Two suspects are accused of allegedly using an Airbnb rental to store a massive stash of drugs. According to the Alhambra Police Department (APD) in California, police officers found over 200 pounds of meth inside an Airbnb, leading to the arrest of two suspects driving a van nearby.

Two suspects allegedly used an Airbnb as a place to stash hundreds of pounds of meth, but were unaware they were being recorded by a Ring camera that police were able to obtain. Officers posted photos and a description of the bust on Instagram.

“Officers responded to the 1400 block of Ethel Ave. regarding boxes that were found by a cleaning crew in an Airbnb residence,” the APD posted on Instagram. “Upon arrival, officers located approximately 235 lbs. of methamphetamine. The suspects were caught on RING camera footage using a U-Haul van to transport the narcotics.”

The post shows large bundles of meth containing smaller bags, lined up on the ground, spread out. Police said the van was approaching the residence to return, then did a 180-degree turn the other way when they saw police approaching.

“While Officers were at the scene, the U-Haul van returned to the location, saw your APD, and quickly made a U-turn, thinking they would get away,” the post continues. “Ultimately, the two suspects were arrested and booked in APD Jail for transporting narcotics.”

According to Alhambra Police Sgt. Efren Tamayo, police waited for the suspects to return to pick up their stash. Tamayo said that details on the case were limited, however a Ring camera captured footage of both the two suspects and the van that was used to transport the meth. 

Airbnb quickly responded, indicating that the service does not tolerate illegal drugs in any case.

“The reported criminal activity has no place on Airbnb and we have removed a booking guest from the platform as investigations continue,” an Airbnb spokesperson told The Los Angeles Times. “Our team is working closely with the host to provide support, and we stand ready to assist the Alhambra Police Department with their investigations.”

The identities of the suspects were not released. 

Drug solicitation isn’t the only problem at Airbnbs. Parties taking place at Airbnb rentals in California have become a nuisance, with out-of-control events taking place more often, and many times, it involves illegal drugs. A few weeks ago nearby in Long Beach, California, neighborhood residents got sick of parties and banned unsupervised Airbnb rentals over concerns about drug-filled parties taking place. 

Andy Oliver, of the College Estates neighborhood of Long Beach, filed a petition to the city’s Community Development Department after out-of-state tourists renting out unhosted houses, throwing parties with drugs and blasting music loud. A shooting victim ended up outside Oliver’s house at one of such parties. “People have to live with this knowing that your house, your safe place, has now been violated by violent crime,” Oliver told CBS News at the time. Due to Oliver’s efforts,  over half of the approximately 800 homes in his area agreed to sign the petition. 

Cannabis At Airbnbs Is Another Story

While drugs are not tolerated on Airbnb rentals, some find ways to incorporate hemp or cannabis in ways that don’t conflict with the law. Airbnb partnered with a Sonoma County-based cannabis farm in 2022 to offer exclusive one-night stays.

The farm is located on 60 acres in Sonoma County, located southeast of Mendocino County, which is a famous region for prime cannabis cultivation. As is customary with Airbnb listings, this home’s official name is descriptive of what its hosts hope guests will experience during their stay: “Live the High Life at Sonoma Hills Farm.”

Staying at the farm doesn’t connect guests directly with any licensed cannabis plants or products, however. “Due to regulations and legal limitations, guests will not be visiting a licensed cannabis marijuana grow or interacting with cannabis marijuana,” the Airbnb listing reads. 

“Guests instead have access to a neighboring private home, vegetable garden and cannabis hemp farm. These plants look and smell identical to the cannabis marijuana plants, but contain less than 1% THC and are federally legal. In addition, they’ll have access to all of the other produce on the property.” The listing does mention a selection of CBD products from various companies in California, such as Green Bee Botanicals, Potli, Rose Los Angeles, and Jane West, as well as candles from Garden Society.

The listing also mentioned a partnership with Airbnb, which will be donating to a worthwhile nonprofit organization that strives to promote regenerative agriculture and restore climate stability. The rental was available for a limited time.

Airbnb does not allow illegal drugs at any of their rentals.

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A new California program incentivizes people using meth or cocaine with money if they can prove they are clean in an evidence-based system in which participants can earn incrementally more the longer they stay clean. Why? Because California is grappling with substance use disorder “crisis” with deaths from cocaine, meth, and other stimulants soaring in recent years. In 2021 for instance, 65% of drug-related overdose deaths involved stimulants, compared to 22% in 2011. The impulsive nature of stimulant cravings and addiction calls for alternative approaches.

A Medi-Cal initiative called CalAIM provides social and behavioral health services, including addiction treatment to individuals in California . California Healthline reports that CalAIM provides people who use meth and cocaine with an incentive to quit habit-forming drugs that are difficult to kick on your own.

