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Learyfan
It's the psychedelic movement!



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Today in psychedelic history (12/31) 2
#13710749 - 12/31/10 10:00 AM (13 years, 30 days ago) |
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Quote:
The Bizarre Case (and Mysterious Disappearance) of an Infamous Drug Kingpin
Arthur James Williams was supposed to stand trial for manufacturing a huge amount of drugs, but when he was released on bail, he vanished, leaving behind a wrecked airplane but no body.
by Tyler Hooper
On the morning of August 16, 1977, a handful of police officers from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police's (RCMP) Victoria drug squad, including at least one bomb expert and a locksmith, carefully made their way across a property on Westdowne Road, located just outside the small town of Ladysmith on Vancouver Island. The officers slowly encircled a barn at the back of the property, with their hands clenched tightly around their weapons and their eyes scanning incessantly for potential booby-traps.
As the officers reached the complex, they discovered that the building resembled more of a fortress of brick and cement, complete with gigantic staircases connected to the building by a drawbridge. Inside, they found numerous secret passageways that ultimately led to a hidden room. The room contained traces of an illicit drug, MDA. It was the final piece of evidence needed to arrest "The Wizard of Ladysmith" a.k.a.: Arthur James Williams.
The story goes that in an underground fortress on his Westdowne Road property in Ladysmith, known as "The Barn," Williams manufactured large quantities of the drug Methylenedioxyamphetamine, or MDA. Using a network of biker gangs, it's believed that Williams's product was distributed as far east as Winnipeg, and some have even suggested his product was sold internationally. In 1977, after years of monitoring Williams's activities, the Victoria drug squad arrested him on charges related to drug manufacturing and conspiracy. But Williams never made it to the courtroom.
On the evening of November 30, 1977, days before he was scheduled to stand trial, Williams took off in a small, single-engine Cessna bound for either Vancouver or Nanaimo. However, his plane never landed in either destination.
After an official inquest, authorities claimed that Williams's plane crashed in the Strait of Georgia, a narrow, navigable body of water between British Columbia's mainland and Vancouver Island, killing him. However, the majority of the wreckage and Williams's body were never found. Almost 15 months later, Williams's estranged wife, Margaret Williams, also seemingly vanished without a trace, leaving authorities baffled.
Nearly 40 years later, the Williams investigation is still open despite a provincial inquiry into his death. Margaret's disappearance has never been publicly solved.
According to Williams's death certificate, he was born in Portbury, England, on December 31, 1924.
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During the raid, authorities caught Elliot with chemicals used to manufacture illicit drugs. As a result, both Williams and Elliot were put on trial for charges related to trafficking MDA, conspiring to traffic MDA, and possessing MDA. In the end, Elliot was found guilty of trafficking MDA and sentenced to ten years. On January 25, 1975, a judge acquitted Williams on all charges, and it appeared that he was in the clear.
The following year, 1976, was a busy one for Williams. For one, it appears that he had continued manufacturing large batches of MDA. In April of the same year, Elliot was acquitted by the British Columbia Court of Appeal after serving only 15 months of his sentence. The acquittal hinged on the grounds that the police had failed to properly describe the drug he was allegedly trafficking. As a result, Elliot and Williams were free to continue their operation.
In an article for Quest magazine a few years later, John Masters wrote an article titled "The Wizard of Ladysmith." In the article, Masters wrote, "[Williams] cranked up a production line that could turn out 22,000 capsules of MDA in 24 hours." This estimate seems plausible as reporters, including Sidenius, alleged that Williams and his associates were making drug transactions in the hundreds of thousands of dollars (one transaction with an informant was rumored to be for $350,000 [about $250,000 USD], which amounts to almost $1.2 million [$868,000 USD] today).
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During the early morning hours of August 16, 1977, authorities raided three different locations, including Williams's property on Westdowne Road. When police raided the duplex, Williams and his girlfriend, Shirley Ferguson, were sleeping. By this time, Williams was estranged from his wife, Margaret, yet she continued to live on the property in a separate dwelling. At least a couple of sources suggest that sometime during the raid, Williams cursed and threatened the police, calling them "Nazi pigs" and yelling, "I'll sue you, I'll sue you!" Williams eventually calmed down, and the police began their search. They turned up nothing in the duplex where Williams, Ferguson, and her children slept. But then they turned their sights on a building in the back of the property, commonly referred to as "The Barn."
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Officers, including a bomb expert and locksmith, searched the tiny apartment and discovered a hidden passage behind the abnormally thick walls. From there, officers descended through tight corridors and found another hidden door disguised as a set of shelves. Once through the second door, authorities discovered a ladder leading to a hatch. Sidenius wrote, "The bombmen swept the chamber and then carefully climbed up and raised the hatch. They entered a concrete-lined room about ten square feet high and seven feet high. They had found the MDA lab at last." In it, the police found traces of MDA along with gelatin capsules.
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The preliminary hearing of the case against Williams ended sometime in early November. Before the trial could get fully underway, however, Williams vanished. All that was found of the supposed wreckage of Williams's plane was a seat, a life vest, a sun visor, and a logbook. Some months later, some said a wheel of the plane washed ashore near Campbell River.
But the mystery doesn't end there.
Almost 15 months later, Margaret Williams, his estranged wife, vanished without a trace from their home on Westdowne Road. According to various local newspaper outlets, when authorities searched the property they found more than $57,000 [$41,000 USD] in cash buried around the home. Even stranger, the house had been untouched, and most of Margaret's belongings remained intact. One of the investigators at the time, Ladysmith RCMP Sgt. Bob Udahl, told local reporters, "There is not an abundance of evidence to indicate one way or another whether Mrs. Williams left of her own volition, or otherwise."
(https://www.vice.com)
- 1954: Science Magazine publishes article named "Pyretogenic Effect of Lysergic Acid Diethylamide"
Quote:
Science 31 December 1954: Vol. 120 no. 3131 pp. 1100-1101 DOI: 10.1126/science.120.3131.1100 Pyretogenic Effect of Lysergic Acid Diethylamide

