Posted on 08/31/2002 3:15:57 AM PDT by chance33_98
Booby-Trapped Pot Injures Three Drug Agents
A booby-trapped pot plant left two national guardsmen and one agent from the Alcohol Beverage Commission with non life-threatening injuries when it exploded. The explosion happened during a routine marijuana eradication conducted by the Governor's Task Force.
At 2:00 p.m. Thursday afternoon, three drug agents found roughly 30 plants in a secluded Maury County pot patch. Suddenly, there was an explosion near the three agents.
"They cut a plant and a device detonated."
Maurice Hobbs, a special ops sergeant with the Tennessee Highway Patrol, rushed to the men who suffered injuries, including ringing ears and cuts from flying shrapnel.
"It was very loud. There was a crater in the dirt indicating, it was some kind of high explosive. It blew a log in half."
Thankfully, no one was seriously injured, but blast experts said had the men been standing directly in the path of the blast wave, the situation could have been much more serious.
"There were enough explosives there to cause extensive damage."
Bomb experts asked News 2 not to disclose how the booby-trapped pot plant was triggered, but agents did tell us it was powerful, sophisticated, and there for a purpose.
"More than likely it was for law enforcement personnel."
"He's taking time to plant marijuana, taking time to build a device for us, hoping to hurt us or kill us."
News 2 spoke to the TBI coordinator for the Governor's Task Force on Marijuana Eradication. He said to date, his men have seized around 400,000 plants across the state, with each plant valued at close to a $1,000. Money is a prime reason some growers booby-trap their crops. If you have any information on who made the bomb, call the Tennessee Highway Patrol.
I don't view legalizing pot as a panacea. I point out that criminals are involved in pot cultivation and trade because of the money that is there. The more illegal it is, the more money it will bring to crime. The more money the more likely that violent people will involve themselves in it.
Criminals by nature will always be criminals. But, there are those who will become criminals for the easy money of drug trading that would otherwise lead, at least marginally, law abiding lives. Drug trading offers the potential of criminal activity to far more people than most other criminal activities. In fact anyone can engage in it.
Well, duh?!
Perhaps if the drug war goons weren't seizing private property through asset forfeiture, then it wouldn't have been grown on public property. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure this one out.
dan
Bzzzzzzt! Wrong! You are using logic here and that will not be tolerated. /sarcasm off
Can't have the bribes or the JBT's funding cut off now can we? Wink wink.
ROTFL!
Oh, silly me. That must mean all is well. Or it does if mindless replies fix everything for you.
Go back to sleep, we'll wake you if something happens.
PC does not come into play here. They are not acting as police.
Said the pig.
So do you suggest that laws can only be unjust if decreed by a king? I don't see how your lame reply is germane.
Personal, ad hominem, attacks say more about the speaker than they do about the intended target.
Red herring. You didn't come within a hundred miles of addressing my post. Typical of "big gov is ok as long as they have "R" after their name" apologists.
You posted:
These armchair constitutionalists who advocate violence as a means of breaking laws they disagree with are no different, imo, than terrorists. They just use a document to justify their illegal, immoral, inflated faux-flag-waving sense of self-worth. Remember?
And so you cry "personal attack" because I challenge you to defend an inflammatory cheapshot. Lame, and pathetic, but so typical.
I've heard that, too.
Some folks who value freedom are not so easy-going, though.
Well those "freedom lovers" should not be surprised when pay-back comes.
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