Contingency Management (CM) is a program that provides motivational incentives to treat people who use stimulants like meth or cocaine, and support their path to recovery. It recognizes and reinforces individual positive behavioral change, and requires them to prove it with drug tests showing negative results for stimulants. “CM is the only treatment that has demonstrated robust outcomes for individuals living with stimulant use disorder, including reduction or cessation of drug use and longer retention in treatment,” the program states.

“The Recovery Incentives Program increases access to new evidence-based treatments for Californians living with substance use disorder,” the program’s Fact Sheet states. “Starting in 2023, the program is available to members living with stimulant use disorder in participating counties, in outpatient, intensive outpatient, and Narcotic Treatment Program settings. As part of the program, eligible Medi-Cal members participate in a structured 24-week outpatient program, followed by at least six months of additional recovery support services. Participants meet with a trained contingency management coordinator twice weekly for the first 12 weeks of the program, then weekly for weeks 13 to 24 to complete a drug test. Participants receive a small gift card each time they test negative for stimulants and can earn up to $599 per year in incentives.”

California is the first state in the country to receive federal approval of CM as a benefit in the Medicaid program through the CalAIM 1115 Demonstration. CM also tested other sources of funding.

According to the state Department of Health Care Services, about 2,700 patients from 19 counties have enrolled in the program since April 2023.

Quinn Coburn, 65, who is in the program, told California Healthline, “It’s that little something that’s holding me accountable.”  Coburn received $10 for each clean urine test he provided the first week of the program, and the pay increases in subsequent weeks: $11.50 per test in week two, $13 in week three—up to $26.50 per test.

The program promises as much as $599 a year, and Coburn is proof that it’s doable: As of mid-May, Coburn had completed 20 weeks of clean drug tests and made $521.50.

“The way stimulants work on the brain is different than how opiates or alcohol works on the brain,” said John Duff, lead program director at Common Goals, where Coburn receives treatment. “The reward system in the brain is more activated with amphetamine users, so getting $10 or $20 at a time is more enticing than sitting in group therapy.”.

The average recovery rate for people suffering from meth addiction is around 37%, which is about equal to other physically addictive drugs such as cocaine, heroin, and prescription drugs. Cannabis is also being explored as a potential treatment to help reduce stimulant cravings.

Fighting Meth Abuse at the National Level

The fight against meth abuse is also taking place at the national level.

In 2022, President Joe Biden signed legislation designed to address the rising scourge of meth abuse in the United States.

The new law, titled the Methamphetamine Response Act, “requires the government to declare methamphetamine an ‘emerging drug threat’ and to develop a response plan specific to methamphetamine,” according to a press release.

The bill had bipartisan support in the House of Representatives and Senate: its sponsors were Sens. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Reps. Scott Peters (D-Calif.) and John Curtis (R-Utah).

According to a study from the National Institutes of Health, “overdose deaths involving methamphetamine nearly tripled from 2015 to 2019 among people ages 18-64 in the United States.” That study showed that the “number of people who reported using methamphetamine during this time did not increase as steeply, but the analysis found that populations with methamphetamine use disorder have become more diverse,” suggesting that “increases in higher-risk patterns of methamphetamine use, such as increases in methamphetamine use disorder, frequent use, and use of other drugs at the same time, may be contributing to the rise in overdose deaths.”

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Many older stoners remember low-grade brick weed, traditionally grown at enormous farms in Mexico, as a commonly available product in the U.S.. But Mexican-grown weed sold on the black market started falling out of favor decades ago as it competed with domestically-grown cannabis. NORML reports that border seizures for Mexican-grown pot at the southwest border have hit a record low.

Hydroponics, organic inputs, feminized seeds, and other improved growing methods made low-quality seeded weed grown outdoors in bulk by cartels a thing of the past. The relatively new phenomenon of state-legal adult-use cannabis, which started in 2014 put the final nail in the coffin for the trade of Mexican-grown weed in the U.S.

Seizures of Mexican-grown cannabis peaked in 2009, when U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents seized 3.3 million pounds (1.5 million kilos) of cannabis on the southwest border that year, the highest amount ever recorded. Often the low-quality weed, a brownish or dark green color, was seeded and vacuum-pressed into kilo-sized bricks, ready to be smuggled over the border. For many Americans, this type of weed was all they could get before domestically-grown, or legal cannabis came to their state.

Nowadays, border patrol agents are intercepting far less cannabis, which can no longer compete with potent pot available at adult-use cannabis retail shops in California, Arizona, and New Mexico, which all border Mexico. 

Tracing back to 2009, you can see a long, steady plunge that shows the weed-smuggling business at the southern U.S-Mexico border is a shadow of what it used to be.

Plunging Cannabis Seizure Statistics at the Border

Agents are finding only a tiny fraction of the pot they used to intercept at the border. According to data published on the U.S. Customs and Border Protection website, federal law enforcement agents intercepted a record low 61,000 pounds (27,669 kilos) of cannabis at the southern border in 2023. The total represents a 29 percent decline from 2022 and a 98 percent decline in seizure activity since 2013, when the agency reported interdicting more than 2.4 million pounds of cannabis.

