Grateful Dead Fan Timothy Tyler Has Been Granted Clemency

http://liveforlivemusic.com/news/grateful-dead-fan-timothy-tyler-has-been-granted-clemency-by-president-barack-obama/

by WhitneyLand • 10 years ago

222 202 10 years ago

SwellJoe• 10 years ago

I don't see any mention of clemency on that page. Perhaps there was a mod-edit to point to a "better" source, which doesn't actually cover the clemency?

jc4p• 10 years ago

I think the purest source is this: https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/president-obama-grants-commut... but that lists a lot more clemencies

ryanlol• 10 years ago

Not exactly relevant but it's somewhat interesting that so many people apparently deserved life sentences but not even a mention of any of them on google.

toomanybeersies• 10 years ago

From one of the clemencies

use of a communication facility to facilitate the commission of a felony

How exactly is this an additional crime to said felony? How does using a telephone make the crime more heinous? This seems like one of those laws that's designed to be guaranteed to add more charges, similar to such gems as "non-violently resisting arrest".

ascorbic2• 10 years ago

I wonder how they decide on the commuted sentence. Timothy Tyler's sentence has been commuted, but he still has to spend another two years in prison.

Natsu2• 10 years ago

The downside of this, sadly, is that he appears to have mental health issues. Unless he has some outside support, which may be difficult with his dad being dead and having been incarcerated since something like 1994, he would be rather likely to end up on the street, alone :(

Here's hoping there are people on the outside to help him out.

sdrothrock• 10 years ago

Here's hoping there are people on the outside to help him out.

I thought the same thing and wondered whether he had been granted clemency, so I googled a bit and found a page by his sister[1], which at least suggests that he has family that thinks of and cares about him. So hopefully they could help out.

1. https://www.change.org/p/my-brother-was-sentenced-to-life-wi...

Natsu2• 10 years ago

That's encouraging to hear, thank you.

justinator• 10 years ago

I would bet that a jam band or ten would be more than happy to put on a concert/festival on his behalf.

omginternets2• 10 years ago

incarcerated since something like 1994

Wow. Wait until he sees a cell-phone...

gFbPR7mAcCcmI5z• 10 years ago

You are aware they have television, newspapers, books, and, yes, even in some cases cell phones in prison, aren't you?

mgr862• 10 years ago

with his dad being dead --

For those unaware his father died in Prison. Why was he in Prison? Well the son committed the crime in the house the father owned. His father died 8 years into a 10 year prison sentence. Cruel.

cloudjacker2• 10 years ago

Ok, curious, what circumstances led to that? The enforcement nowadays seems limited to civil forfeiture, where they would have seized ownership of the house without ever charging the dad, also an egregious act but very different from what happened here?

I read that Timothy was selling LSD to a DEA agent so this implies the entire case was federal? Do the feds still act this way in charging the homeowner instead of "merely" moving to seize the house?

wvrvwwwe2• 10 years ago

This is only related in that it's another person incarcerated over LSD, but I've always found this individual and his story pretty fascinating:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Leonard_Pickard

http://www.freeleonardpickard.org/Skinner-Timeline.html

The second link discusses Gordon Todd Skinner, who was the informant that facilitated the arrest of Pickard. I don't know how much of that information is accurate, but it's an engrossing read and it paints a horrible picture of what a government informant can get away with.

cnp• 10 years ago

It's so fascinating. Not to sound insensitive, but I've been waiting for a screenplay about this for a while...

billh• 10 years ago

VICE did a documentary on Krystle Cole, a friend of Mr. Skinner's prior to his arrest. It includes a tour of the missile silo that Skinner had been using as a lab.

(NSFW - Drugs, Sex, etc.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7qliVpGEk0

nkurz2• 10 years ago

Even more incredible is the perspective of Brandon Green, the man who Skinner is in jail for kidnapping and torturing. Brandon posted his version of events online at the end of last and beginning of this year: https://www.shroomery.org/forums/dosearch.php?uid=367971

I am totally in awe of his attempts to come to terms with what happened to him. I also credit him with the likely the greatest understatement I've ever read on the internet: "To all you guys who constantly say how badly they want to have sex with 'Neurosoup,' take it from me - I've been there and I can testify that its definitely not worth it!"

steve-howard• 10 years ago

It's kind of creepy to watch that in light of the link on Mr Skinner's history, which included allegations that Ms. Cole was an enthusiastic participant in the brutal torture of Brandon Green. The details are fairly disturbing. The narrator's awestruck tone sounds pretty nauseating in that light.

nkurz2• 10 years ago

From jail, Pickard recently managed to publish a complex allegorical tale which (likely) includes his side of the story:

http://www.theroseofparacelsus.com

https://www.createspace.com/5377339

I have not yet read it. Here are a couple reviews:

http://psypressuk.com/2016/08/01/the-rose-of-paracelsus-by-w...

http://www.erismag.com/ss-blog/2016/2/22/illuminated-verbiag...

