500 pound college bust

[gothash]

http://www.wesh.com/crime/22758796/detail.html

march 5, 2010

 

there is a video on the link aswell....

 

CHULUOTA, Fla. --

College students suspected in a massive marijuana operation that was busted in Central Florida went to court on Friday.

 

Several agencies busted operations in Orange, Seminole, Lake, Polk and Pinellas counties on Thursday. Those arrested went before a judge on Friday.

 

Drug agents suspect the men were buying marijuana by the hundreds of pounds from a California broker and bringing it to Florida.

 

Before dawn Thursday, drug investigators kicked down doors and rounded up suspects by the dozen -- 31 in all.

 

One of them was University of Central Florida student David Cole, who shouted, "Legalize marijuana!" to news cameras as he was being arrested.

 

Detectives said Cole distributed just under $100,000 worth of marijuana per week. They said he was part of a larger ring suspected of exploiting California law that allows marijuana growth for medical use. About 500 pounds of marijuana were seized in the operation.

 

"I do believe that California has legalized it, and hopefully soon the whole nation will have it legalized," Cole said.

 

Cole and others faced a judge Friday and found out how illegal marijuana still is in Florida.

 

Cole and a parade of other men, several of them students in their early 20s, who are suspected suppliers and drug transporters, are facing charges of racketeering, trafficking and money laundering.

 

Judge Mark Herr said he found it hard to process the depth of this case.

 

"There's no way for me to mentally tabulate all these counts," Herr said.

 

Cole, a UCF senior who is a semester from graduation, is now facing the possibility of life in prison and being kicked out of school. His bond is set at $250,000.

 

A provision was set on Friday that the suspects will have to prove their bond money is not from drug proceeds. In some cases, it will mean asking their parents for the money.

[malbuzz]

it is sad to see this kind of thing on the news .

31 young lives ruined for selling a flower . yes i agree david cole lealize marijuana . but it was your greed that put you were you are today . with such an obviously very clever buisness mind he had other options .

[Budstedpothead]

Well just a few statements.

 

Even if Cannabis was Legal, running grow ops and selling them would be unacceptable and probably would carry the same penalties as selling home grown chop chop tobacco.

 

This is why Cannabis supply will never end, it's teenagers and young adults like these that get onto illicit cultivation and sale of weed because of the money.

Bikies aren't the only people who know how to grow choof.

Anybody can grow choof it's not micro circuit engineering, shit if you ever grown hydroponic vegetables you meet half the specifications of growing weed, all you need to know then is how to care for the plants to help them reach maximum potency.

 

Lastly i cannot really sympathise with these guys, if you do grow and sell you accept the risks if it works out you get loaded, if it doesn't you get 5 years jail.

But lastly how stupid would you have to be NOT TO ACTUALLY CHECK THE LEGAL STATUS before growing.

I was told by some friends back when i was new to pot smoking, that Cannabis has been legalised in some parts of australia, of course i did not go "OMG OMG LEGAL" then order seeds and grow them, nah, i checked the internet found absolutely nothing to confirm what they said, and police raids in recent news confirmed it is not legal.

My idiot friends mistook Decriminalisation for Legalisation (which is in some parts of AUS)

To quote rule of Aquisition 190 Hear all trust nothing.

[Sequoia Crone]

This young man is a year away from college graduation and doesn't know that Marijuana is not LEGAL anywhere in the United States. (Except for limited medical use in 14 states)

 

IMHO no one should be incarcerated for this plant, growing, possessing or using it.

I would have preferred seeing this person become an activist for changing the law instead of getting caught up in the illegal charges he is now faced with.

 

What a waste of human effort.....maybe he can finish his degree in prison. I think he will get the book tossed at him.

 

[Budstedpothead]

I don't think anybody should be imprisoned for using posessing growing or selling weed,

not till it's legalised, any black market trade would be severely frowned upon.

but that's not a problem really, there will be no real reason for anybody to grow and sell unlicensed.

 

Still, he should have paid more attention, ignorance of the law isn't the best defence, especially when you make a stuffup as big as his.

 

if you get caught with a bag of Cannabis for personal use and are confused about medicinal/decriminalisation stuff you can get off with a caution if you don't be a smart ass to the police.

but a growop i mean just.. COME ON was he making attempts to hide the plants? was he caught because he left them out in the open? if thats so he might have a chance of getting off, but if he concealed his growop he is pretty much fucked and will be double bumholed if he did and claimed he didn't know it was illegal but then if you thought it was legal why hide it?

that's what we should be asking.

 

And yeah he should have been a cannabis activist, i am an activist and i am in the perfect position, i got no job besides an optional volunteer, my money comes from the goverment, and i have no job that can be used as an extortion chip to force me out of Cannabis activism.

 

Theres allot of discrimination against MEDICAL users in the US with an actual certificate, it's true that if you have a high paying job you can easily find yourself removed if management dissaproves of you being part of a