“When it comes to retail cannabis, the prevailing attitude is ‘Buy American,’” said NORML Deputy Director Paul Armentano. “The rise of the regulated state-legal cannabis market has not only supplanted Americans’ demand for Mexican cannabis, but in many places it has also disrupted the unregulated domestic marketplace.”

According to survey data compiled by New Frontier Data and published on May 16, 2023, 52 percent of US consumers residing in legal states said that they primarily sourced their cannabis products from brick-and-mortar establishments. By contrast, only 6 percent of respondents said that they primarily purchased cannabis from “a guy” illegally.

What can also be gleaned from the latest U.S. Customs and Border Protection data is that meth is on pace to surpass cannabis as the number one drug found at the border. Meth has already surpassed cannabis at the southwest border as agents found 121,000 pounds of the drug, almost twice as much cannabis found at that border in pounds.

Weed Smuggled the Other Way, From U.S. to Mexico

Mexican cartels have, for the most part, shifted to production of other drugs—namely meth. But in some cases, cartels never stopped growing and infiltrated grow operations in the U.S. including farms in Northern California and Oregon. Trinity County Sheriff Tim Saxon told USA Today in 2023, that cartel activity in the area is high, and sometimes involves human trafficking.

If anything, pot is being smuggled in the other direction more often. High Times reported in 2016 that cannabis is now being smuggled the other way—south of the U.S.-Mexico border.

A report from KPBS suggests that people living in Tijuana with visas or dual citizenship have been driving into California, where weed has been legal for medical purposes for nearly two decades, and smuggling small amounts back home. 

Dr. Raul Palacios, clinical director at the Centro de Integración Juveníl drug rehabilitation facility in Tijuana, told KPBS that many of his patients prefer the high quality of medical cannabis they get in California to the cannabis grown in Mexico because it gets them higher. But he says that since these people have grown accustomed to lower THC levels, California-grown cannabis has a capacity to induce hallucinations and cause paranoia.

The falling numbers show that Americans prefer high-quality lab-tested cannabis versus weed that has to be pressed into bricks and smuggled over the border. The harsh smoke, earthy taste, and tell-tale red eyes have been replaced with lab-tested pot regulated in state industries.

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Prison walls do little when drones can easily deliver drugs and other contraband to prisoners, and the tactic appears at prisons all across the country. Georgia Gov. Brian P. Kemp announced last week that 150 individuals were arrested in a drone drug delivery operation that served inmates in Georgia correctional facilities as law enforcement confiscated 67 pounds of pot and various other drugs.

“Operation Skyhawk” was a joint investigative effort between the Georgia Department of Corrections (GDC) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation Safe Streets Gang Task Force. Eight dirty GDC correctional officers who allegedly took part in the operation were also arrested and immediately terminated from their positions.

NBC News reports that items that have been confiscated thus far during the operation include a full range of illegal drugs, with a total combined street value of over $7 million. This includes 87 drones, 22 weapons, 273 cell phones (which are banned in the prisons), 180 civilian cell phones, 185 pounds of tobacco, 67 pounds of pot, 12 pounds of meth, 51 pounds of ecstasy, 10 grams of cocaine, and 90 various pills. Photos of the confiscated drugs and weapons, including Wonka-branded products, were also released. Three large vacuum-sealed bags of flower can also be seen in the photos.

The governor announced the arrests in a March 28 press release. Search and arrest warrants were served at two locations in the Metro Atlanta area—taking down a “sophisticated, multi-state criminal enterprise that included civilians, inmates, and staff involved in contraband introduction into GDC facilities.”

“Georgia will not tolerate those who put our communities at risk by trafficking drugs, weapons, and contraband both in and out of our correctional facilities,” said Kemp. “I want to thank Commissioner Oliver, the hardworking men and women of the GDC, and all law enforcement who worked to shut these operations down and help keep both Georgians and our correctional facilities safe.”

“Operation Skyhawk” led to over 1,000 criminal charges stemming from contraband introduction, drug trafficking, and felons in possession of firearms. 

The governor also announced that many of the individuals arrested will also be facing Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) charges and Participation in Criminal Gang Activity in multiple venues across the state, resulting in what may be the largest Gang RICO investigation in the state’s history.

Law enforcement officers warned that many other states may also be affected by the same criminal enterprise.

Prison Drone Delivery

Drone deliveries in California and Kansas recently led to a total of 10 indictments. The U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of California posted a press release on Thursday, announcing that four defendants have been indicted in schemes to deliver drugs into prisons via drone.