MrJagil• 10 years ago

Here it is in long-form: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9053993 It's a good read.

nol13• 10 years ago

Free Pickard!

dharness• 10 years ago

I'm not sure where this title came from - this article seems to indicate there has been no clemency?

Cozumel• 10 years ago

Link actually mentioning the clemency: http://liveforlivemusic.com/news/grateful-dead-fan-timothy-t...

How would you even start putting your life back together after been in jail so long? It's unimaginable.

sctb• 10 years ago

Thanks, we updated the link from http://famm.org/timothy-tyler.

JohnTHaller• 10 years ago

Those infamous 'carrier weight' LSD laws where the weight of what the single drop of LSD is on counts as part of the drug in calculating the sentencing. And it's not even the dumbest 'war on drugs' law in our arsenal of dumb 'war on drugs' laws.

mighty_atomic_c• 10 years ago

Call me cynical, but I don't think it is dumb. I think it is intentional.

MaxfordAndSons• 10 years ago

Dumb and intentional aren't mutually exclusive here.

What would be truly cynical is to believe it's pragmatic, and not just dumb.

ellisdewalt3• 10 years ago

It's dumb because even if they wanted to have that severe of a punishment for LSD specifically, they could do math and just make the sentence greater for smaller amounts of actual drug. Be as cynical as you like, but we'd see equivalent exaggerations for every other drug if your line of thinking made sense.

_bdog• 10 years ago

About the dumbness in the "war on drugs":

There is a nice scene in the documentary "Le route de l'opium", where they interview, I believe the guy responsible for europol drugwar coordination. They ask why the laws and system are like this if they are so incredibly stupid and not working.

His answer: Because this is the way many individuals earn the most money with it. Change anything and manufacturers, dealers, corrupt politicians etc. would lose money.

alanwatts• 10 years ago

Economics 101: increased risk = increased reward

bogomipz11• 10 years ago

The carrier weight is significant because its proportional to the amount of substance, the paper is the distribution vector. Someone caught with a sheet of LSD is carrying significantly more than a single tab of LSD. The latter defying "personal consumption. And personal consumption vs intent to distribute is significantly different.

While I don't believe that non-violent drug offenders should be locked up for life, this individual failed to appreciate the gravity of being arrested for the serious offense of distribution on two prior occasions! To add to the stupidity , the Seth Faranti case was a huge cause célèbre in 1993 and he was put away for life. It was well known at the time that the Feds were taking a serious view of LSD distribution and were targeting Deadshows. Yet he continued his disregard for consequences well into 1994.

LSD is not physically addictive so this is not like someone who became physically addicted and was arrested as a recidivist offender as a result. This was someone who was financing a lifestyle by selling acid. There were plenty of other Deadheads that financed their road trips without selling drugs. It was a choice he made on at least three different occasions.

While I believe the war drugs is indeed dumb, getting arrested for the same serious crime three times is even dumber.

There is a difference between making a mistake in ones youth and throwing your life away.

Nursie19• 10 years ago

Carrier weight is really dumb because someone carrying a 1g crystal has up to 10,000 doses on their person, 1g of paper, not so much.

CoryG8910• 10 years ago

The carrier weight is significant because its proportional to the amount of substance

This is not true. I can take a clean sheet of paper and dissolve as much LSD (or as little) on it as desired. 1g of near-pure crystal will definitely contain thousands of doses. 1g of paper could contain anything from 0, 1, 10, or 100 doses or more.

iconjack2• 10 years ago

I will never, ever vote for anyone who supported the drug war. Yes, that includes you, Hillary.

duaneb• 10 years ago

This kind of thinking helps nothing. If you are outraged, push to change it. If you seriously think the best way to do that is to not vote for Hillary, I'd love to hear your reasoning.

wvrvwwwe2• 10 years ago

You can not vote for Clinton and push to change drug laws, they're not mutually exclusive.

iconjack2• 10 years ago

I am outraged by the drug war, therefore I will not vote for a drug warrior. Not sure what else to say.

hobs2• 10 years ago

Last time I checked Clinton promised to move marijuana to schedule II, not do anything like pledge to end the completely pointless war on drugs.

