Nine law enforcement agencies joined together to take down a massive illegal drug operation after a 35-pound shipment of psilocybin edibles revealed the extent of the operation. Agents found an assortment of drugs including multiple forms of cannabis, psilocybin, steroids, and even a distiller tool to make illegal moonshine.

In a press release and a Facebook post, the West Tennessee Drug Task Force, representing the state’s 28th, 29th, and 30th Judicial Districts, announced they served warrants to dismantle a drug operation at a building formerly occupied by Walmart. It involved all three jurisdictions of the West Tennessee Drug Task Force, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, the United States Postal Inspector, Counterdrug Task Force, A.T.F., Humboldt Police Department, Tennessee Dangerous Drugs Task Force, and the 26th Judicial District Drug Task Force.

Search warrants were executed last on July 25 to deploy agents at a warehouse building in Humboldt, Tennessee (Not to be confused with Humboldt County in California). It’s the culmination of an elaborate drug investigation involving over 25 law enforcement officers from nine different agencies.

NBC affiliate Action News 5 reports that it’s the “largest drug bust in western Tennessee history.”

Four suspects were arrested for allegedly taking part in a drug trafficking operation: Joseph Brian Moss, 41, and Lauren Nichole Tippet Moss, 35, both of Humboldt; and Dustin Page, 38, and Tiffany Page, 39, both of Madison County. 

Officers knew of the operation, but the last straw was a delivery of almost 35 pounds of psilocybin edibles that were shipped to a former Humboldt Walmart. A team of agents served a search warrant at the building located at 2500 North Central Avenue.

“This seizure is the biggest in the 28th Judicial District and arguably West Tennessee,” said Drug Task Force Director Johnie Carter. “It is the result of many years of hard work and partnerships formed between multiple agencies. West Tennessee and more specifically, Humboldt, is a safer place to live, work, and raise our families as a result of the hard work and dedication put into this case by my agents and our partners.”

The drug operation evidence might suggest a person was living a Jason Bourne-like life with dozens of identities.

Officers scoured the area and found 376 vials of steroid oils, 21 pounds of various steroid powders, 3.6 gallons of steroid oil, 9,180 steroid pills, 70 forged driver’s license cards from four states—all with the same photo of a person—and 43.5 pounds of psilocybin, 40 pounds of cannabis in multiple forms, 29 weapons, $153,421 in cash, a still to make moonshine, drug “paraphernalia,” and a digital and paper trail.

All have been charged with various criminal offenses, including: possession with intent to sell/deliver and/or manufacturing of Schedule I, III, and VI controlled substances, possession of a firearm during the commission of a dangerous felony, possession of drug paraphernalia, identity theft trafficking, maintaining a drug location, and felony drug paraphernalia.

“We want to thank Director Carter and our West Tennessee Drug Task Force team for their work on this investigation,” said Frederick Agee, District Attorney General for the 28th Judicial District. “This continues to be an ongoing investigation that involves not only local and state agencies but also federal agencies. Our office will seek accountability and justice, which is our goal in every case we prosecute.”

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Oregon State Police seized roughly 500,000 pounds of cannabis as part of a sweeping bust last week, the latest illicit grow operation to uncovered by authorities in the southern part of the state.

The state police said that its Drug Enforcement Section for the southwest region of Oregon served a search warrant last Thursday in the community of White City, which is located in Jackson County.

The location targeted by the warrant “consisted of five industrial-sized warehouses zoned for commercial use,” the state police said.

“Over 100 individuals were initially detained, identified, interviewed and released. Several of the individuals were migrant workers living on-site in subpar living conditions without running water,” the organization explained in a Facebook post published over the weekend. 

The operation spanned more than two days, over the course of which “an epic amount of illegal, processed marijuana and a firearm were seized.”

“The DES Team’s conservative estimation on the amount of processed marijuana seized was approximately 500,000 lbs., which depending on where it would be exported to, has a conservative street value of somewhere around $500 million,” the state police said, adding that it remains “a very involved investigation and will be ongoing for several weeks,” and that it will release “more information when available.”

Such raids have become a common occurrence in Jackson County, where local officials last month declared a state of emergency over the illicit cannabis cultivation.

Oregon voters passed a ballot measure in 2014 legalizing recreational cannabis use for adults and establishing the framework for a regulated cannabis market, but unregulated production endures, particularly in the southern part of the state. 

Jackson County law enforcement officials served another search warrant last month that resulted in the destruction of 17,522 cannabis plants and about 3,900 pounds of harvested marijuana. And a separate bust last month in the southern Oregon county of Klamath led to an enormous haul in a 27,000-square-foot potato shed.

