Psychoactive Drugs

Medical Marijuana's Promise of Relief Lures Desperate Parents and Patients to Flee Texas

(Editor's note: This week's cover story comes courtesy of our sister paper, the Houston Press. Visit here for more stories by reporter Angelica Leicht.) BY ANGELICA LEICHT Sitting cross-legged on the floor in her apartment outside of Houston, Faith's mother looks over at the toddler repeatedly as ... More >>

Texas Could Bring In $166 Million From Legalizing Marijuana, Man

Good news for E Cannabis Unum supporters across the country: Texas, land of big businesses and economic prosperity, could stand to gain a ton of money from legalizing marijuana -- over $166 million per year, by some estimates. That's a Texas Miracle if we've ever heard one. Of course, it would als ... More >>

After Latest Bust, Dallas Should Probably Lay Off the (Fake) Pot

In a perfect example of why it's best -- if you're looking to run a successful drug empire -- to keep the manufacturing and distribution arms of your outfit separate, the Drug Enforcement Administration moved to seize 35 financial accounts, six cars, jewelery, almost $20,000 in cash, seven gold Cana ... More >>

Tea Partying Steve Stockman Was the Only Texas Rep to Support an Important Pot-Law Amendment

State Representative Steve Stockman is the Texas lawmaker who is probably least likely to whip out a joint at the party and share it with everyone. He likes families, straight people, guns and fertilized eggs that might one day become babies. He hates liberals. Not as much as he hates the federal ... More >>

Decriminalizing Weed Might Actually Reduce Violent Crime, UT Dallas Researchers Find

No one seriously believes anymore in the Reefer Madness depiction of marijuana use, in which this new-fangled devil weed transforms otherwise upstanding teenagers into murderous sociopaths. Even some otherwise staunch social conservatives (e.g. Rick Perry) are beginning to embrace some degree of dec ... More >>

Texas Governor Rick Perry Is Still a Long Way From Legalizing Pot

It's not often that Texas Governor Rick Perry has occasion to wax at length about his views on drug policy, but when you find yourself in Davos, Switzerland, on a World Economic Forum panel devoted to the "drug dilemma," there isn't much else to talk about. This morning's discussion (it was late ev ... More >>

Crave DFW Founder Steven Doyle Is in Jail on Drug Charges

Crave DFW, the popular restaurant-news site, has been unusually quiet this week, and now we know why: Steven Doyle, the site's founder, was arrested this week in Farmers Branch on outstanding warrants and drug charges. He's currently being held on multiple bonds. According to the arrest report, Doy ... More >>

A Drug-Smuggling Truck Driver Was Caught after Crashing His Rig During the Icepocalypse

Those who could stay off the roads on Friday did so, but truckers, the grease that keeps American commerce humming, couldn't rest. They had consumer goods to deliver, groceries to restock, gasoline stations to replenish. At around 3:30 p.m., police say Martin Barrera was transporting a particularly ... More >>

Three Years After Voting to Ban K-2, Dallas Councilman Sheffie Kadane Still Doesn't Know What It Is

No one expects Dallas City Councilman Sheffie Kadane to be an expert on drug culture. He comes across as a staunch teetotaler, someone who associates marijuana with Reefer Madness-style hysteria, who would turn off The Wire in shocked disgust. Yet his role as a municipal policymaker requires at lea ... More >>

A New Poll Says a Majority of Texans Want to Legalize Marijuana, But It's Probably Wrong

The pendulum of public opinion on marijuana policy has been swinging rather dramatically in recent years away from prohibition and toward a more libertarian approach. Hence last year's decision by voters in Colorado and Washington to legalize the stuff and the corresponding announcement by the Justi ... More >>

Enough People Are Smoking "Fake Weed" That Denton PD Helped Bust a Multi-State K2 Ring

Consider this a public service announcement for smokers of K-2 and similar products. There's a widely available, all-natural product -- a miracle, really -- that delivers that synthetic marijuana-like high you crave without any unfortunate face-eating side effects. It's called weed, and it's about a ... More >>

At El Palacio and Other Dallas Nightclubs, the Married Owners Were Also the Coke Dealers

Over the course of several months in 2008, undercover narcotics detectives with the Dallas Police Department visited El Palacio Bar at 4430 Maple Ave. on three occasions and asked for cocaine. Each time, their server dutifully retrieved a small plastic baggie of powdered nine-hour energy from a stor ... More >>

An Irving Man's Disastrous Attempt to Cook K2 Burned Down His Apartment Complex. Now, His Neighbors Are Suing.

