You left out the happy ending. When he got out of prison he turned his life around and started a UK SaaS accounting software company with the help of the Prince’s Trust. He sold it a couple years ago for gobs of money. He’s an inspiration of triumph over adversity.
I kept waiting for the part when the DEA bumbled the case so bad, that he’d just get released triumphantly that same day.
I couldn’t believe what happened next.
I’m a little hazy on the adversity, is that the part where he commits the felony? It seems like his drug dealing adversity is really a result of his own actions.
Adversity would probably be a better word to use for someone imprisoned wrongly.
I mean the adversity of being a convicted felon. It’s very hard to get a job let alone found a successful business with a rap sheet.
Yeah, I mean, imagine just not bringing in 6,500 tabs in the first place, it probably would have eliminated a lot of tha adversity.
While I can’t agree with the DEA and the legality of various drugs, it’s not like this guy was smuggling puppies for orphanages.
He did nothing wrong per se. He violated a law, but that’s it.
Violating laws isn’t wrong? I’ll be sure to tell them that the next time I get caught speeding or paying for a prostitute.
Possession of >5 grams of ex is a crime, that’s it. I mean, he was going big or going home, and he’s to be saluted for that, but it’s not like he didn’t do something wrong to create adversity.
When we look back on history, the progress of Western civilization and human rights is actually founded on the violation of law. […] Ultimately, if people lose their willingness to recognize that there are times in our history when legality becomes distinct from morality, we aren’t just ceding control of our rights to government, but our agency in determing our futures.
- Edward Snowden
Well, I dunno what the US rabies laws are like, but puppy smuggling in Perfidious Albion would get him short shrift…
(also, where’s your banana gone? I liked the banana. I hate and fear change)
He stepped away while I have business in Charybdis. He’ll be back some day.
Wait - do you actually think morality and legality are perfectly aligned? When did we reach this nirvana of jurisprudence?
No, but we’ve got to start somewhere. We have agreed as a society that ex is illegal in certain amounts the same way it’s wrong and illegal to drive after your BAC is over a certain limit.
6500 tablets of molecule? Hey, nobody’s perfect.
Why here?
We did not agree. Nobody asked me.
Edit: Nor did they ask a lot of other people.
Drugs kill people. I could make my own version of a perfectly legal drug and kill hundreds of people. The unlicensed manufacture and distribution of dangerous drugs is rightly regulated.
I assume the adversity was whatever convinced him that strolling of a flight with 6500 pills in his bag was good idea.
As for having a drug conviction in the States, it wouldn’t be a huge problem in the UK as 1. no one would think to check and 2. ‘everyone knows’ that the US has crazy drug laws, and you could probably convince a potential employer that there was a tiny speck of weed in your pocket when you flew over etc.
Of course it’s looking like drug laws in the US may be becoming more sensible than the UK, I not sure where this burst of sanity has come from, but I don’t trust it.
Wait, are we talking about the same drug here? MDMA, right? The one that is completely illegal, and practically impossible to even get access to for research purposes? That’s not regulation, that’s prohibition.
Prohibition is basically the opposite of regulation, because it makes any effort to ensure quality and/or safety illegal. There used to be a harm reduction organization called DanceSafe which would set up at raves and offer free testing of ecstasy tablets, to check if they were adulterated. The cops quickly put a stop to that by arresting anyone who shows up at the DanceSafe kiosk for possession. So now dealers are free to press whatever dreck into a pill and call it ecstasy, which like you say can get people hurt.
Our society has the tools to make drug use safe, but the government has deliberately made those tools illegal. That’s because drug policy is not about health and safety, it’s about control.
Yay, Rehabilitation Of Offenders Act!