Do you have millions in donations to a campaign or millions of followers to vote for your cause? Then I wouldn't hold your breath "pushing for change" within a campaign on either side of the aisle because your opinion simply doesn't matter to them.

pcurve• 10 years ago

People's view evolve. It wasn't that long when vast majority of Americans were against gay marriage.

hyperliner• 10 years ago

They evolve when it becomes politically convenient.

api2• 10 years ago

... and Trump, and any major party candidate for the past 75 years.

The unfortunate truth is that it's a democracy and the majority of the voting public still supports the drug war. That support in softening, but very slowly.

logfromblammo4• 10 years ago

No.... it's a constitutionally limited democratic republic. That's supposed to prevent "the majority of the voting public" from mandating stupid laws and forcing the minority to live under them.

As such, place the blame where it belongs: the majority of Democratic and Republican party politicians, who have employed the drug war as a means to preserve or increase their political power, and to distract and propagandize the aforementioned voting public away from any issues of real importance that cannot be solved effectively without doing something unpopular among certain blocs of the electorate.

Hondor• 10 years ago

Sounds like a good idea. If politicians were held accountable for their actions for their whole career, they might actively look for the long term better policies instead of blindly mirroring whatever nutty ideas their current round of voters want.

ascorbic2• 10 years ago

So that one issue wipes out all others? Do you really have no preference as to whether Trump or Hillary wins?

Nursie19• 10 years ago

Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos

cmdrfred2• 10 years ago

My issue is I simply want someone reasonably honest as President. I have no preference as neither candidate exhibits that behavior.

ghshephard4• 10 years ago

People's positions evolve, particularly as better information is available and we become more knowledgable on a subject.

sova• 10 years ago

May he feel safe and at home where-ever he stands.

thowar2• 10 years ago

The bigger story here, Obama has granted clemency to 111 inmates. It looks like they are mostly drug related. https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/president-obama-grants-commut...

PhantomGremlin• 10 years ago

Many of our drug laws are way too harsh, so it's a good thing that Obama is injecting a modicum of sanity into things.

In contrast, on Bill Clinton's last day in office, he shamelessly engaged in "cash for pardons". E.g.:

Critics complained that Denise Eisenberg Rich, [Marc Rich's] former wife, had made substantial donations to both the Clinton library and to Mrs. Clinton's senate campaign.

Longtime Clinton supporters and Democratic leaders such as former President Jimmy Carter, James Carville and Terry McAuliffe, were all critical of the Clinton pardon. Carter said the pardons were "disgraceful."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Clinton_pardon_controvers...

downandout• 10 years ago

Agreed. I am no Obama fan - for one thing I think his unprecedented expansion of covert surveillance programs and defiant tone in the wake of the Snowden revelations did tremendous damage to US tech companies seeking to do business overseas. But I am quite happy he did this. It shows a measure of humanity and common sense that is rare in US politicians. These are traits that we are unlikely to see in the next President, regardless of which candidate wins.

bmm6o• 10 years ago

According to the report on NPR, they are inmates would have served more time than they would if they were convicted today (due to changes in sentencing guidelines or criminal classifications). It seems to me like we should default to releasing such people or it should at least not require something as powerful as a presidential pardon.

toodlebunions• 10 years ago

Mandatory minimums are terrible.

hasbroslasher3• 10 years ago

Always amazes me that LSD is illegal while alcohol is legal, the latter causing all host of metal and physical ailments, the former causing mostly hilarious navel-gazing

ultramancool3• 10 years ago

Alcohol is probably only legal because it's easy to make and has existed in the culture for ages, nothing to do with any ailments. History defines the laws far more than logic does.

aaronbrethorst• 10 years ago

Specific background: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-first_Amendment_to_the_...

And the Ken Burns documentary is fantastic: http://www.pbs.org/kenburns/prohibition/

smcl2• 10 years ago

What do you mean "nothing to do with any ailments"?

wastedhours5• 10 years ago

I'm intrigued by this line of argument - have always assumed it's mainly because alcohol can be enjoyed on its own merits, whereas most drugs are taken solely for the impact on the mind (e.g. wine for taste etc...).

