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 Anno
Experimenter
 
Registered: 06/17/99
Posts: 23,764
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 Immigrants bring new drug, Khat to Tennessee
#7985572 - 02/06/08 02:50 AM |
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http://www.wbir.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=40955
Immigrants bring new drug, Khat to Tennessee
Date created: 1/5/2007 9:56:47 AM
Last updated: 1/5/2007 11:13:05 AM
By JENNIFER BROOKS
Staff Writer - THE TENNESSEAN
It was all over for Mohamed Iman the moment the Bedford County deputy noticed his green teeth.
The 24-year-old Somali immigrant had been pulled over during a routine traffic stop when the deputy spotted a telltale bulge in his cheek and bits of greenery along his gumline. On the floorboards of the car, according to the police report, was a small pile of what looked like wilted leaves and twigs.
Most people would assume Iman was chewing substandard tobacco or a really bad salad. The deputy recognized the green stuff for what it was.
Khat. Tennessee's most obscure drug crime.
Khat ("cot") is a shrub found in parts of Africa and the Middle East. Its leaves and twigs have been chewed for their stimulating effects for thousands of years. In countries like Somalia, Ethiopia and Yemen, where the drug is legal and sold in markets, men gather to chew khat the way Americans get together for a cup of coffee or a beer after work.
And as more and more immigrants move to the U.S. from these countries, khat has followed.
"It's a bad thing," said Abdirizak Hassan, director of the Somali Community Center of Nashville, which works with the estimated 5,000 Somali immigrants and refugees who have relocated in recent years. "We tell people ? forget about what you were doing back home. You're in America now."
Here, fresh khat, a natural amphetamine, is a schedule I narcotic, in the same league with heroin and LSD, and it carries the same severe penalties. Iman's mouthful and the additional 2 pounds of the plant found in his car landed the Nashville man a 10-year jail sentence in November.
Many Somalis have moved to Bedford County in recent years, and Iman had the bad luck to be pulled over by a deputy who knew what to look for.
"He had it all in his teeth," said Deputy David Sakich, who spotted the car weaving along State Route 231 on Sept. 4, 2005. A search turned up 17 bags of khat in the vehicle ? the largest amount ever confiscated in the county. Iman pleaded guilty to possession, but his attorney, Jefre Goldtrap, is appealing his sentence, arguing that his client did not understand the legal issues involved in his plea.
"It's out there, and there's a lot of it. But not many people are familiar with it," said Sakich, who had read up on the drug in manuals but had never seen fresh khat leaves until that day.
Despite the risks, khat smuggling is on the rise. In July, a federal Drug Enforcement Administration sting ? dubbed "Operation Somali Express" ? seized 25 tons of khat, worth an estimated
$10 million and arrested 44 members of an alleged multistate drug smuggling ring that had been shipping massive quantities of the plant from the horn of Africa to immigrant communities in the U.S.
More and more, khat is finding its way onto Tennessee police blotters.
Officers intercept the plant almost by accident, usually when they're searching for other drugs.
Khat is not a subject many Somali immigrants feel comfortable discussing with outsiders. It remains virtually unknown outside the small circle of law enforcement officers who deal with it occasionally.
Neither the state attorney general's office nor the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation tracks khat arrests or prosecutions, leaving the record keeping to the local police.
"We don't have a clue how much is coming in," said Sgt. Mark Chestnut of the Metro Police Department's drug interdiction unit.
In 2005, Metro police impounded 121 pounds of khat. In 2006, the number was closer to 400 or 500 pounds. In comparison, Metro police seized 3,200 pounds of marijuana last year.
"It's almost blatant," Chestnut said of the way khat users smuggle the plants into this country in bulk shipments of 10 to 50 pounds.
Still, it's a tricky drug to smuggle. Users prefer to chew fresh leaves and stems, and the plants are most potent immediately after they've been picked. Cathinone, the key chemical that gives khat its kick, breaks down quickly and vanishes within two to three days.
If smugglers can't get the khat to market before then, they're left with wilted bits of shrubbery that can be dried for tea or sprinkled in food but are 10 times less potent than the fresh drug.
And if police don't move quickly to preserve and test the khat they've seized, the drug wilts and the case falls apart. It may be the only drug crime that can downgrade from a major felony to a parole-level offense in the time it takes to fill out the paperwork on the bust. Nashville police freeze impounded khat in an attempt to preserve it for trial.
At the Davidson County evidence lockup, Sgt. Neil Cook wheels in a cart full of khat. The khat comes into Nashville in bundles ? 40 or so twigs with reddish buds at the tips, wrapped in banana leaves for freshness and wrapped around and around with twine.
On the cart, too, is the most common method of smuggling the drug into Nashville ? a bright red Royal Mail shipping crate with one side ripped open to reveal bundles and bundles stacked neatly inside. The plants are swaddled in pages from the Daily Star tabloid, showing that the plants were shipped from Britain, where khat is legal and sells for about $6 per bundle.
In Nashville, a similar bundle would sell for between $15 and $35. The box, intercepted on Sept. 14, 2006, holds 20 pounds of khat.
Khat was added to the federal Controlled Substances Act in 1993, the same year that U.S. soldiers deployed to Somalia and began to report back about troops of the local warlords who attacked them with plugs of khat bulging in their cheeks.
