Mississippi For Cannabis Has Received The Ballot Initiative Petition From The Secretary Of State's Office, Meaning The Group Can Now Begin Collecting Signatures. It Needs More Than 106,165 Signatures. Go, go, go sign the petition is the message a group wanting to make weed legal in Mississippi is telling voters after everything has been cleared for the group to begin collecting signatures to try to have an initiative placed on the November 2016 ballot. Mississippi for Cannabis has received the ballot initiative petition from the Secretary of State's office, meaning the group can now begin collecting signatures. [continues 266 words]
HATTIESBURG - The Lamar County School District is expanding its random drug testing program to include more than 1,000 of its nearly 9,250 students this year. In the past few years, the district has randomly drug tested only about 350 students annually. "My overall goal is to get to 2,000 to 3,000 drug tests a year, especially with our district growing," Superintendent Ben Burnett said. The district randomly drug tests students in the eighth through 12th grades who are involved in extracurricular activities. [continues 550 words]
Many veteran narcotics officers can tell you that people will hide drugs almost anywhere. The Jackson Police Department has two new tools to unearth the most well-hidden contraband. Their names are Alpha and Darius. The two K9s joined the force about three months ago, officials said, and have been on the streets in marked cruisers for about a week, said JPD Deputy Chief Brent Winstead. JPD had gone a few years without a K9 unit, and Chief Rebecca Coleman made the project a priority, he said. [continues 395 words]
Prescriptions Required To Fight Meth Use Starting today, sinus and allergy sufferer Joan Blanks of Pearl won't be able to buy her favorite antidotes without a doctor's blessing. "But, praise the Lord, I've been able to get prescriptions written, and they're good for a year," said Blanks, 79. This day marks the arrival of new restrictions on buying drugs containing ephedrine or pseudoephedrine, an essential ingredient for making crystal methamphetamine, an illegal, addictive drug experts say destroys families. [continues 763 words]
An ordinance creating steps for the city of Jackson to tear down suspected drug houses passed a key committee vote today, but some on the council wondered whether the process is worth it. The procedures in the proposed ordinance are mirrored in a 2008 law giving cities the power to tear down vacant houses used for drug activity, but leaves the decision up to a circuit judge. That's a higher legal burden than the city's normal procedures for tearing down blighted buildings, a fact that had some on the council concerned. [continues 348 words]
A Ridgeland man has been handed a 60-year sentence for selling cocaine in Rankin and Madison counties. William Thornton Harper, 31, also pleaded guilty to a 2001 charge of stealing a law enforcement vehicle in Madison County. Through the plea agreement, the last 20 years of his sentence were suspended, according to a statement from District Attorney Michael Guest, who serves both counties. On March 7, 2008, the Flowood Police Department, through the use of a confidential informant, attempted to purchase cocaine from Harper. The informant contacted Harper and established a time and place to meet him in order to purchase $300 of powder cocaine. When Harper arrived at the pre-arraigned meeting location he became suspicious that he had been set up, and he attempted to leave before the transaction occurred. [continues 494 words]
Brains Altered; Families Broken Methamphetamine wrecks lives because it wrecks the brain. And it destroys self control. So says Cathy Dixon, a Jackson-area psychologist and consultant who lectures on meth abuse. "The first thing you're going to find in a home where meth is abused is pornography," she said. "The second thing is weapons." Meth is a pervasive, illegal stimulant the Drug Enforcement Administration calls the fastest-growing drug threat in Mississippi. Last year, at least 620 seizures of meth laboratories were made by law enforcement - more than double the number in 2008. [continues 770 words]
If not for methamphetamine, the lives of Gayla Chalmers and Nickie Langford probably would have never intersected in Mississippi. Chalmers, 44, is from Rogers, Ark.; Langford, 24, is from Tuscaloosa, Ala. Recently, both discovered the Friendship Connection in Jackson, a residential drug-treatment facility for women. They began their lives separated by hundreds of miles and an entire generation. But meth brought them to the same place. Langford For Nickie Langford, it started with a guy. Until then, she was never interested in any "harder drugs," she said, never mind meth. [continues 1141 words]
Cleaning up meth labs in the state last year cost millions of dollars, the head of the Mississippi Bureau of Narcotics said. In Mississippi, it costs from $2,500 to $7,000 to clean up a meth lab, said director Marshall Fisher. In 2009, more than 620 meth labs were seized in the state, which translates to a cost of between $1.5 million and $4.3 million. But the overall cost of cleaning up everything about meth use is virtually immeasurable, experts say. [continues 462 words]
Meth Surpasses Cocaine In Arrests Unnecessary evil. Cycle of madness. Modern-day plague. That's how law enforcement officials describe methamphetamine, an illegal stimulant and appetite suppressant known as "the poor man's cocaine." This relatively cheap, illegal drug is a physical and spiritual corrosive eating into Mississippi's resources, social fabric, and even its soul, law enforcement says. In 2009 alone, the epidemic spawned at least 620 seizures of meth laboratories by law enforcement agencies. That's more than double the number from the previous year. [continues 814 words]
Also, Legislation Would Allow More To Earn Their Freedom The economic squeeze on the Mississippi Department of Corrections means hundreds of nonviolent inmates could see fewer days behind bars. MDOC Commissioner Chris Epps said he has asked the state Parole Board to review the files of some 2,100 inmates who have been denied parole. "I recommended to the governor that, in my view, we should have the parole board relook at these individuals," Epps said. He estimated that about 25 percent - or 525 inmates - could earn parole on a second look for a savings of about $1.5 million before the fiscal year ends June 30. [continues 702 words]