Nursie19• 10 years ago

If it wasn't for the effect, nobody would bother acquiring the taste for beer or wine...

Alcohol is, for the vast majority of the time, taken solely for the impact on the mind.

tigershark3• 10 years ago

It always amazes me how many people on HN trivialise extremely dangerous drugs saying that alcohol is more dangerous. I'd rather stay in a room with someone that drinks a glass of wine a day than with someone that assumes LSD every day.

ghshephard4• 10 years ago

Some objective research is useful here. Lancet did an evaluation across multiple spectrums, harm to self, harm to environment, harm to society, harm to others, crime, etc...

(https://www.researchgate.net/publication/47635105_Nutt_DJ_Ki...) - in particular, check out the graph down the page.

Alcohol is unquestionably the more destructive of substances, LSD ranks far lower in this scale. Importantly, Alcohol results in a lot of harm to other people (violence, drunk driving, etc...).

Broken_Hippo5• 10 years ago

First, it is pretty rare for folks to take LSD daily, outside of the current trend of microdosing for treating depression, etc. In this case, it seems generally no more faulty than a glass of wine a day. Besides, this is comparing apples to oranges - you'd need to compare an alcoholic, drinking vodka, to the daily user for that to be an apt comparison. And honestly, at that point I'm not too sure who I want to spend time with.

In addition, the comparison would work better with pot. Would you rather spend time with someone drinking a bit or that smokes a bowl every night? That gets to be a much more fuzzy.

In addition, there are questions like: Assiming folks are taking as many responsible precautions as would be expected, is it better to get wasted by alcohol once a month or two or to take some lsd once a month or two? What about once or twice a year? These sorts of questions are closer to mimicking most folks' use of lsd.

But most folks use such things in a much more responsible manner. Occasionally. There will be outliers, just like alcohol. Most folks don't get addicted: 25% of heroin users might, and the rest is at 10% or less (Source: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/aug/26/neil-woods-u...).

As far as dangers are concerned: Part of the danger is not having honest sources and not having access to good information (think about how much more dangerous alcohol was during prohibition). Sure, there is a risk of addiction, but you have that with alcohol, prescription drugs, gambling, and a myriad of other things. Effects on society are heaviest on the illegal things because of the illegality. Current laws would cover a lot of the other 'dangers' much as they do with alcohol (don't be violent, take care of your kids, drive sober). We can regulate potency much like we do with alcohol. Sure, some things can be dangerous, but most folks aren't doing it in those ways. Just like alcohol. We just hear about the bad stuff more because of the political and moral stance on them.

leoedin• 10 years ago

And I'd much rather go to a music festival with someone on LSD than someone who's drank loads of alcohol.

I'm curious though - have you ever been around people on LSD? There's a huge amount of misinformation about it.

Nursie19• 10 years ago

The thing is that alcohol is objectively more dangerous and more harmful than many/most illegal drugs.

It has both acute and chronic health effects, it's addictive and it causes (or at least facilitates) all sorts of social problems including a lot of violence. It kills its users and its users sometimes kill or hurt other people when under its influence.

It always amazes me how willing people are to overlook the evils of alcohol while highlighting the evils of other drugs.

hasbroslasher3• 10 years ago

The equivalent of drinking a glass of wine every day is microdosing LSD, which, interesting, is something that's increasingly popular in the tech community. You may be already be around people every day who are consuming LSD.

To avoid a false dichotomy, you should say you'd rather spend your days with your friend who's drunk to the point of constantly hugging you and telling you "I love you bro, we're fucking bros, man, lets move to Mexico and become fucking PIRATES, man"

Last, it sounds like you've never been around someone who's on LSD, because at low doses they're usually very tame and can at times provide great conversation.

Gibbon1• 10 years ago

LSD is illegal because of 60's era moral panic, plus the drug companies trying to divert attention away from the harm that amphetamines were causing.

eggy4• 10 years ago

It's crazy to spend that much time in jail for a nonviolent offense, and such a small amount of substance in the US.

The war on drugs is a big waste of many things. But to put it in perspective, I am currently living in SE Asia where you are informed by airline announcements and signs that drug trafficking is punishable by death in several of the countries here!