Judging from some pretty spectacular video clips and photos, it's little short of a miracle no one was killed in the December 3 fire that destroyed The Arbors of Las Colinas apartment complex in Irving. As it was, only one resident was taken to the hospital after falling from a third-story window, w ... More >>

The Legislative Push to Make Texas More Marijuana-Friendly is Officially Dead

Marijuana advocates were abuzz last month -- and by "abuzz" we mean excited, of course -- when a bill to reduce penalties for marijuana possession was passed out the Texas House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee. The bill had been watered down to apply only to people younger than 21, but the Texas ch ... More >>

The Feds Say a Dallas Clothing Store Was Actually a Front for Jet-setting Drug Dealer

There was just something that didn't add up about Debonaire Bros, the retail menswear business Kristian Fitz had registered with the Texas Secretary of State. For one, there didn't seem to be any clothes. Federal agents staked out the store's supposed address, a Red Bird home belonging to Fitz's par ... More >>

Sylvespa "Paw" Adams: Once Accused of Beating a Kid Over Drug Money, Now Popped for Running a Large Dallas Weed Operation

Agents of nearly a dozen federal and local law enforcement agencies busted a large drug ring this week, arresting a dozen people and seizing 600 marijuana plants and 25 pounds of hydroponic weed. The sweep -- conducted by Dallas PD, the Dallas County Sheriff's Office, Homeland Security and the IRS, ... More >>

The DEA Seized 269 Pounds of Leafy Greens En Route to a Dallas Produce House Last Week

Last Thursday, an agent with the Drug Enforcement Agency received a tip from someone in Brownsville, Texas: A Dallas-bound freight shipment described on shipping manifests as a collection of scales and metal plates actually seemed to contain something else entirely. The shipment was picked up that ... More >>

This Cinco de Mayo -- OK, Fine, Cinco de Mota -- NORML Takes its Cause to Dallas City Hall

With Cinco de Mayo fast approaching, the Dallas/Fort Worth chapter of NORML, the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, is scrambling to remind Americans that if you're going to undermine a holiday designed to celebrate a culture's heritage, you don't have to just do it by getting h ... More >>

Don't Panic, But There's Probably Meth in Your Ecstasy and De-Wormer In Your Cocaine

What's in your drugs? Well, not your drugs, obviously, or ours, because we're law-abiding, tax-paying, speed-limit-driving good citizens, one and all. But as anyone who may have a purely academic interest in this sort of thing might like to know, street drugs are often very, very impure (shocker), a ... More >>

Mothers, Drugs and Need

Dallas Federal Grand Jury Indicts Sam Hurd, Co-Conspirator For Cocaine Distribution

​Seems like only three weeks ago Sam Hurd was just another former wide receiver for the Dallas Cowboys who was on his road to journeyman status, which, in his case, ran through Soldier Field. Then it was revealed: Even before his acquisition by the Chicago Bears, the San Antonio native fancied him ... More >>

A 420 for 2012

Rave On? Not Likely as City Appeal Board Puts Afterlife to Death Following Riveting Hearing.

In mid-October we predicted that the hearing before the Permit and License Appeal Board over whether the club Afterlife should have its dancehall license revoked  would probably be the most exciting thing that's come before the board in a very long time. In hindsight, that was probably an under ... More >>

Postcard from Texas Meth Country

In one East Texas town, a new brand of meth lab has business -- and the occasional house -- booming.

Obama's War on Weed

In a strange about-face, the President tries to hack medical marijuana off at the knees

The War on Drugs Reach a Higher Place

Arrest Made In Case of August Death at Afterlife As City Officials Serve Club Its Walking Papers

​Robert breaks the news: An arrest has been made in connection with the August 13 death of 19-year-old Matthew Allen of Grandview. Police have arrested 19-year-old Skylar Brandt on felony charges alleging that she supplied Allen the drugs he took and eventually overdosed on.And that's just the sta ... More >>

The War on Film

Another Death In The EDM Scene: Ecstasy Use Blamed For Teen's Death at After-Hours Club

Matthew Allen was 19.​We've spent much of the morning today trying to track down more information on what happened to Matthew Allen, the 19-year-old who died in an Irving hospital on Saturday morning after apparently using ecstasy while attending at Club Afterlife on Northwest Highway on late Frid ... More >>

That's Just a NORML Squad Car

Via.​Just couldn't hold this till item till 4:20, so sorry. But I'd meant to mention last week that the Dallas-Fort Worth chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (or NORML) was staging its part of the World Wide Marijuana March on May 7 on the Dallas City Hall Plaza. ... More >>

A Party for Your Buds

Over The Weekend: Destroyer, The War on Drugs at The Loft

Destroyer, The War on DrugsThe LoftMarch 26, 2011Better than: listening to karaoke Wham!, I guess.Destroyer's Dan Bejar​The bottom line: I wish I had thought to bring a Kindle to read at The Loft on Saturday night -- not unlike the guy helping me hold up the column in the middle of the floor at th ... More >>

A hallucinogen called ibogaine has helped addicts kick heroin, meth and everything in between. Is it the trip that does the trick?

Once, He Ran West Dallas Drug Houses. For the Next 30 Years, He'll Be in State, Federal Prison.