In that case, drones delivered not only weed, but spice/K2 drugs that mimic weed, butane oil, and an assortment of other drugs and contraband items. If convicted of conspiracy charges, the defendants face a maximum statutory penalty of 10 years to life in prison and fines of up to $10 million. If convicted of possession with intent to distribute drugs, the defendants face a statutory penalty of five to 40 years in prison and a fine of up to $5 million.

Meanwhile, another team of criminals allegedly used drones to deliver drugs into the U.S. Penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kansas.  Between August 2020 and May 2021, drugs on demand were available, and inmates into the prison yard could order specific drugs.

Last September, an Australian woman and two accomplices pleaded guilty in court to using a drone in an attempt to traffic multiple different drugs and a USB stick filled with pornography into a Queensland, Australia prison yard.

In that case, 27-year-old Cheyenne Anniki Petryszyn was on parole when a drone containing Buprenorphine strips, methamphetamine, and a USB thumb drive containing pornography was found in an exercise yard where it crash-landed.

Prison staff said they found a drone on the ground near a baggie containing 79 strips of Buprenorphine which is a drug used to treat opioid dependence, 0.94 grams of meth, and the USB drive containing an undisclosed amount of pornographic material. 

Law enforcement is also using drones to spot cannabis operations—particularly in California. A pilot program involving the use of drones to spot illegal cannabis grow operations took place in 2021 in Nevada County, California.

In many areas in California, growers have the challenge of competing with illicit operations amid an epic oversupply problem—driving some operators into the black market. 

Also in 2021, a House appropriations committee backed federal efforts to track down illicit grow operations on public lands in California. If issues around cybersecurity and domestic production can be resolved so that drones can be fully trusted, it could become a reality in more areas. 

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As a “laboratory of democracy,” Oregon’s experiment with decriminalizing all drugs—including hard drugs like heroin and meth—has run its course and come to an end. The Oregon law was reversed on April 1 under new legislation signed to impose misdemeanor charges for crimes involving hard drugs.

On Monday, Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek signed House Bill 4002, which reverses the first-of-its-kind, voter-approved drug decriminalization law that was enacted three years ago.  HB 4002 was approved by the state Senate 21-8 after the House approved it 51-7.

In 2020, nearly 60% of Oregon voters passed the state’s drug decriminalization law, Measure 110, which in a radical move, decriminalized the possession of small amounts of illicit drugs and was designed to direct drug addicts to rehab instead of doing time. The bill made the personal use possession of illegal drugs such as heroin, cocaine, and meth punishable by a mere ticket and a maximum fine of $100. 

But critics claim the law created a hellscape of drug addicts on the streets of cities like Portland. The New York Times called it a “deluge of overdose deaths.” How true are these claims? Oregon ranked 17th for the highest drug-related deaths last year, with 30 fentanyl overdose fatalities for every 100,000 people—up from 36th out of the 39 states (including Washington, D.C.) that reported fentanyl overdose deaths in 2019. This was too high of a climb amid the state’s experimental drug law, some analysts said, however it was still lower than the rates seen in other states. 

Fast forward to August 2023, and 56% of Oregonians said they disapproved of the drug decriminalization law, and lawmakers—Republicans and Democrats included—introduced legislation to reverse the bill. Liberal commentators, however, said the state is reigniting a police state.

Statesman Journal reports that beginning on Sept. 1, Class E violations, which were created under Measure 110, eliminating criminal penalties for possession of small amounts of illegal drugs, will be repealed under the new law. The new law means that people caught with small amounts of illegal drugs will face a new “drug enforcement misdemeanor.”

HB 4002, raised the punishment for personal use possession to a misdemeanor punishable by up to six months in jail. It gives cops the green light to confiscate the drugs and crack down on their use on sidewalks and in parks. 

It also establishes ways for rehab treatment to be offered as an alternative to jail time by encouraging law enforcement agencies to create “deflection programs” that would divert people to addiction and mental health services instead of the criminal justice system.

In a letter to Senate President Rob Wagner and House Speaker Julie Fahey, Gov. Kotek wrote that the bill still encourages law enforcement to prioritize “pre-arrest deflection.”

“Implementation of House Bill 4002 will be complex, but committing to clarity and coordination is one way to improve its likelihood of long-term success,” the governor stated. “Therefore, I direct the Criminal Justice Commission to leverage their full authority for deflection programs to use a standardized certification document that is easily identifiable as evidence of a person’s successful completion.”

“Committing to this approach is one strategy to reduce collateral consequences of justice system involvement and can help mitigate the racial and ethnic disparities this legislation is projected to create,” Kotek stated in her letter. “For example, pre-arrest deflection for all standalone PCS charges can support a simplified sealing process later by reducing the number of records created and, based on historical data, could potentially reduce the disparate impact of criminalization of communities of color.”

Republican leadership responded to the governor signing HB 4002.

“Republicans stood united and forced Democrats to do what Oregonians demanded: recriminalize drugs,” said House Leader Jeff Helfrich. “Make no mistake, this bill is not enough to undo the disaster of Measure 110. House Republicans are ready to continue the work we started and bring real change to Salem in the next session.”

