Foster argued, by the fact Hursh stood looking at his hands instead of fleeing when the victim fired the gun at him.

Citing the "horrendous nature of the crime," Reilley imposed the maximum sentence.

Reilley found the victim was "particularly vulnerable" and that the crime involved a high-degree of viciousness and callousness.

Alton raid nets psychedelic mushrooms
By
Cutter Mitchell
jmitchekk@citizen.com
Article Date: Wednesday, December 5, 2007

Alton raid nets psychedelic mushrooms
December 5, 2007 - citizen.com

ALTON — Local police have seized material relating to what they call a large-scale psychedelic mushroom-growing operation with an estimated street value of $200,000 per growing cycle.

The seizure of evidence at 70 Bay Hill Road was the second raid at that residence in a week. Last Friday, after having received a tip from the California Department of Justice about a package containing four pounds of marijuana heading to the Alton home, police seized 70 marijuana plants capable of producing a pound of the contraband each, eight counterfeit bills of U.S. currency, 1,000 rounds of ammunition, 24 firearms, a small bag of what was believed to be cocaine, two knives, and a pair of nun-chucks.

Police obtained a second search warrant two days ago after reviewing photographs taken at the original raid.

Chief Philip Smith explained there were a number of items that caught the attention of his officers. "These were plain-view items; nothing was hidden," said Smith.

Instead of seizing the suspected mushroom-growing operation at that time, officers took time to review the photographs then obtain a second search warrant.<

In the second raid, police seized more than 70 cases of canning jars with each case containing 850 individual jars, brown rice flour, 114 syringes containing what is believed to be psychedelic mushroom spores, two large pressure cookers, and a seedling grow mat.

The Alton Police Department has issued an arrest warrant for Aaron Diamond, 24, of Alton, thought he has yet to be located. Diamond is the second tenant of 70 Bay Hill Road.

Diamond is wanted on four felony charges, including possession of controlled drug/narcotic, sale of controlled drug/narcotic, manufacturing of a controlled drug, conspiracy to commit forgery.

Diamond's roommate, Glenn Mallon, 32, of Alton and his female acquaintance, Kristen Campos, 23, were arrested in the initial raid last week and are facing similar charges.

RAY MONGEAU/CITIZENPHOTO Alton Police officer Kurt Driscoll, left, and Patrolman Kirt Hart, right, with equipment and material that is used to produce mushrooms that contains psilocybins, which were seized in a raid as a result of an on going investigation.

RAY MONGEAU/CITIZENPHOTO Material and equipment seized by the Alton Police department that is used to produce psilocybin mushrooms also known as the magic mushroom. The equipment and material was estimated to have the ability to produce a street value of $200,000.00 worth of mushrooms.

Red Bluff Daily News Online, Red Bluff California.

1-30-2008.

Man's death leads to 'massive' drug discovery

Search of home turns up $500,000 in mushrooms, arrest

By KAREN McINTYRE-DN Staff Writer

Article Last Updated: 01/30/2008 08:39:26 AM PST

CORNING - The body of 52-year-old Allen Joseph Milanowski found on Loleta Avenue just outside of Corning Monday morning led to one of Tehama County's biggest drug busts.

Inside the residence where Milanowski's vehicle was found, Tehama Inter-agency Drug Enforcement agents found 160 pounds of processed psilocybin, or hallucinogenic, mushrooms with a street value in excess of $500,000, TIDE commander Vic Lacey said. They were packaged in about 340 individually vacuumed

bags. Agents also found 10 pounds of marijuana, $5,000 in cash and multiple scales, packaging materials, dishes, glassware and a ventilation system to process the mushrooms, Lacey said.

"It's pretty massive," he said.

One man is in custody for the mushroom growing operation.

"He knew what he was doing," Lacey said. "He's obviously been doing this for a while."

TIDE agents discovered the operation by serving a search warrant on the house after discovering four marijuana plants at the residence Tuesday morning while investigating Milanowski's death.

Milanowski is not believed to be a homicide victim, Tehama County Sheriff Clay Parker said. An autopsy is scheduled for the man at 10 a.m. today in Woodland.

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Staff writer Karen McIntyre can be reached at 527-2153, extension 109 or kmcintyre@redbluffdailynews.com.

http://www.redding.com/news/2008/jan/30/magic-mushroom-bust-may-be-largest-north-state-his/

Redding.com

"Magic mushroom" bust may be largest in north state history

By Ryan Sabalow (Contact)
Originally published 12:39 p.m., January 30, 2008
Updated 12:39 p.m., January 30, 2008

CORNING - Calling it the biggest hallucinogenic mushroom bust in the history of the north state, drug agents announced today that they seized more than 160 pounds of the fungus from a home near where a body was found earlier this week.

"We get small quantities (of mushrooms) from time to time - a couple grams here or there, at the most maybe an ounce," said Vic Lacey, the special agent supervisor of the Tehama Inter-Agency Drug Enforcement Team (TIDE). "We don't see large quantities like this."

The bust came Tuesday, when Tehama County Sheriff's investigators requested TIDE agents' help after they found a car belonging to Allen Joseph Milanowski, 52, parked at an Oren Avenue home.

