Haley, since you like Mother Jones and there has been interest in our military and Somalia during the last several days you might search for an article in Mother Jones called "From Civil War to the Drug War" written by an acquaintance of mine, Frank Burns several years ago. Twenty years ago October 4 American troops invaded Somalia and were attacked by Somalis who were chewing "khat" leaves which essentially got them stoned. A copter went down and some of our men died and others had to be rescued. Ten years later the incident was the subject of a movie called "Black Hawk Down". Coincidentally just before October 4, 1993, the DEA had put a chemical known as "cathinone" which comes from the "khat" plant on Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act. About 3 years after the Black Hawk Down incident three people in Atlanta were charged with possession of the stuff with the intent to sell and I wound up with my first "khat case". I eventually tried 70 of them in 25 states and the District of Columbia. Search "From Civil War To the Drug War" in Mother Jones for my name and you can read about it...at least the early part of what I could call "The Khat War".
Posted on: Sun, 06 Oct 2013 03:50:58 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015