Rep. Tim Knopp, a Republican, said that the bill ends a crisis that the state was grappling with. 

“Make no mistake, this bill is not enough to undo the disaster of Measure 110,” Knopp said in a statement. “House Republicans are ready to continue the work we started and bring real change to Salem in the next session.”

“Now that the Governor has given the recriminalization bill her stamp of approval, we can finally end the chapter on Oregon’s experiment with decriminalizing hard drugs.”

“HB 4002 is not a perfect solution; legislators will have much more work to do in upcoming sessions. But it sets a standard for how the state should approach the drug addiction crisis: by empowering law enforcement and our behavioral health systems to work together to help Oregonians struggling with chronic addiction seek life-saving treatment.” 

The changes under the new law take effect Sept. 1.

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Mexican authorities have raided and dismantled the biggest meth lab found under the current presidential administration in the northern state of Sonora.

According to the Mexican Navy, a clandestine “mega-laboratory” was discovered recently in the area of Rancho Viejo, Quiriego, Sonora. That laboratory was raided by naval personnel on an undisclosed date and effectively neutralized.

“In coordination with [the Attorney General’s Office] [and the Attorney General’s Office of the State (FGE) of Sonora] and authorities of the state of Sonora, in recent days a mega laboratory was located and dismantled, the largest insured during the current administration, which was made up of six drug generation points and represents more than 50% of the drugs and precursors secured during the current year,” The Secretary of the Navy of Mexico said on X, formerly known as Twitter.

This particular raid was responsible for the seizure of 41,310 kilograms of bulk methamphetamine as well as 12,705 kilograms of precursor chemicals used to synthesize methamphetamine capable of producing a total of 54,015 kilograms of methamphetamine. The Mexican Navy indicated in a press release that if individually bagged and tagged for personal use, this would constitute over 1 billion doses of meth (not to split hairs but by my count it’s more like 540 million).

The Mexican Navy also indicated that 72 reactors, 102 condensers, 32 centrifuges, three vehicles, two motorcycles, a trailer and other miscellaneous material were seized during this operation. Before this raid the largest lab found was in Sinaloa and had only13 reactors. It was also noted in the same press release that after distribution, the amount of narcotics seized in this raid would have netted the cartels over $700 million USD. Including this raid, a total of 73,520 kilograms of methamphetamine and 141,470 kilograms of precursor chemicals have been seized and destroyed in Mexico thus far this year.

The United States has been ramping up pressure on President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and subsequently the country of Mexico to crack down on the flow of illegal narcotics from Mexico into the United States, the vast majority of which are fentanyl and methamphetamine produced by the cartels. As a result of this increased pressure, Mexico has been increasingly raiding drug labs around the country but a Reuters investigation released in March of last year found via leaked government documents that Mexico has been dramatically inflating the number of drug raids it performs.

This inflation was reportedly performed by including a large number of raids in the tallies shared with the U.S. which were labs that were already inactive by the time the military got there. In fact, a report released last December found that 89% of raids on suspected fentanyl-producing labs were performed on inactive labs. 

“These numbers are outrageous and not worth the paper they are written on,” said Matthew Donahue, former U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Regional Director to Reuters, calling the number inflation an attempt at “placating the United States and to make it appear they are doing something, when clearly they are not.”

Data obtained from the Mexican Defense Ministry by Reuters showed that in 2023, Mexican military units performed 503 raids on inactive labs and 24 raids on active labs. In 2022 the military raided 450 inactive labs and 42 active labs.  In 2021 it was 195 inactive and 22 active. In 2020, 267 inactive and 55 active.

This increased pressure by the U.S. on Mexico has been consistent to the tune of several in-person meetings and conversations between the Biden administration and President Obrador. It even led to an ominous warning to all drug cartels being posted on signs throughout SInaloa in October of last year expressly telling people to stop producing fentanyl in the area, though by all accounts fentanyl production has not slowed down whatsoever since the notices were posted. 

“Attention. Due to the incessant disinformation of some media and the obvious omission of the government in not investigating and prosecuting the true culprits of this epidemic,” the banners said (in Spanish). “In Sinaloa, the sale, manufacture, transportation or any type of business that involves the substance known as fentanyl is strictly prohibited, including the sale of chemicals for its preparation. We have never been nor will we be related to that business. [Be warned of] the consequences. Att: Chapitos,” the signs read.”

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Police seized nearly five tons of methamphetamine in Fiji, equivalent to more than $2 billion in Fijian dollars (approximately $886.2 million USD). The first Jan. 14 raid resulted in seizure of more than three tons of meth at a warehouse on the western side of Fiji’s main island near the country’s main international airport, according to an OCCRP report.