Milanowski's partially clothed and bruised body had been found a day earlier on the side of Loleta Avenue in Corning near Oren Avenue, investigators have said.

The death wasn't immediately classified as suspicious - there were no gunshot or stab wounds - and an autopsy on the Lake County man was set for today, Undersheriff Dennis Garton said Tuesday.

In a press conference today, officials said Milanowski had health problems and hypothermia may have contributed to his death. Toxicology results are expected in two weeks. Officials also said he had a history of arrests for marijuana cultivation.

When deputies arrived and interviewed the home's owner, Robert Crane Rawhouser, 57, they noticed marijuana plants and evidence of psilosybin mushrooms being grown and processed on the property, Lacey said.

TIDE teams obtained a search warrant for Rawhouser's home and found the 160 pounds of mushrooms, as well as 10 pounds of processed pot, digital scales, large quantities of shipping and packing materials, Lacey said.

A hundred and 10 pounds of the fungus was dried, vacuum sealed in plastic bags and ready to be shipped, Lacey said.

"This guy had been in operation for a long time," Lacey said.

Investigators said Rawhouser was a federal fugitive wanted for not appearing in Wisconsin in 1993 on mushroom growing charges, said Sheriff Clay Parker.

He is being held without bail at the Tehama County Jail.

This isn't the first time a north state man was arrested in recent months for being in possession of large quantities of mushrooms.

On July 2, when Kenneth Ian Rosner, 40, of Carlsbad was pulled over in a traffic stop on Interstate 5 near the Fawndale exit, investigators found more than 18 pounds of psilocybin mushrooms wrapped in sealed 1-gallon baggies.

Rosner pleaded guilty in August to transporting or attempting to sell a controlled substance.

Lacey said he's unsure if the two alleged crimes are related.

Reporter Ryan Sabalow can be reached at 225-8344 or at rsabalow@redding.com.

Chico Enterprise Record

1-31-2008

160 pounds of hallucinogenic mushrooms seized in Corning drug bust
By KAREN McINTYRE - MediaNews Group
Article Launched: 01/31/2008 12:09:21 AM PST

CORNING -- After making the biggest drug bust of its kind in county history Tuesday, Tehama Inter-agency Drug Enforcement agents displayed on Wednesday most of the 160 pounds of processed hallucinogenic mushrooms they seized from a Corning home.

"This would make a pretty nice-sized salad," TIDE Commander Vic Lacey said.

But all kidding aside, he said, the mushrooms seized are illegal and dangerous. They would have been worth at least $518,000 on the streets -- enough to sell 8-ounce quantities at $25 to 20,754 customers. Lacey said he hasn't heard of a bigger mushroom bust in the north state in at least 20 years.

"We had no idea this operation was going on anywhere around here," he said.

Agents discovered the drugs while investigating the death of Allen Joseph Milanowski, 52, whose body was discovered Monday morning on the side of Loleta Avenue between Marguerite and Oren avenues.

Milanowski's truck was later found parked in front of 4020 Oren Ave., and detectives approached a man who was living in the home.

"Things went downhill for him from there," Tehama County Sheriff Clay Parker said.

After seeing marijuana in the home, a search warrant was requested, and granted.

From the door, detective Richard Knox said he could see a mushroom the size of a forearm sitting on a scale. It weighed 360 grams.

Detectives went on to find a "very large and sophisticated illegal psilocybin mushroom growing and distribution operation," according to a TIDE press release. In addition to 160 pounds of processed mushrooms, agents seized four growing marijuana plants and 10 pounds of processed marijuana with a street value exceeding $30,000. They also found $5,000 in cash, several digital electronic scales, laboratory glassware, lots of FedEx packaging and shipping materials and boxes of drugs sealed and ready to be shipped.

About 110 pounds of the mushrooms were in 340 vacuum-sealed bags. The other 50 pounds were on drying racks in a heated and ventilated room. Hundreds of spores were in petri dishes that Lacey said would grow to be about 6-inch long mushrooms in just seven to 10 days.

A man who referred to himself as Fred William Thalgott and lived in the home was taken into custody, Lacey said. After fingerprinting and interviewing the man, law enforcement found out his real name is Robert Crane Rawhouser.

The 57-year-old man's fake name was found on receipts and other drug-related items in the home, he said.

Rawhouser is charged with possession for sales of hallucinogenic mushrooms, possession for sales of marijuana, cultivation of marijuana, maintaining a residence where illegal drugs are distributed or used and providing false information to a peace officer. He is being held without bail in the Tehama County Jail.

As it turned out, Rawhouser is a federal fugitive. Parker said a warrant was also issued for Rawhouser in 1993 from the U.S. District Count in eastern Wisconsin. His charge was failing to appear on a hallucinogenic mushroom charge.

"So we know he's been in this business for at least 15 years," Lacey said

Quote:

lots of FedEx packaging and shipping materials and boxes of drugs sealed and ready to be shipped

No market for 160 pounds?

http://www.chicoer.com/news/ci_8126080

Karen McIntyre is a reporter for the Red Bluff Daily News.

theunion.com

North San Juan, Nevada County, California

Friday, July 18, 2008

Raid brings in cash, pot plants, mushrooms

Spumitro Sen

Officers seized marijuana, gold and silver coins and $70,000 in cash in what they believe is a "commercial operation" in North San Juan, Nevada County Sheriff Keith Royal said Thursday.