But khat has never lived up to that boogeyman image in the U.S. In the years since its use was banned, khat has remained a low-key habit, limited almost exclusively to immigrants from the Horn of Africa and parts of the Arabian peninsula who use it when they socialize.
"Is it a drug that's causing a lot of crime? No," Hickerson said. "The majority of the khat we see in Nashville is being sent to family members. It's not sold for resale. There's nothing known about people robbing each other to support their khat habit."
Despite the concerns of federal drug officials, it does not appear to be spreading to other drug users. American drug addicts, after all, have plenty of other options ? drugs that are more potent, won't wilt and won't turn their teeth green with prolonged use.
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The Rich Jerk
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CollegeGuy
Addict
Registered: 11/30/07
Posts: 235
Last seen: 2 months, 14 days
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Re: Immigrants bring new drug, Khat to Tennessee [Re: Anno]
#7985690 - 02/06/08 06:22 AM |
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wow now the government has a easy was to keep new immigrants out
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All posts from this account do not contain any factual or real events only ones that could happen.
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 Chemy
Abusus non tollit usum
Registered: 10/05/07
Posts: 3,519
Loc: Nassau, Bahamas
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Re: Immigrants bring new drug, Khat to Tennessee [Re: CollegeGuy]
#7985866 - 02/06/08 08:46 AM |
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The title of this news story should be: Inbreds learn new politically correct way to discriminate against middle eastern immigrants.
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The thesis that I want to advance today is that the drug war and the laws that prohibit the private consumption of certain drugs are unconstitutional. Prohibition laws, themselves, violate every tenet of limited government that is embodied in our Constitution.
http://www.paulhager.org/libertarian/drug_con.html
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Ojom
member
Registered: 10/27/99
Posts: 439
Last seen: 22 hours, 57 minutes
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Re: Immigrants bring new drug, Khat to Tennessee [Re: Chemy]
#7985937 - 02/06/08 09:20 AM |
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I've seen workers in gas stations using this stuff in TN...
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SheikCorp
Stranger
Registered: 01/09/08
Posts: 463
Last seen: 10 hours, 2 minutes
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Re: Immigrants bring new drug, Khat to Tennessee [Re: Anno]
#7985954 - 02/06/08 09:24 AM |
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WTF is up with th e law!
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ApJunkie
part-time Ninja
Registered: 08/17/06
Posts: 1,900
Loc: Loc:Loc:Loc:Loc:Loc:
Last seen: 9 hours, 33 minutes
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Re: Immigrants bring new drug, Khat to Tennessee [Re: SheikCorp]
#7986022 - 02/06/08 09:41 AM |
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I think I may like to chew some of this Khat business. Sounds interesting.
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"No summit don't call me stupid when you don't know my back round."
-albino_shroom
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SheikCorp
Stranger
Registered: 01/09/08
Posts: 463
Last seen: 10 hours, 2 minutes
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Re: Immigrants bring new drug, Khat to Tennessee [Re: ApJunkie]
#7986370 - 02/06/08 11:54 AM |
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it's really not. It's the equivalent to us drinking a shot of espresso.
Also the shipping over seas bit. The goodies in Khat degrade relatively fast. Unless they ship it fresh i don't see how it can be any good by the time it gets here.
It's like chewing coca leaves almost. But coca stays fresh longer.
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HighHat
USDA Certified, Grade A 3===D
Registered: 01/24/08
Posts: 244
Loc: I TiVo my eBay. Constantly.
Last seen: 8 days, 10 hours
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Re: Immigrants bring new drug, Khat to Tennessee [Re: SheikCorp]
#7987257 - 02/06/08 03:21 PM |
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I got a bigger buzz from some Grizzly snuff than Khat. The shit is like a dip form of coffee. I like how Mr. Sheriff simply says "Its Bad." With no other explanation. How stupid are these people?
It seems US guidelines for making a substance illegal depends on the answer to these 2 questions:
1. Does it make the user feel good?
2. Is it patented by a pharmaceutical company yet?
If the answer to 1 is 'yes' and/or the answer to 2 is 'no' the substance becomes "bad", illegal, and apparently has the power to sprout wings and fly long distance right into the bodies of our children making them strung-out whores.
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Have you ever felt like you were wearing a hat, but you weren't?
"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety" -Letter from the Pennsylvania Assembly, November 11, 1755
This profile is strictly for role-playing. Any alleged association with illegal activities is purely fictional.
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SheikCorp
Stranger
Registered: 01/09/08
Posts: 463
Last seen: 10 hours, 2 minutes
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Re: Immigrants bring new drug, Khat to Tennessee [Re: HighHat]
#7989466 - 02/06/08 10:04 PM |
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it's scheduled because when fresh it's a better precursor for meth then Ephedra sinica. Or I have been led to believe.
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 KrishnaDreamer
Looking for Alice...
Registered: 09/23/07
Posts: 572
Last seen: 57 seconds
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Re: Immigrants bring new drug, Khat to Tennessee [Re: SheikCorp]
#7989851 - 02/06/08 11:35 PM |
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might as well illegalize tobacco and alcohol as well, and anything else that can be used for recreation. i say make anything you don't physically need illegal.
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