I'm from Brooklyn, but I live in Indonesia now. I'm currently in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. 138 Nigerians are awaiting death penalties in China, Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore at this time.

bogomipz11• 10 years ago

It wasn't an 'offense' it was plural 'offenses' as in three. And we aren't talking about personal possession we are talking about intent to distribute. The distinction between these are night and day.

eggy4• 10 years ago

I read that, and I get your point, but LSD, or marijuana, to me are not in the same league as heroin or cocaine and the amounts those are usually traded in along with the gangs and violence associated with them. I'm not at all addressing the law; I am expressing surprise over the extreme sentence in comparison to what I think are worse crimes. Rapists get what, 4 years in the US if prosecuted? There were/are people serving life sentences over marijuana sales, and now it's legal in some states.

mcguire3• 10 years ago

"According to a pre-sentencing memorandum, Tyler was charged with selling 13,000 hits of acid, found on 13 sheets of paper and equivalent to several grams of liquid. Tyler pleaded guilty to drug distribution...."

Wikipedia. Plus the two prior offenses.

And here I was looking at the title and thinking they'd outlawed the Dead.

elbrownos2• 10 years ago

You forgot the Philippines. President Duterte has summarily executed nearly 2,000 suspected drug dealers and users since July 1st and vowed to execute 98,000 more.

http://time.com/4462352/rodrigo-duterte-drug-war-drugs-phili...

StavrosK2• 10 years ago

How are the words "executed" and "suspected" in the same sentence?!

soylentcola• 10 years ago

Yeah, and when I was over in Indonesia for a month a while back, I even had randos thinking I was an Aussie tourist and trying to sell me pills, weed, etc. on the street. Sorry buddy, but as much as I might love to roll up a spliff out on the beach this evening, I don't feel like either getting set up by some crooked scam where I end up having to give some cop all my money to let me go or, worse, end up in some prison for buying and possessing some cannabis or shitty E.

Needless to say, I stuck to the Bintang.

ImTalking• 10 years ago

Laws should only be there for harm, not morality.

fnj2• 10 years ago

I get that the right to consume any substance one wants into one's own body is a basic human right, but outlawing LSD and cannabis are two cases of outrageous, striking dumbness and pointlessness. Neither one is addictive, and the LD50 of each is an incredible number of orders of magnitude higher than a normal dose. It is virtually impossible to harm yourself.

andrei_says_• 10 years ago

I started to ask Ehrlichman a series of earnest, wonky questions that he impatiently waved away. “You want to know what this was really all about?” he asked with the bluntness of a man who, after public disgrace and a stretch in federal prison, had little left to protect. “The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.”

Self harm never had anything to do with anything.

titzer4• 10 years ago

I think this quote is complete bunk. It comes from here: http://harpers.org/archive/2016/04/legalize-it-all/

This is Dan Baum recalling a conversation with a dead Ehrlichmann after he got out of prison, 20 years after he served with Nixon. Dan puts quotes around this passage but I don't believe for a second that that is what Ehrlichmann said. And Ehrlichmann died 17 years ago, so he's not around to defend himself.

hutzlibu2• 10 years ago

While I do agree that it is a human right to consume anything you want, I very much disagree that "It is virtually impossible to harm yourself" with LSD or Ganja ...

Just because you can't really physically kill yourself with the drug, doesn't mean it can't do you bad otherwise.

Broken_Hippo5• 10 years ago

Minus the legality issues, neither of these have shown to be any worse than some of the dangers of alcohol. Either can be bad for folks with severe mental illness of certain types. It probably isn't safe to drive on LSD, and you'd not really want to be too stoned (or drunk) to take care of your kids.

But this same sort of stuff is true for so many other things. If it were that bad, I'm pretty sure there would be many more problems in places like Amsterdam.

justsaysmthng• 10 years ago

In the eyes of the traditional establishment, LSD is an extremely dangerous substance, not because of it's potential for causing physical harm (which is very close to zero), but because of it's consciousness altering ability, also called "mind expansion" ability.

People who go through a proper acid trip are permanently changed. Their core philosophy, religious and political views can be dramatically altered.

They stop believing the stories that the State and Church wants them to believe and some become hard to control, insubordinate, etc which I would sum up with one word - "free" (of course, with it's own set of consequences).

If the System "brainwashes", the LSD "braincleans".