Officers with Nevada County Narcotics Task Force seized 73 marijuana plants, more than 10 pounds of dried, trimmed marijuana, two large bags of hallucinogenic mushrooms, six firearms and four safes from the 23000 block of Hyatt Road on Wednesday evening, Royal said.

"From the safes, we've recovered $70,000 and several pounds of gold and silver coins," Royal said. "Based on the volume of cash and marijuana, we believe this must have been a commercial marijuana growing operation."

The owner of the property was not at home when the search was conducted, Royal said. His name is being withheld until the investigation is complete, Royal added.

"Our officers have received information that (the property owner) might be in an Oregon jail on charges. We don't know right now," Royal said. A local arrest warrant will be issued, and the Oregon jurisdiction will be notified, Royal said.

"Once he has served his charges there, we'll go pick him up," Royal added.

No one was present on the property during Wednesday's raid, and officers don't suspect anyone else besides the property owner, Royal said.

"We don't believe anyone else is involved, but as in all investigations, it's sometimes amazing the paths you could be going down as facts emerge," he said.

This is the second big drug bust for the Narcotics Task Force in recent weeks.

Last month, officers uncovered a major drug ring at a house on Bitney Springs Road that led to the arrest of seven people. Officers confiscated two pounds of methamphetamine, one-quarter pound of cocaine, one pound of processed marijuana kef (fine powder), $48,000 in cash, two rifles, a pump shotgun, ammunition and scales for weighing drugs.

To contact Soumitro Sen, e-mail ssen@theunion.com or call 477-4229.

Pro Skater goes crazy climbs on roof and strips naked on shrooms

By Larry Altman Staff Writer

Posted: 06/03/2009 06:18:36 PM PDT

http://www.dailybreeze.com/news/ci_12514063

Jereme Rogers

Professional skateboarder Jereme Rogers said Wednesday he was sorry for disturbing his Redondo Beach neighbors this week when he "ate some `mushrooms' and bugged out," preaching naked on his rooftop.

Rogers, a high school dropout who attributes his skateboarding skills to God, was eventually grabbed by police officers and brought down from his precarious perch.

"It obviously was not an everyday experience," the 24-year-old athlete said. "It was a very out-of-body experience. I've never had an experience like that."

Rogers pulled off his boxer shorts about 6:40 a.m. Monday and climbed onto the roof of the two-story house he shares with roommates on Havemeyer Lane and Goodman Avenue.

"It was obviously something I shouldn't have done," Rogers said as he rolled a marijuana joint in his bedroom. "It was just something that happened."

Redondo Beach police Lt. Jim Acquarelli climbed about 20 to 30 feet to the roof, where he found Rogers yelling and screaming. Acquarelli said Rogers' roommates told him that he had ingested the hallucinogenic drug.

Rogers ran back and forth around the roof's perimeter, sitting down at the edge with his back to the street.

"He would have fragmented, interrupted conversations with people that weren't there," Acquarelli said.

Rogers never tried to jump or talked of suicide, but he came very close to falling.

"He never lost his balance," the lieutenant said. "The potential
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was there for it. If he had taken a few negligible steps to the right, that would have impeded his balance and would have led to his demise."

Rogers, who is religious and often talks about spirituality, said in the interview that he was preaching to the neighbors and talking about God.

"I literally was walking on the edge," he said. "They said my balance was amazing."

Acquarelli said he read some of the tattoos on Rogers' body and used the words to try to draw his interest. Rogers has "In God I Trust" tattooed on his neck and similar tattoos on his body and arms.

The police officer told Rogers he was a Catholic high school teacher, talked about spirituality and success, and drew Rogers' attention. He got closer to Rogers and two other officers moved in and grabbed him.

Rogers was taken to County Harbor-UCLA Medical Center for 72-hour observation. He was not arrested but possibly could face charges later.

Rogers, a native of Boston, was voted TransWorld Skateboarding's 2006 Rookie of the Year. His sponsors include Billabong, DVS, Royal Diamond, Modern Wheels, Monster Energy Drink and Boost Mobile, according to a profile on about.com's skateboarding page.

"Jereme Rogers is a self-taught, highly driven skateboarder," wrote the author, Steve Cave. "He pushed himself into being good enough to ride with the pros, and he still pushes himself today to become the best park rider around. And he's doing it. Jereme Rogers' style is strong and fluid, and loads of switch tricks mixed in."

The article said Rogers dropped out of high school to pursue skateboarding, and is a very outspoken Christian.

"In interviews he has no problem talking about how he got his skill in skateboarding from God, and then dropping an F-bomb. Jereme Rogers has a clean image and is a role model to skaters all over the planet."

Rogers did not smoke the joint in front of a reporter. He said it is well known among his fans that he is a user.

"Yeah, I'm rolling weed," he said. "I have a medical card. I'm a weed

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