The Kauai Police Department is in line to receive $90,000 to battle drug abuse, and aiming at fighting those who sell and use crystal methamphetamine, a drug that's known on the street as "ice" or "batu." The announcement came at a meeting of the Kaua'i Police Commission held Friday. The KPD is becoming part of a nationwide federal communications system that tracks drug offenders and drug trafficking suspects. The use of ice is a major problem on Kaua'i that hurts the entire community. The illegal substance draws both dealers and users into crime, and if not checked will lead dozens of today's Kaua'i children into crime when they come of age. Ice use and dealing leads to robberies, bad check writing, car theft and other crimes. [continues 401 words]
Letter to the Editor There have been at least four front page, detailed reports in The Garden Island over the past two or three years about authorities destroying marijuana plants. The reports name as participants virtually every County, State, and Federal drug enforcement agency: Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF), Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Kaua'i Police Department (KPD), Department of Land and Natural Resources (DLNR), Hawaii Police Department (HPD), Hawaii Air National Guard, and more. The reports describe long hours of investigation, aerial recon, and combined task forces swooping in. Plants are cut down (does this kill the root?). Readers can imagine the drama. [continues 95 words]
Is it me? Or what. Somehow I just don't get it. We spend big bucks to fly around and spot pakalolo growing, so we can eradicate it, but do nothing about ICE. Now personally, I've never heard of a crazed pot smoker going on a rampage and killing innocent people. Anywhere! I have heard of ICE users killing innocent people, and right here on our beautiful island of Kauai. So.... how do we get rid of ICE. Well it doesn't grow on trees like pot, and I really doubt there are enough labs on this island to support the habits of all the users that live here. Where does it come from? There are only two sources. The Air and the Sea. Do we have dogs at the airport to sniff baggage as it passes by on the luggage conveyor or to check people as they exit the cargo daily? No. We need a special task force devoted to this purpose. Oh yes, it will cost big bucks to implement a squad for that purpose. But think for a moment. Instead of spending millions on island beautification for the tourists, and even more money to bring tourists to Kauai, we might try to save our children. Very much like Parkinsons disease, ICE eats holes in the brain until you go maki. These are our children for goodness sake. Think about it, if you've got any money invested in tourism, who wants to come to Ice Island. That's where we are headed. Just like "Garbage Island" from the past, we can whip this problem if we put our minds and money where it is needed. R. Lawrence, Kapaa [end]
Aloha. Your editorial of July 8th is one for the record books. Since you praise it so highly, I dare you to report on the unintended(?) consequences of your island's marijuana eradication program. Kauai has a raging "ice" epidemic and other negative social indicators all around and yet you pretend to wonder where they came from? Duh! From the program you praise so highly, that's where! Just ask Dr. Patricia Morgan, Associate Professor of Public Health at U.C. Berkeley. She did the Hawai'i study connecting the dots from marijuana eradication directly to the ice epidemic from 1991 - 1994. Her telephone number is (510) 642-4861. Her email is momorgan@uclink.berkeley.edu. [continues 122 words]
The Kauai Police Department earlier this week cut down almost 10,000 marijuana plants of varying size. They were assisted by state and federal agencies in spotting the plants using a helicopter and in eradicating the plants. The good news is the number of plants located and destroyed. The bad news is word that the sale of ice, which requires no growing of plants and it thus less obvious, is the drug of choice now to sell. However, continuing to fly Green Harvest operations is an important part of the battle to keep the Island free of drug abuse. [continues 65 words]
Gov. Ben Cayetano is reported to be ready to sign a bill today that would offer drug treatment to non-violent first time offenders of drug-related crimes in lieu of jail time. The goal of the bill is to ease the overcrowding in the state's prisons. Some 300 prisoners might be released once the bill is in place. The bill is being driven by the fact that the state is facing lawsuits over overcrowding in prisons. The cost of the drug treatment programs are about half the cost of sending someone to prison, according to retired Circuit Judge Masato Doi. [continues 208 words]