(http://www.sciencemag.org)
(http://www.erowid.org/)
- 1958: Valentina P. Wasson dies
Quote:
Dr. Valentina P. Wasson New York (AP) Dr. Valentina P. Wasson, 57, a children's doctor and one of the world's leading amateur authorities on mushrooms died Wednesday [December 31st 1958] of cancer. Her husband, R. Gordon Wasson, is a vice president of J.P. Morgan and Co
(The Courier-News (Bridgewater, New Jersey) 2 Jan 1959, Fri, Other Editions Page 13)
- 1972: Michael Randall is arrested for conspiracy to manufacture and distribute LSD
Quote:
Mr. Sinclair, I understand you said that Michael Boyd Randall, whom you considered the No. 1 in the LSD operation, was first arrested on December 31, 1972 ?
Mr. Sinclair. That is correct.
Mr. Sourwine. And is currently a fugitive wanted on four separate narcotics and false passports warrants, or is that five now?
Mr. Sinclair. No. It is still four.
Mr. Sourwine. Four.
The subcommittee has been informed that after his first arrest Randall retained the services of two attorneys, Michael Kennedy and Michael Tigar, both of whom have a long record of involvement in the defense of left wing militants including Angela Davis and the Chicago 7 and the Seattle 9. Is our information accurate in that respect as far as you know ?
Mr, Sinclair. Yes, sir, it is.
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Mr. Sourwine. May we then go back to you and get the Randall story, the rest of it, and then you can tell us about the others.
Mr, Strange. As I stated earlier, Michael Boyd Randall was indicted on December 6, 1972, by the Orange County grand jury. He was arrested in San Francisco, Calif., on December 31, 1972, and taken to Orange County where his bail was set at $250,000 pursuant to the grand jury indictment.
He retained counsel and over a period of time had his bail lowered to $25,000.
In the month of March we came up with some information revealing that a primary figure in the LSD operation was unknown to us. We had a name but we did not know who it was. The name was that of Michael Thomas Garrity. This name appeared on shipping documents where a Jaguar had been shipped from the LSD laboratory in Brussels, Belgium, to New York and it appeared on several other legal documents concerning the purchase of property in Riverside County, in southern California.
Just as a chance, agent Elliot submitted this name with agent Keel to the passport office and it turned out that Michael Thomas Garrity was in fact Michael Boyd Randall.
This greatly strengthened our case against Randall and it also gave us an additional charge, under 18 U.S.C. 1542, 1544, for obtaining a passport fraudulently.
(https://archive.org)
Quote:
D.M. Turner (born Joseph Vivian; 5 October 1962 - 31 December 1996) was an author, psychedelic researcher and psychonaut who wrote two books on psychoactives and entheogens. His book, The Essential Psychedelic Guide contains Turner's views on the subjective effects of various psychoactive and hallucinogenic mind-altering substances. His second book, Salvinorin addresses the effects of Salvia divinorum. Turner died after injecting an unknown quantity of ketamine while in a bathtub, presumably drowning while incapacitated by the effects of the drug.
Works
1994: The Essential Psychedelic Guide 1996: Salvinorin: The Psychedelic Essence of Salvia divinorum
(https://en.wikipedia.org)
Edited by Learyfan (12/31/20 06:58 AM)
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Learyfan
It's the psychedelic movement!



