Stratton - Kingpin: prisoner of the war on drugs

ALSO BY RICHARD STRATTON:

Smack Goddess

Slam: The Book (editor, with Kim Wozencraft)

Altered States of America: Outlaws and Icons, Hitmakers and Hitmen

Smugglers Blues: A True Story of the Hippie Mafia

Copyright 2017 by Richard Stratton

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to Arcade Publishing, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.

First Edition

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Stratton, Richard (Richard H.), author.

Title: Kingpin : prisoner of the war on drugs / Richard Stratton.

Description: New York : Arcade Publishing, [2017] | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2016053991 (print) | LCCN 2017006981 (ebook) | ISBN 9781628727265 (alk. paper) | ISBN 9781628727289 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Stratton, Richard (Richard H.) | PrisonersUnited StatesBiography. | Drug trafficUnited StatesBiography.

Classification: LCC HV9468 .S77 2017 (print) | LCC HV9468 (ebook) | DDC 365/.6092 [B]dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016053991

Cover design by Erin Seward-Hiatt

Front cover prison photo: iStockphoto

Printed in the United States of America

As you are going with your adversary to the magistrate,

try hard to be reconciled on the way,

or your adversary may drag you off to the judge,

and the judge turn you over to the officer,

and the officer throw you into prison.

I tell you, you will not get out

until you have paid the last penny.

Luke 12:58-59

You want to know what this was really all about? The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what Im saying? We knew we couldnt make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.

John Ehrlichman, Nixons domestic policy chief

C ONTENTS

A UTHOR S N OTE

PRISONER OF THE WAR ON PLANTS

T HIS BOOK IS based on my eight-year stretch as a prisoner of the US governments war on plantsspecifically, in my case, the ancient and mysterious cannabis plant. At the end of June 1982, I was arrested by DEA agents, agents with the US marshals fugitive task force, and LA city cops in the lobby of the Sheraton Senator Hotel at Los Angeles International Airport. I had jumped bail on a federal indictment in the District of Maine, where I was charged with conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute marijuana. The Feds were also after me for any number of other successful hashish and pot smuggling escapades that our group had pulled off over a fifteen-year run as one of the major dope smuggling families of the so-called hippie mafia.

That story, the story of my years as an international marijuana and hashish smuggler, is recounted in my previous book, Smugglers Blues . This book picks up where that one left offwith me in custody in the Los Angeles City Jail, also known as the Glass House, possibly the worst jail in America. It quickly became apparent to me and to lawyers involved in my various federal prosecutions that the government had a hidden agenda. Yes, they were anxious to punish me for my long, illicit love affair with the green, splayed, and spiky-leafed cannabis plant. But their ultimate aim was to get me to roll over and inform on friends and enemies they believed were involved in the marijuana underground. Chief among those targets the government wished to prosecute was my friend and mentor, the world-renowned author Norman Mailer.

Mailer, who once dubbed himself General Marijuana, was one of the first American writers of any stature to write about his personal use of pot. He had been on the governments enemies list since back in the fifties, when the Civil Service Commission accused him of being a concealed communist for his left-leaning politics. Always an outspoken critic of the government, with his efforts to end the war in Vietnam, he became a high priority on the Feds hit list. Making a drug conspiracy case against Norman Mailer would diminish his voice as a leading author and undercut his credibility by branding him as a dope-smoking pinko outlaw while also enhancing the careers of government agents and prosecutors.

This book tells the story of my journey through the courts and Federal Bureau of Prisons, which I have renamed the Bureau of Punishment (BOP) for reasons that should become apparent as I relate how the government sought to turn me into one of their unhappy stool pigeons. Some names have been changed to protect those outlaws who have yet to be captured and to disguise the identities of the snitches who testified against me. They did what they felt they had to do; I did what I felt I could live with and chose not to cooperate with the government.

Looking back on it all, with those wild and perilous years smuggling weed behind me, I am gratified to see that cannabis is now grown abundantly in all fifty states. It is legal in an ever-increasing number for medicinal use and was recently made legal for recreational enjoyment in six states. The war on plants seems to be winding down. When I walk free in the world and into a marijuana dispensary and see the various cannabis strains displayed in all their legal glory, it appears that the alleged bad guys have actually won, albeit at great cost in money, broken families, prison time, and even untimely death. And yet it seems incomprehensible to me the lengths to which our federal government was and still is willing to go to punish me and others for trafficking in this God-given plant. As I write, the troglodytes of the Drug Enforcement Administration, more concerned with job security than with the truth and justice, refuse to accept that marijuana has proven medicinal value and must be rescheduled to reflect the scientific proof.

All considered, even given the years I had to spend in prison, I am glad that I decided to take the heat and do the time. The government is simply wrong when it comes to criminalizing this plant. As Americans, we have a right to alter our consciousness as we see fit so long as we are not hurting anyone else. And as citizens living in a participatory democracy, we have a right to be heard and listened to by our civil servants. End the war on plants.

Here then is the story of those long eight years spent in the American prison system, where still to this day too many prisoners of this absurd and destructive war are locked up, serving criminal sentences for possessing or dealing in vegetable matter that long ago should have been made legal.