The second raid took place Jan. 20, with Fiji’s public prosecutor sanctioning charges against 13 people in connection to the raids, RNZ reports. Those accused have been charged with unlawful possession of illicit drugs, according to a statement from the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (ODPP).

Drugs Down Under: The First of Many Possible Busts to Come

“Of the 13 accused persons, two are also charged with unlawful importation of illicit drugs. It is alleged that the accused persons without lawful authority, facilitated the importation and were found in possession of 4.8 tonnes of methamphetamines, an illicit drug, the statement says.

The ODPP also said that three of the 13 suspects were also charged with possession of property suspected of being proceeds of crime.

“It is alleged that the three accused persons were found in possession of cash (local and overseas currency) suspected of being proceeds of crime,” the statement said.

One of the 13, Justin Ho, was previously charged for exporting 2015.7 grams of cocaine from Sydney in 2018 while working as a flight attendant for Fiji Airways. Ho, and the other suspect, ended up walking free after the drugs went missing from the Namaka Police Station and the ODPP filed to discontinue proceedings.

A Fijian police officer was also charged in relation to the incident, after allegedly scooping up what was believed to be crystal meth powder from the first drug bust. The officer also allegedly fled the scene on Jan. 14 and was apprehended two days later.

An Ongoing Investigation

A Fiji court proceeded to grant bail to the 13 people charged after questioning and holding them in custody for 48 hours per country law. They are still under a curfew and must appear at the Lautoka High Court on Friday. 

Fiji Police are now working with their nearby counterparts, like the Australian Federal Police and the Pacific Transnational Crime and Coordination Centre, and expect to make additional arrests.

According to Fiji Police Assistant Police Commissioner Mesake Waqa, the drugs arrived in Fiji in late December and the country was “being used as a transit point and that the methamphetamine was destined for a foreign market.” Waqa also said that the exchange of the meth shipment was believed to have been made outside of the country’s Exclusive Economic Zone, and the packages were delivered through a barge.

“The Fiji Police Force will not be making further comments on the ongoing investigation until major developments are made,” Waqa said.

Fiji Leaders Unite Against Drugs

According to the Fiji Sun, three chiefs — Tui Nadi Ratu Vuniyani Navuniuci, Tui Sabeto Ratu Viliame Mataitoga and Tui Nawaka Ratu Joeli Naevo — have also united to address the issue and naming their concern about drugs in the country.

It’s looking as though this incident could ignite a War on Drugs in the region, as entities like the Nadi Chamber of Commerce and Nadi Town Council also urged for swift action to address what they called a “serious and worrying issue.” 

Dr. Ram Raju, president of the Nadi Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said that these drug busts were staggering and that Fiji is vulnerable acting as a middle country for illegal drug trade. Raju similarly called for major, sweeping measures, even suggesting that Fiji be deemed as “smoke and drug free.”

Pio Tikoduadua, Fijian Parliament minister and member, pointed to the need for legislative review and strengthening the country’s laws around illicit drug trade and border control. Tikoduadua also called for harsher penalties on those involved in the drug trade and building effective processes for police investigations while emphasizing that education is one of the best tools to discourage Fijians from using drugs.

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Cannabis use around the world continues to eclipse other drugs––and is increasing. Opioids, meanwhile, continue to cause the most harm.

Those are just some of the takeaways from the United Nations’ annual “World Drug Report” for 2023.

“Drug use continues to be high worldwide. In 2021, 1 in every 17 people aged 15–64 in the world had used a drug in the past 12 months. The estimated number of users grew from 240 million in 2011 to 296 million in 2021 (5.8 per cent of the global population aged 15–64). This is a 23 per cent increase, partly due to population growth,” the report’s “executive summary” said. 

According to the report, cannabis “continues to be the most used drug, with an estimated 219 million users (4.3 per cent of the global adult population) in 2021.” 

That number is also trending upward––perhaps a byproduct of legalization in the United States and elsewhere. But the report also showed a gender divide when it comes to pot use.

“Use of the drug is increasing and although globally cannabis users are mostly men (about 70 per cent), the gender divide is reducing in some subregions; women account for 42 per cent of cannabis users in North America,” the report said.

Opioids, meanwhile, “continue to be the group of substances with the highest contribution to severe drug-related harm, including fatal overdoses,” according to the report. 

That will come as little surprise to those in the United States, which has been mired in an opioid epidemic for more than two decades. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the number of people in the U.S. who died from a drug overdose in 2021 “was over six times the number in 1999” and the “number of drug overdose deaths increased more than 16% from 2020 to 2021.”

Among the nearly 107,000 drug overdose deaths in the United States in 2021, more than 75% involved an opioid, according to the CDC.

The CDC says that the “rise in opioid overdose deaths can be outlined in three distinct waves.”