The use, manufacture and distribution of crystal methamphetamine, a drug with the street name "ice," is continuing to be a major root cause of crime on Kaua'i. Ice addicts are stealing to support their habit, are dangerous to other drivers on our roads, and their crimes are filling up our jail as they steal from businesses, homes and individuals. The latest twist to this curse on the Island is the discovery of small labs used to turn the powder form of methamphetamine into a crystal form. All it takes is some common chemicals easily available on Kaua'i or in any other community. Many of the labs might be in rural areas, and hard to detect by our law officers. Kauai Police Department officers say a strong smell of acetone, which smells like nail polish remover, is a sign that a crystal lab might be in operation. Outside of beauty parlors and surfboard factories the chemical isn't commonly used in quantity here. The KPD relies on tips from citizens for help in ferreting out these labs and thus helping to curb this drug epidemic. The nature of addiction to crack makes this a thankless job for our law officers who must deal one-on-one with these criminals. Support is needed from the community for the KPD and other law enforcement agencies involved in this anti-ice work so that one day ice will no longer be a common drug on Kaua'i. [end]
Pot growing is apparently way down in Kaua'i fields and wilderness areas. A comment by Lt. Marty Curnan of the Kauai Police Department comparing the number of pot plants found during a recent raid to similar searches in the early 1980s, shows a great decline in this practice. Curnan said 20 years ago he could uncover 50,000 marijuana plants on Kaua'i in less than a week, compared to just over 4,000 during a recent operation led by the state Department of Land and Natural Resources. This decline in on-island drug production is good news for law enforcement officials and for the community who should find hiking and other outdoor wilderness activities safer places with less pot growers in action. [end]
Despite Kaua'i's physical beauty, the island is populated by people, and people here have problems like people everywhere else. And when they have troubles, some people try and take the edge off with narcotics. The biggest problem substance on Kaua'i is ice (crystal methamphetamine) according to cops and prosecutors. "Ice is all over the place," Chief Deputy Prosecutor Craig De Costa said Wednesday. "Ice is easy to make, highly addictive and (provides) an intense high. There are people on ice who believe the drug gives them an energy boost. They think they can handle it, but that's not true," De Costa added. [continues 713 words]
Through public awareness and aggressive campaigns to curb their use, health officials in Hawai'i report a downward trend in children turning to alcohol, cigarettes and illegal drugs. Community and government organizations leading the anti-drug fight are far from declaring victory, however, and the battle against substance abuse got an important financial boost recently in the amount of $1.7 million - the amount of the first round of awards from an $8.4 million grant to Hawai'i from the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. [continues 132 words]
The Coast Guard is proud of its history of being America's police force on the water for more than 200 years. Recently, those duties have included fighting the importation of illegal drugs into Hawai"i. But although drug interdiction is still a primary component of the Coast Guard's role, recent federal belt-tightening is expected to cause some problems in enforcement. "Our budget has been cut recently 15 to 30 percent in operations, and that will affect those long-range patrols. We've scaled back recently, and that's not helping our cause," said Chief Gary Openshaw, a Coast Guard spokesman on Oahu. [continues 204 words]
WASHINGTON - Ecstasy (3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine or MDMA) works by targeting cells in the brain that release serotonin. The drug causes cells to release all of their supply of the chemical into the bloodstream, creating a powerful high. The street price for MDMA is between $20 and $30 per dosage unit. The main supply of MDMA comes from Europe, particularly from the Netherlands and Belgium. There is also a small amount being produced domestically. The Drug Enforcement Agency also reports that "Israeli organized crime syndicates - some composed of Russian emigres associated with Russian organized crime syndicates - have forged relationships with Western European traffickers and gained control over a significant share of the European market." [continues 408 words]
Maybe it's serious to them, but to most people, the plan by two Big Island men to create so-called marijuana ministries is sillier than wool hats on a sunny beach. Jonathan Adler, who is running for Big Island mayor (no, his campaign slogan isn't "A vote for Adler is a vote for pot"), and Roger Christie want to use marijuana for legally recognized religious purposes and formal ceremonies. Among other things, Christie intends to make it a sacrament in a wedding ceremony. [continues 94 words]
Question of the week: Can Green Harvest helicopter pilots tell the difference between a medical marijuana plant and a commercial pakalolo plant? Answer: No one knows yet. But sometimes I wonder about the timing of things in the universe, or in this particular case, the timing of different levels of government functioning in Hawai'i. On Tuesday, the state Senate approved a medical marijuana bill. A day later, the Kaua'i County Council accepted $146,000 in federal and state funds for the Domestic Cannabis Eradication and Suppression Program. [continues 747 words]
