FREEDOM JOINS KNUCKLEHEADS

After State Street head shops cleaned out their pipe selection to avoid
prosecution for selling "drug paraphernalia," Freedom skate and head shop
closed down Friday and moved across the street to join Knuckleheads Tobacco
and Gifts.

Corporate president Steve Agee said the consolidation was not a difficult
decision because the same corporation owns Freedom and Knuckleheads.

"It was a corporate secret, so we could have something on either side of
Pipefitter's," Agee said.

He said Freedom would not have survived through the winter because most of
the store's winter revenue came from pipe sales.

"I was hurting too," Agee said in reference to Knuckleheads, which he manages.

However, the store's business has been steady since the skate shop moved up
to Knuckleheads.

"Now that the pipes are gone, those customers are gone too, but we're
getting a lot of new customers," Agee said. "We have so much stuff now; we
have more cigars than anybody."

Knucklehead's pipes are priced down to $10 and almost completely sold out.

Agee said a few landlords have offered to buy Freedom's location at 511
State St. He hopes an offer to turn the store into a DJ shop will be accepted.

The Pipefitter's business also changed drastically in response to the
federal crackdown on pipe sales. Store manager Gregg Hinkley turned the
store solely into a gift shop, saying in February that he decided to sell
his pipes to take advantage of the frenzied pipe sales at the time rather
than due to federal pressure.

Knuckleheads employee Wayne Patari II and Freedom employee Ryan Pierce said
in February they sold all of the stores' pipes to prevent the risk of
prosecution after a string of drug-merchandise-related arrests announced in
mid-February.

"We're getting rid of them so we don't have to deal with any trouble,"
Pierce said at the time. "We don't want to get stuck with anything and get
screwed later."

Acting DEA Administrator John B. Brown III said in February the prosecution
of the nation's largest drug-paraphernalia suppliers was a necessary part
of the war on drugs.

"People selling drug paraphernalia are in essence no different than drug
dealers," Brown said Feb. 24.

"These criminals operate a multimillion-dollar enterprise, selling their
paraphernalia in head shops, distributing out of huge warehouses and using
the World Wide Web as a worldwide paraphernalia market," he said,
announcing the closure of 11 "illicit" websites selling drug merchandise.

U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft said the website shutdowns were
necessary to prevent children from accessing the sites.