And then people turn into "hippies", wearing flowers in their hairs, hugging trees and eating vegetarian food. They look at all people as "human beings", instead of "Communist", "Muslim" or "Gay".

They also want everyone to take it.

If I were the military-industrial ego-centric paranoid war-mongering establishment of the '60s, then I would definitely outlaw it and try to get rid of everyone who promotes its use.

Fortunately, LSD and Marijuana are making a major come back, now globally, with millions of young people "waking up", which in our day and age is vitally important, so I hope we'll see news like these more often, including the release of Ross Ulbricht of SilkRoad fame among others.

soundwave1062• 10 years ago

Because LSD ended up being used primarily within counterculture after academia dismissed its medical potential, I do believe there is some degree of truth in the Erlichmann quote / rememberance. But the fact that LSD culture was aligned with the rise of the beatniks and hippies does not mean that every person who takes LSD becomes a rebel-against-the-system hippie.

Some early LSD use was actually intended for therapeutic treatment, recall. LSD was also experimented with by those same military-industrial complex you are talking about, in the infamous Project MKULTRA experiments. These experiments may have contributed to making a hippie or two (Ken Kesey famously was a participant), but clearly not all participants became a hippie for sure. (Some individuals in fact received negative effects from what I recall, LSD is safer than DARE videos would have it, but the potential for causing mental harm is there, paranoia / schizophrenic type issues in particular) Do also recall that the Hell's Angels (in the California / Hunter S. Thompson circle at least) were also pretty big fans of LSD "back in the day". Biker culture is quite far away from hippie culture.

Today, with marijuana in particular, currently I think you are seeing somewhat of a "normalization" with marijuana in that it's becoming more "normal" to use in a casual manner (ala casual consumption of alcohol). It's not just "hippies" smoking marijuana anymore, it's anyone from CEOs to Olympic athletes these days. It's why, in my opinion, it eventually will be legalized. It won't happen with LSD as easily in my opinion, not enough potential for casual usage, but marijuana's story is a good reason why one has to be careful conflating the recreational substance with the culture it is associated with.

curun1r2• 10 years ago

Comments like yours are very dangerous. They buy into the DARE framing of the dangers of drugs being death. But there are much more subtle dangers that get ignored when the discussion is framed this way.

And I say this as someone who went through a prolonged depression following ecstacy use in my early 20s. I stupidly evaluated the dangers of the drug and determined that the naysayers who were warning of possible death were full of shit and didn't think to consider the less severe negative consequences.

torrent-of-ions• 10 years ago

I went through depression after my first relationship. We don't warn children about the dangers of relationships, we just expect that they'll "figure it out" just like everyone else.

You figured out the dangers of high ecstasy usage yourself. Are you one of these people who thinks nobody but you is capable of figuring out how to use it safely?

Broken_Hippo5• 10 years ago

Folks go through depression after prolonged alcohol use as well, and likelwise use it to treat their own depression. But it is still legal. We tend to ignore a lot of subtle dangers of alcohol as well - or overemphasize them in some contexts.

Unfortunately, a lot of the context of illegal drugs is of the overemphasizing sort instead of normal, down-to-earth information taking good with the bad. Which leads to some things like your situation and stupid behavior.

Besides, it is really difficult to sort that depression stuff out. Pot and hash can induce panic attacks in a small portion of the population, but in general that only happens if they have a predisposition to it or if they have an untreated anxiety condition. And it seems to be the same sort of thing with other drugs - and I'm going to guess that it only happens with a small portion of users in reality, much like most folks don't get addicted to most drugs. I fully believe to get over that sort of hump, we not only need balanced and completely truthful information on drugs, but we also need to be able to have truthful and destigmatised discussion about mental health in addition to having facilities available to help folks out.

namlem• 10 years ago

LSD isn't addictive, but cannabis absolutely is. It's not very addictive, but it's still addictive.

fnj2• 10 years ago

I favor precision in language. One may develop a cannabis psychic dependency or habit, but addiction means physical dependence including a real physical withdrawal syndrome.

GrinningFool• 10 years ago

This story is extremely sad, but now seems to be heading towards a happy ending.

Two lives (plus unknown others that they touched on) destroyed, and 20+ years later getting set free - with no acknowledgement of anything wrong with doing that to them in the first place - that fixes everything. /s

Grateful Dead Fan Timothy Tyler Has Been Granted Clemency

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