This is from my heart to yours, concerning the meth problem in our state. Some people are all riled up over the "inconvenience" of having to get a prescription for ephedrine and pseudoephedrine after the passage of a new law to make it harder for meth manufacturers to get the main ingredients to enable them to make their "life-changing" drugs. Let me mention some of the lives that are changed: innocent children who matter less to these meth addicts than the meth itself and their next fix; children who have to sleep in tents in the freezing cold because the "grown-ups" are in the house tending their meth labs; or children in the back room sleeping on the floor with the dogs to keep warm, or the children who get burned and scarred for life, others who are burned to death. And let us not forget the precious newborn babies born into drug addiction. They also suffer from withdrawals, seizures and bad headaches and some even die. [continues 226 words]
Cannabis Grown for Research Through Contract With Federal Government OXFORD -- It's the smell - pungent and slightly citrusy-that first greets visitors to Mahmoud ElSohly's office on the University of Mississippi campus. Next are pictures lining the hallways of the bright green plants ElSohly has researched for 35 years as chief cultivator in the nation's only legal marijuana farm. The University of Mississippi Marijuana Project provides marijuana by the bale to licensed researchers throughout the nation. They study the drug through a federal contract with the National Institute on Drug Abuse. [continues 798 words]
Come July, Mississippians will need a doctor's prescription to buy cold medicines like Mucinex, Claritin D and Sudafed. Gov. Haley Barbour has signed House Bill 512, making any medicine that contains pseudoephedrine - a key ingredient in methamphetamine - a controlled substance as of July 1. Supporters say the measure, which passed the House and Senate in recent weeks, will deter meth production. "We are serious about reducing the use of methamphetamine in our state," Barbour said in a statement. "This law is another tool for law enforcement to fight illegal drugs and protect our communities. Meth use is a problem all over the nation, and I'm proud Mississippi can lead the way in battling this drug that damages lives." [continues 181 words]
Hinds County Judge William Skinner said stopping methamphetamine abuse is worth the inconveniences caused by a new law that will restrict use of decongestant medicines, the main ingredient of meth. "We took a lot of heat over supporting this," Skinner said, noting his three years presiding over the county's drug and Youth courts showed him the ill effects of meth abuse. Gov. Haley Barbour signed House Bill 512 on Thursday requiring prescriptions to purchase medicine that contains pseudoephedrine, like Sudafed D and Zyrtec D. The Legislature overwhelmingly approved the measure. [continues 358 words]
The Senate on Tuesday sent to the governor House Bill 512, which supporters say is designed to curtail the state's escalating meth activity. The House earlier passed the bill. Gov. Haley Barbour said he would sign the bill. The law would go into effect July 1. Oregon passed a similar law in 2006. Barbour said the new law would "make it more difficult to obtain the ingredients for this drug that tears families apart and harms many of our communities. Meth labs threaten public safety, and I don't think there is any doubt we will see a drop in the number of labs in our state." [continues 581 words]
The Legislature's rather decisive vote to strike a blow at the supply of pseudoephedrine available in Mississippi for home meth labs represents a huge victory for state lawmen and a huge loss for drug companies and their lobbyists. Law enforcement agencies don't really have the political clout or the financial resources to lobby in the classic sense - nor should they have to engage in that nonsense. New moonshine? Crystal methamphetamine is the new moonshine in Mississippi. It's relatively easy to make, the precursors are cheap and readily available at a lot of locations in even the smallest Mississippi towns and the demand for the drug is high. [continues 241 words]
Jurors in the federal trial of Mayor Frank Melton took a master's course in constitutional law from federal prosecutors last week. So far, the defense has given them little more than a pop quiz in what might have driven Melton on Aug. 26, 2006, when he and his entourage raided a suspected crack house on Ridgeway Street. Melton and his former police bodyguard Michael Recio are charged with federal civil rights violations related to the raid and face between five and 25 years in prison if convicted. [continues 522 words]
If wrapped up today, verdict could come by end of the week Defense attorneys for Mayor Frank Melton and his former police bodyguard Michael Recio expect to wrap up their cases today in federal court, paving the way for a possible verdict by the end of the week. It is still unclear whether Melton plans to take the stand. However, Recio's attorney, Cynthia Stewart, indicated Recio likely will testify. The plan was announced Tuesday at the end of a stop-and-go day at the federal court house in downtown Jackson. [continues 736 words]
Jackson Mayor Frank Melton is back in federal court this week, continuing the ongoing legal and personal battles that have marked his administration. Jury selection begins today for the trial of Melton and his former bodyguard, Michael Recio, who are charged with civil rights violations in connection with the destruction of a duplex on Ridgeway Street. The house was partially destroyed by sledgehammer-wielding youths while the mayor and Recio allegedly looked on. Melton claimed it was a drug house. Another bodyguard, Marcus Wright, pleaded guilty to a lesser charge and is expected to testify against them. [continues 131 words]