“The first wave began with increased prescribing of opioids in the 1990s, with overdose deaths involving prescription opioids (natural and semi-synthetic opioids and methadone) increasing since at least 1999. The second wave began in 2010, with rapid increases in overdose deaths involving heroin. The third wave began in 2013, with significant increases in overdose deaths involving synthetic opioids, particularly those involving illicitly manufactured fentanyl. The market for illicitly manufactured fentanyl continues to change, and it can be found in combination with heroin, counterfeit pills, and cocaine,” according to the CDC.

The UN’s report said that an “estimated 60 million people engaged in non-medical opioid use in 2021, 31.5 million of whom used opiates (mainly heroin).” Opioids remain “the leading cause of deaths in fatal overdoses,” the repot said, accounting “for nearly 70 per cent of the 128,000 deaths attributed to drug use disorders in 2019.” 

“Opioid use disorders also accounted for the majority (71 per cent of the 18 million healthy years of life lost owing to premature death and disability in 2019,” the UN report said.

According to the report, “most drug use disorders are related to cannabis and opioids, which are also the drugs that lead most people to seek drug treatment, but opioids remain the most lethal drug.”

“Among all countries that ranked the drugs leading to drug use disorders, the majority (46 per cent of countries) reported cannabis in first place, 31 per cent of countries reported opioids in first place, mainly heroin, whereas amphetamine-type stimulants, in particular methamphetamine, were reported in first place by 13 per cent of countries. The ranking in each country is determined mainly by two factors: prevalence of use and dependence potential,” the report said.

The UN report also provided a regional breakdown of drug use.

“There are clear regional differences in the primary drug reported by people entering drug treatment: in most of Europe and most of the subregions of Asia, opioids are the most frequent primary drug of people in drug treatment, whereas in Latin America it is cocaine, in parts of Africa it is cannabis, and in East and South-East Asia it is Methamphetamine,” the report said.

The report also identified an uptick in intravenous drug use.

“An estimated 13.2 million people were injecting drugs in 2021,” the report said. “This estimate is 18 per cent higher than in 2020 (11.2 million). This increase is due to newly available estimates in the United States of America and in some other countries. Eastern Europe (1.3 per cent of the adult population) and North America (1.0 per cent) remain the two subregions with the highest estimated prevalence of people who inject drugs, and, in absolute terms, North America now has the highest number of individuals that report injecting drugs, ahead of East and South-East Asia.”

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Thousands of cannabis shops opened across Thailand after the nation became the first in Asia to decriminalize cannabis, and there are no signs of a slowdown as opposition to the industry grows, led by the country’s new prime minister. 

On June 9, 2022, Thailand removed cannabis from the nation’s list of banned drugs, making the country the first Asian nation to decriminalize pot. Government officials claimed that the move does not legalize cannabis for recreational purposes. Under Thailand’s new regulations, marijuana and hemp cultivation and commerce are no longer illegal. Restaurants and cafes are permitted to sell foods and beverages infused with cannabis, but only if they contain no more than 0.2% THC. Products with higher concentrations of THC are allowed for medical purposes.

Thailand’s new prime minister, Srettha Thavisin, declared war on drugs as a national agenda in his campaign, Bangkok Post reports, focusing on meth, but with part of the plan to scale back the country’s cannabis policy. “A consensus has been reached among the 11 coalition parties as well as all other parties in the opposition that the need to tackle the drugs problem is high on the agenda,” he said. “Let’s make today the start of a new fight to stamp out drug problems from society.” The falling price of meth in the country led to a surge in use. He also vowed to reclassify cannabis as a narcotic.

Thailand’s new leadership is rushing to rewrite the nation’s cannabis policy after around 6,000 cannabis shops opened up, and people found legal loopholes to sell psychoactive cannabis despite the country’s low limit on THC. 

The Strait Times reports the new law created a “regulatory vacuum,” following last year’s decriminalization measure, and it created a green rush with over 6,000 dispensaries spanning across the country.

Some in favor of cannabis, however, argued that adding new regulations, such as a track and trace system used for narcotics, could actually benefit consumers.

The massive growth isn’t being ignored, but leaders say the industry policies have to be revised. Health Minister Cholnan Srikaew said in a statement late on Tuesday, “Between economic and health benefits, we put health first.”

A new draft of Thailand’s cannabis bill failed to clear parliamentary hurdles before an election in May. The bill was significantly rewritten due to concerns that misuse of cannabis could lead to addiction.

The Guardian reports that Thavisin, has said his administration will “rectify” the country’s cannabis law and limit its use to medical purposes—all within six months. PM Srettha came into power last August, and ran his campaign under the Pheu Thai Party—with a hardline anti-drug agenda, promising to control the nation’s exploding cannabis market. Furthermore, the Pheu Thai Party is now in a coalition with Bhumjaithai Party led by Deputy Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul, which led to the decriminalization of cannabis in the first place.

“The law will need to be rewritten,” Srettha told Bloomberg reporter Haslinda Amin in an interview in New York, where he was attending the UN general assembly. Bloomberg posted a video of the interview on X, formerly Twitter.