The Herald and News newspaper reported at the time that the large potato shed was “filled with marijuana in various stages of processing: drying in giant strands that stretched from the roof to the floor, buds pruned and stuffed into 40-pound bags, hundreds of those bags stacked against a wall and years of discarded marijuana waste in piles ready for disposal.”

The illicit activity has prompted Jackson County officials to call for help. 

In a letter to Oregon Gov. Kate Brown and other legislative leaders, Jackson County’s board of commissioners lobbied for assistance to law enforcement officials and regulators who they said were beleaguered by the amount of illicit marijuana activity.

The commissioners called the unregulated cultivation an “imminent threat to the public health and safety of our citizens from the illegal production of cannabis in our county.”

“Jackson County strongly requests your assistance to address this emergency,” the commissioners wrote in the letter.

One of the commissioners, Rick Dyer, said at a news conference last month that county law enforcement had reported a “59 percent increase in calls for service associated with the marijuana industry, including burglary, theft, assault, robbery and nuisance crimes.” 

The commissioners requested additional funds and even the deployment of National Guard troops to combat the illicit activity. The Oregon State Police said that last week’s 500,000 pound bust in White City “was assisted by the Josephine Marijuana Enforcement Team (JMET) of Josephine County, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Medford Office, the Basin Interagency Narcotics Team (BINET) of Klamath County, the Illegal Marijuana Enforcement Team (IMET) of the Medford Police Department-Jackson County Sheriff’s Office and Jackson County Fire District No. 3.”

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An ongoing operation in southern California culminated on Sunday, yielding the arrests of 34 people and the seizure of more than 33,000 marijuana plants.

The sheriff’s department in San Bernardino County, California said that “Operation Hammerstrike” was carried out between November 1 and November 7 by investigators from the department’s Marijuana Enforcement Team (MET), as well as San Bernardino sheriff’s deputies “from several different Patrol Stations.”

The department said that it was the 10th week of Operation Hammerstrike. 

Together, they “served 26 search warrants at various locations in Lucerne Valley, San Bernardino, Twentynine Palms, Wonder Valley, Helendale, Newberry Springs, Pinon Hills, Phelan, Daggett, Barstow and Rancho Cucamonga” in arresting 34 suspects and seizing 33,189 marijuana plants, 8,588 pounds of processed marijuana, nine guns and more than $24,000 in cash.

Those suspects “were cited or booked on charges of Cultivation of Cannabis, over six plants, Possession for Sales of Marijuana, Illegal Water Discharge and Possession of a Firearm with Obliterated Serial Number,” the department said.

Moreover, investigators said they “eradicated a total of 211 greenhouses found at [those] locations, as well as two indoor locations,” and that they “mitigated one electrical bypass.”

“MET personnel had received numerous complaints about large outdoor and indoor marijuana cultivations in these areas,” the sheriff’s department said. “The investigations revealed the cannabis cultivations were not in compliance with California’s Medical and Adult-Use Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act (MAUCRSA) and San Bernardino County’s ordinance prohibiting Commercial Cannabis Activity.  

“San Bernardino County has a law prohibiting Commercial Cannabis Activity, which includes growing marijuana plants outdoors. The Sheriff’s Gangs/Narcotics Division will continue to enforce California’s cannabis laws and San Bernardino County’s ordinance regarding cannabis cultivation and distribution. Persons found guilty of violating the state law and county ordinance are subject to fines, prosecution, and seizure of property.”

California voters legalized recreational pot use and sales by passing a ballot measure, Proposition 64, in 2016. But five years later, the illicit market continues to thrive in the Golden State, and this is an issue the state is still working on tackling. 

A report over the weekend by National Public Radio noted that “fully legal weed makes up just a fraction of the state’s marijuana market, with some experts estimating that 80 to 90 percent of cannabis sales in California still fall into a legal gray zone.”

NPR interviewed Amanda Chicago Lewis, a reporter who covers the cannabis industry, who said that “the problem is the legal market is expensive to join if you are a seller, if you’re a grower,” and that “it’s expensive to participate as a consumer.” The unregulated market, by contrast, poses little barrier to entry for prospective sellers, as well as cheaper products.

The trend has also occurred in other places, such as Canada, where recreational marijuana is likewise legal.

That means that operations like the one in San Bernardino County over the last week have continued to be common in California.

Last month, the state’s attorney general, Rob Bonta, said that California law enforcement officials had destroyed more than a million marijuana plants this year as part of the so-called “Campaign Against Marijuana Planting.”

“Illegal and unlicensed marijuana planting is bad for our environment, bad for our economy, and bad for the health and safety of our communities,” Bonta said at the time. 

To that end, the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department warned that property owners “who are growing marijuana or are aware their tenants are growing marijuana on their properties in violation of the state law and local ordinances may also be subject to civil or criminal sanctions.”

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