Registered: 04/20/01
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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: Learyfan]
#15596106 - 12/31/11 09:58 AM (12 years, 30 days ago) |
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Annual bump.
Edited by Learyfan (12/31/17 11:22 AM)
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Nature Boy
Stranger than most



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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: Learyfan] 2
#15596351 - 12/31/11 11:03 AM (12 years, 30 days ago) |
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Interesting. I'd have bet it was due to vasoconstriction limiting the cooling effect of the ears, too. Apparently not. Since it is only page one, I'm not sure what the ultimate conclusion was on the causative mechanism back then, although its virtually certain to have been identified and confirmed by now by others.
N.B.
-------------------- All submitted posts under this user name are works of pure fiction or outright lies. Any information, statement, or assertion contained therein should be considered pure unadulterated bullshit. Note well: Sorry, but I do not answer PM's unless you are a long-time trusted friend. If you have a question, ask it in the appropriate thread.
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Learyfan
It's the psychedelic movement!



Registered: 04/20/01
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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: Nature Boy]
#17475165 - 12/31/12 05:06 AM (11 years, 30 days ago) |
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40th anniversary of Michael Randall's arrest for conspiracy to manufacture and distribute LSD.
Edited by Learyfan (12/31/17 11:21 AM)
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Learyfan
It's the psychedelic movement!



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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: Learyfan]
#19349912 - 12/31/13 05:37 AM (10 years, 30 days ago) |
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Annual bump.
-------------------- -------------------------------- Mp3 of the month: The Apple-Glass Cyndrome - Someday
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Learyfan
It's the psychedelic movement!



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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: Learyfan] 1
#21047474 - 12/31/14 05:39 AM (9 years, 30 days ago) |
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60th anniversary of that Science Magazine article today.
-------------------- -------------------------------- Mp3 of the month: The Apple-Glass Cyndrome - Someday
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Rebelutionsssss
Mdmazing



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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: Learyfan] 1
#21047488 - 12/31/14 05:49 AM (9 years, 30 days ago) |
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They used LSD for some fucked up science experiments back then. Just got done watching this old documentary and shit is ffuuckkedd uppppp
-------------------- : To define is to confine.
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Learyfan
It's the psychedelic movement!