Click to embiggen to see where some of the West Dallas Gator Boys' drug houses were​Back in August Sam told you all about Tyrone Weatherall, a leader of the West Side Gator Boys -- and an exotic animal collector -- who pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to possess with the intent to distrib ... More >>

Dallas Gang Leader, Drug Dealer and Apparent Exotic Animal Lover Pleads Guilty to Conspiracy

We're thinking the kiddos at Pinkston High School weren't having a tough time getting high last year. (The markers are streets where drug houses were located.)​Tyrone Weatherall, the 35-year-old leader of the "West Side Gator Boys," pleaded guilty today to one count of conspiracy to possess wi ... More >>

Six Months After La Familia Bust, Dallas Boss Pleads Guilty to Meth Trafficking

Kimberly ThorpeSome of the drugs and money seized by law-enforcement officials in the fall of 2009​We were there in October of last year, when the Drug Enforcement Administration, the FBI, the I.R.S., the U.S. Secret Service and Texas Air National Guard -- and every other law-enforcing acronym -- ... More >>

Dallas-Born Encycloweedia—Exactly What It Sounds Like—Is Trying a New Way to Turn Pot into Dough

With Shifting Attitudes and a Burgeoning Medical Marijuana Movement, the Future Looks Rosy for Legalized Weed

Kurt Vile Adds A Lo-Fi Spin To American Music Classics

Pot for Pain? Not in Dallas County, No Sir.

​Will the feds' new stance on medicinal marijuana have any impact on local users, even though, sadly, Texas isn't among the states that permit the practice? Craig Watkins's office says no way, no how. Local Libertarians, not surprisingly, are crossing their fingers. (As opposed to ...) "The federa ... More >>

Dallas County Sheriff's Deputy to Plead Guilty to Stealing Coke So He Could Deal Coke

Back in January, we told you the sordid story of Dallas County Sheriff's Deputy Standric Choice, who, with two other men, was arrested for plotting to steal cocaine so they could deal cocaine -- how HBO. Two months and one confidential informant later, the 36-year-old former law enforcement officer ... More >>

"West Texas Puro Tango Blast" -- Not As Much Fun As It Sounds

Only a few days ago, The Dallas Morning News ran a piece about Texas' Tango Blast gang, which was formed within the confines of the state's penitentiaries and "could change the Dallas landscape because it rejects old notions of prison gang exclusivity and lifelong commitments," wrote Tanya Eiserer. ... More >>

Eastside Homeboy Gets 19 Years

The U.S. Attorney's Office just sent word: Arturo Tinoco is going to federal prison for a long, long time -- 19 years and then some. Why? Because twice in the span of seven months, the 29-year-old was stopped by Dallas police, who, both times, found a whole bunch of methamphetamine in the car -- not ... More >>

Like an Episode of Dragnet

It's not one of your more dramatic, studio-pitch press releases from the U.S. Attorney's Office; it's no Freddy Lee Foots armored-car narrative, that's for sure. Still, I did think today's missive from The Man -- concerning a big Ecstasy bust involving 13 folks from Dallas, Plano, Euless, Arlington, ... More >>

Mark Stepnoski, Lou Grant Looking to Smoke Out 9/11 Conspiracy

Mark Stepnoski About six years back, Our Boss Man wrote about former Dallas Cowboys offensive lineman Mark Stepnoski's efforts to play on grass as the then-newly installed president of Texas NORML -- you know, the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. Which, turns out, was only the ... More >>

C'mon, TSA Doesn't Allow Anything Larger Than Three Kilos ... Oh, Wait.

Say it ain't so, Joe Ezeokeke. Because, really, if you can't take more than three ounces of liquid onto an airplane, what in the world made you think you could bring four kilos of cocaine onto a flight? Alas, that's just what the Nigerian citizen did on December 22 of last year, when he smuggled cok ... More >>

Ab-NORML-y Good Music? Well, Maybe. For Once.

High on music, man. Maybe it’s a coincidence, but not long after we totally harshed on DFW NORML’s mellow about the terrible bands that perform at the organization’s events, they announced a party with music that approaches tolerability. Well, at least it’s not rap-rock. Reform-minded f ... More >>

Smack in the Middle of Northwest Dallas

Dennis Road runs from Royal Lane north toward Forest Lane, where it turns into Josey Lane. But on that short Northwest Dallas street, federal law-enforcement agents discovered a fairly large heroin trafficking operation that, early next year, could very well land three Dallas men in prison for life. ... More >>

Kicking Down the Door at the "House of Death"

This is Lalo, the man to whom the U.S. government paid $260,000 to act as an informant -- and the man believed to be responsible for at least one murder, if not many more. The cover story in this week's issue of Unfair Park is based largely on court documents and internal government memos, most of w ... More >>

Toke This

If news happens, but no one is there to issue a press release, is it still news? There's a koan for all you tree-hugging hippie stoner types to mull over while we offer up some rather old news to the less easily distracted: The League of Women Voters of Texas has come out in favor of decriminalizing ... More >>