Pubdate: Thu, 24 May 2001
Source: Reuters (Wire)
Copyright: 2001 Reuters Limited
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/364
Author: Tim Large

MAGIC MUSHROOMS SLIP THROUGH JAPAN DRUG LOOPHOLE

TOKYO (Reuters) - In a country known for some of the Western world's 
toughest drug laws, dealers of hallucinogenic ''magic'' mushrooms 
brazenly tout their wares in Japan.

Sidewalk vendors hawk mind-altering fungi on the streets of Shibuya, 
Tokyo's hip center of fashion, while magazines run advertisements for 
Hawaiian toadstools and Peyote cacti.

Thanks to a bizarre legal loophole, psychedelic substances have 
mushroomed into a major money-spinner and stores, known as ''head 
shops,'' with names such as Herb on Air, Whoopee! and Psychedelic 
Garden are sprouting up all over the capital.

``You can't be punished for possession. Magic mushrooms are not 
listed in the drug law,'' a Justice Ministry official said.

A Tokyo customs official confirmed the loophole that lets dealers 
import vegetable matter that would be considered Class A narcotics in 
many countries. ``The plants themselves aren't illegal. There's no 
law prohibiting their import.''

In a society not known for recreational drug use, such laxity is the 
exception to the rule. Even some over-the-counter cold medicines such 
as Sudafed are routinely seized by Japanese customs officers because 
of the stimulants they contain.

``Japan is no paradise for druggies, that's for sure,'' said a user 
of magic mushrooms, who declined to be identified. The 26-year-old 
office worker described how she painstakingly raised her own magic 
mushrooms at home using a spore-growing kit imported from Amsterdam.

Zapped With Hair Dryer

``My mushrooms were 10 times better than the stuff you can buy in 
Shibuya,'' she said.  ``That's mostly because the dealers dry them 
with a hair dryer that effectively zaps most of the psilocybin out.''

Psilocybin, the chemical that gives magic mushrooms their 
hallucinogenic properties, is specifically outlawed under drug laws, 
as is mescaline from Mexico's peyote cactus. But unlike hemp, the 
fungi and cacti themselves get off scot-free.

``If you know it's a magic mushroom and eat it, that's illegal. If 
you don't know what it is and eat it, that's fine,'' said the branch 
manager of a head-shop chain who identified himself only as Mr. A. 
``It's all right to show and sell them, just not to encourage people 
to ingest.''

He said about 20 people a day, from junior high school students to 
retiress, buy mushrooms imported from Europe and Hawaii at his 
basement bazaar in Tokyo's Shinjuku district. The shop also stocks 
pipes and books on alternative culture.

Dealers know they walk a fine legal line. Police made their first 
fungus-related arrest in 1998, nabbing a man in the western city of 
Osaka for selling 2,000 bottles of capsules containing powdered magic 
mushrooms, worth about $80,000.

But putting him in handcuffs took some wrangling. The man was 
arrested not for hawking hallucinogens but for flouting a law 
requiring people who sell pharmaceutical products to have a license, 
said a police spokesman. He had taken out magazine advertisements 
saying his mushrooms had ``a great effect on sex,'' the spokesman 
added.

The same year, a 19-year-old employee of a Tokyo magic mushroom 
dealer died of a drug overdose, although it was not clear exactly 
what drug she had taken.

``Magic mushrooms are essentially poisonous mushrooms,'' said Katsumi 
Kinoshita, chief of the Health Ministry's Pharmaceutical and Medical 
Safety Bureau. He declined to say whether the ministry was 
considering making them illegal.

Last month Japanese pop idol and TV star Hideaki Ito, 25, was rushed 
to a hospital after police found him babbling incoherently in a 
store, local media said. Ito said he had been given magic mushrooms 
by a friend without his knowledge.

Unwelcome Publicity

The incident drew unwelcome publicity for a fledgling industry eager 
to distance itself from illegal trafficking.

``It's shop policy not to talk to the media,'' said the manager of a 
Shibuya magic mushroom emporium, declining to answer questions. 
``They always paint us in such a bad light.''

Japan's ``yakuza'' organized crime syndicates control the vast 
majority of narcotics trafficking, and their most lucrative product 
is amphetamines, popular as a pick-me-up for those with fast-paced 
lifestyles, police say.

``Rave'' drugs have also become popular. The Osaka customs office 
reported this year that seizures of ecstasy, a controversial 
stimulant and mild hallucinogen sometimes called the ``love drug,'' 
increased almost ninefold in 2000.

Perhaps Japan's most high-profile drug bust was in 1980, when former 
Beatle Paul McCartney was arrested at Tokyo International Airport for 
possession of 219 grams of marijuana. Held in jail for nine days 
before being released and deported, he could have faced seven years 
in prison.

``Japan's drug laws are the way they are because they were forced on 
us willy-nilly by America after the war,'' said a magic mushroom 
street dealer. The long-haired vendor said the occupation authorities 
who gave Japan its new constitution and legal code lumped hard and 
soft drugs together as dangerous and ''evil'' substances -- although 
magic mushrooms slipped through.

``In Japan, the people who make the rules don't have a clue,'' Mr. A 
said. ``To them, it's just fungus.''
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MAP posted-by: Josh Sutcliffe