“It needs to be rectified. We can have that regulated for medical use only.”

When asked if there will be a compromise for recreational use of cannabis, Srettha answered “no,” adding that problems due to cannabis use have been “widespread lately.”

High Times covered exactly how widespread the industry is getting.

A four-part series by High Times Vice President of Content Jon Cappetta, starting with Part 1, covered the new cannabis scene in Bangkok, Thailand. There, dispensaries dotted the streets all over and strip malls were home to as many as 20 cannabis businesses.

Thanet Supornsahasrungsi, group executive director of Sunshine Hotels and Resorts in Pattaya, said most of the cannabis shops that are open sell products meant for recreational use.

“If we would like to use it for medical purposes, law enforcement should be stricter to make sure we can offer them medical treatment which is safe for their health,” Thanet told Bangkok Post in September.

Things have been shaping up to loosen cannabis laws for years in the country. In 2018, Thailand became the first Southeast Asian nation to legalize cannabis for medical use. Two years later, the Thai cabinet approved amendments to the country’s drug laws to allow for the production and sale of medical cannabis, including flower. 

Thailand remains an island of tolerance of cannabis, amid other countries like Singapore and Malaysia that impose strict corporal and capital punishments for cannabis-related offenses.

The country’s new prime minister aims to change that, ensuring that only medical dispensaries stay put.

The draft bill will likely be submitted for Cabinet approval in December. 

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The owner of a racehorse that won a race last month in Malta has been fined after the horse tested positive for several different drugs.

According to the Times of Malta, The Malta Racing Club has fined the owner of a six-year-old mare named Halina Jibay €350 after the horse tested positive for cocaine, methamphetamine, ketamine, and stanozolol which is a synthetic steroid. The owner,  whose identity was not released, was also barred from entering any other races for at least two years. 

Halina Jibay reportedly outran nine other horses at the Marsa racetrack on October 1. A urine sample was taken the day of the race and sent off to Laboratoire des Courses Hippiques, a French laboratory, for testing as part of regular anti-doping measures set forth by EquestriMalta, the regulatory body for Maltan equine sports. That urine test came back with a positive reading for the aforementioned list of drugs. Drug tests are routinely carried out on the winners of races and the other contenders are chosen via a random lottery system. 

At least two of the substances found in the urine analysis, cocaine and methamphetamine to be exact, were considered to be among the most serious rule breaches of the Malta Racing Club. EquestriMalta told the Times of Malta that they took specific measures to ensure incidents like this did not happen, including an increase of the number of required anti-doping tests and financial assistance to the Malta Racing Club to ensure testing regulations could be easily followed. 

The owner was given until Monday to contest the findings of the urine analysis and present a counter analysis. If the owner chose not to contest, a report was to be filed with Maltan law enforcement. According to the Times of Malta, the horse was born in France in 2017 and has raced 13 other times this year. She placed first in two of those races and placed second in four of them.

Apparently, cocaine works very similarly on horses as it does on humans in that it gives them increased bursts of energy and numbs any muscular pain they might be experiencing. The Times of Malta article said horse owners using cocaine to cheat races is actually somewhat common but it does not happen in Malta as often. Malta, which is a small island tucked in the Mediterranean Sea between Sicily and the North African coast, has seen four cases involving horses testing positive for illegal substances in the last eight years. 

The rest of the world, however, is apparently feeding cocaine to their horses like hot cakes. A cursory Google search showed me way more stories of similar horse-drugging incidents than I was expecting. The most recent example was a 3-year-old Queensland horse named End Assembly that tested positive for cocaine after winning the $200,000 grand prize at a feature race in December of 2022. 

The horse’s trainer and his son, Mark and Ben Currie respectively, were both found guilty of being in charge of a racehorse with a prohibited substance in its system, according to ABC Australia. Another horse trained by the Curries had previously tested positive for cocaine as well. There are countless more examples of horses being accused or found guilty of being on drugs that, in Google terms, go back as far as 2016. 

Beyond that, cases of humans using drugs on horses go all the way back to the Roman Empire when crucifixion was handed out as a punishment for treating horses with hydromel, which is essentially beer. Arsenic doping of horses was also somewhat common in the 1800’s. A stable boy was even hung for giving arsenic to a horse in 1812. In 1912, swabs were made available that tested racehorses for common stimulants and painkillers at the time like caffeine, theobromine and morphine. Horse doping really took off after pool betting was legalized in 1933 as well, with some estimates putting the number of doped up racehorses well over 50% at the time.

The owner of Halina Jabay was ordered to return any prizes won, suspended from the Malta Racing Club and banned from transferring the horse while under suspension. Halina Jibay was suspended from racing for one year following the incident, which seems a little unfair because as far as I know, horses are not capable of preparing and ingesting drugs. But with how often it seems to be happening…

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