Registered: 04/20/01
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This is true.
-------------------- -------------------------------- Mp3 of the month: The Apple-Glass Cyndrome - Someday
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Learyfan
It's the psychedelic movement!



Registered: 04/20/01
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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: Learyfan]
#23970325 - 12/31/16 10:01 AM (7 years, 28 days ago) |
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Annual bump.
-------------------- -------------------------------- Mp3 of the month: The Apple-Glass Cyndrome - Someday
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Learyfan
It's the psychedelic movement!



Registered: 04/20/01
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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: Learyfan]
#24880908 - 12/31/17 11:24 AM (6 years, 28 days ago) |
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45th anniversary of Michael Boyd Randall's arrest today.
-------------------- -------------------------------- Mp3 of the month: The Apple-Glass Cyndrome - Someday
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Learyfan
It's the psychedelic movement!



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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: Learyfan]
#25713180 - 12/31/18 05:38 AM (5 years, 29 days ago) |
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60th anniversary of the death of Valentina Wasson today.
-------------------- -------------------------------- Mp3 of the month: The Apple-Glass Cyndrome - Someday
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Learyfan
It's the psychedelic movement!



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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: Learyfan]
#26408830 - 12/31/19 06:35 AM (4 years, 29 days ago) |
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Today either would have been, or is, Arthur Williams' 95th birthday. I believe he faked his own death. So Arthur, if you're out there, have a great birthday sir!

-------------------- -------------------------------- Mp3 of the month: The Apple-Glass Cyndrome - Someday
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Learyfan
It's the psychedelic movement!



Registered: 04/20/01
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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: Learyfan]
#27117657 - 12/31/20 07:14 AM (3 years, 28 days ago) |
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Annual bump.
-------------------- -------------------------------- Mp3 of the month: The Apple-Glass Cyndrome - Someday
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Learyfan
It's the psychedelic movement!



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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: Learyfan] 1
#27600860 - 12/31/21 07:18 AM (2 years, 28 days ago) |
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25th anniversary of the death of D.M. Turner today.
-------------------- -------------------------------- Mp3 of the month: The Apple-Glass Cyndrome - Someday
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Learyfan
It's the psychedelic movement!



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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: Learyfan]
#28118469 - 12/31/22 07:34 AM (1 year, 28 days ago) |
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50th anniversary of Michael Randall being arrested for conspiracy to manufacture and distribute LSD.
-------------------- -------------------------------- Mp3 of the month: The Apple-Glass Cyndrome - Someday
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nooneman


Registered: 04/24/09
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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: Learyfan] 1
#28118911 - 12/31/22 02:47 PM (1 year, 27 days ago) |
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Quote:
Learyfan said:
- 1954: Science Magazine publishes article named "Pyretogenic Effect of Lysergic Acid Diethylamide"
Quote:
Science 31 December 1954: Vol. 120 no. 3131 pp. 1100-1101 DOI: 10.1126/science.120.3131.1100 Pyretogenic Effect of Lysergic Acid Diethylamide

(http://www.sciencemag.org)
(http://www.erowid.org/)
Interesting, this indicates that overheating involving LSD (such as the recent death in the news) is treatable with benzos. Also it shows that hyperthermia caused by LSD has been known about since the 50s; this effect should perhaps be taken more seriously when combined with high heat environments and the possibility of the combo leading to overheating.
In cases where LSD and overheating is suspected, this indicates standard first line treatment should be benzos.
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Learyfan
It's the psychedelic movement!



Registered: 04/20/01
Posts: 34,083
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Re: Today in psychedelic history (12/31) [Re: nooneman]
#28604406 - 12/31/23 09:54 AM (27 days, 22 hours ago) |
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I guess they're saying part of overheating is in your head and becoming calm reduces your temperature. That makes sense.
But anyway, it's the 65th anniversary of Valentina P. Wasson's death today. R.I.P.
-------------------- -------------------------------- Mp3 of the month: The Apple-Glass Cyndrome - Someday
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