A-HEADHUNTING HE WILL GO: ASHCROFT'S CRACKDOWN ON HEAD SHOPS HITS SAN DIEGO

Tucked in the back of a nondescript industrial park named for fault-lined
Rose Canyon sits a small company that is in a world of trouble with U.S.
Attorney General John Ashcroft, the guy who lost a U.S. Senate race to a
dead man.

The Zong Toy Company, which manufactures a variety of water pipes and other
products that Ashcroft has labeled drug paraphernalia, is one of a number
of companies nationwide that are in the rifle scope of Ashcroft and his
band of lifestyle police who seem intent on bringing down the paraphernalia
industry.

In a much-ballyhooed media event last week, Ashcroft announced that 55
people had been indicted in a countrywide crackdown on so-called head shops
that offer merchandise deemed illegal by the U.S. Justice Department. Among
those indicted were the operators of the Zong Toy Co., which the Justice
Department alleges is a national distributor of drug paraphernalia.
Yesterday, no one at the Morena Boulevard company would come to the door,
although music could be heard coming from behind a large metal bay door.

"I think I'd be nervous, too," said Bob Doyle, president of the San Diego
chapter of NORML, the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana
Laws. "We had no idea this was coming. Undoubtedly, a lot of people are
shocked."

Federal law is quite clear on the topic. It says unequivocally that it is
unlawful for any person to "sell or offer for sale," "use the mailsŠ to
transport" or "import or export" drug paraphernalia, with a maximum prison
sentence of three years for each count. Those convicted would also face
forfeiture of their products, which would then be "destroyed or [used] for
law enforcement or educational purposes by federal, state or local" agencies.

The feds define drug paraphernalia as "any equipment, product, or material
of any kind which is primarily intended or designed for use in
manufacturing, compounding, converting, concealing, producing, processing,
preparing, injecting, ingesting, inhaling or otherwise introducing into the
human body a controlled substance."

State law is equally straightforward on the matter. "It basically says you
can't own [paraphernalia] if its primary purpose is to somehow help you
ingest illegal drugs," Doyle explained. "It's odd. If you look at the state
laws on the books, they're very explicit about what a head shop can and
cannot do. And as far as I know, the head shops in San Diego follow all
those rules pretty tightly."

Debra Hartman, spokeswoman for the local U.S. Attorney's office, said the
indictments came out of federal offices in Pennsylvania and Iowa, where
prosecutors are notorious for interpreting these laws very narrowly. The
indictments reportedly came after the companies charged had distributed
their products to those states. Hartman said three arrests were made
locally, but she could offer no further details on those arrests.

"The government's out of control," said Kurt Dornbush, owner of The Black,
a counterculture institution for decades in Ocean Beach. Dornbush spoke
hesitantly about the crackdown, pointing out that Ashcroft had targeted
companies that distribute paraphernalia via the Internet. "We have no
Internet sales. If you aren't old enough, you can't come in here."

Most head-shop owners contacted by CityBeat declined to discuss the
crackdown, reasoning that drawing attention to themselves might be a bad
idea. "Everything's up in the air right now," said one before cutting off
the conversation.

Doyle of the local NORML said he has received calls from head-shop owners
from as far away as Hawaii and Salt Lake City-"they couldn't find a local
NORML chapter," he explained-asking how far he thought this crackdown would
go. "Well, I'm not sure if it will get worse, but what's going on is
somebody decided to enforce the laws that have been on the books for an
awful long time but have been widely ignored," Doyle said.

The chapter president may not have all the answers-no one seems to-but he
has an idea why it's happening. "These are easy targets. I think Ashcroft
and his friends went after [head shops] because they wanted to deliver a
morale blow to the cannabis-culture people in America. It's kind of a blow
to a lot of people's morale," he said. "It gets people to start thinking,
'Oh man, head shops aren't going to be in business anymore?'"

Some people were also curious about some of the comments made during
Ashcroft's press conference last week when he unveiled the results of what
the Justice Department dubbed "Operation Pipe Dreams" and "Operation
Headhunter," the latter which involved the local indictments.

"The drug paraphernalia business is now accessible in anyone's home with a
computer and Internet access," Ashcroft sneered during his announcement.
"Quite simply, the illegal drug paraphernalia industry has invaded the
homes of families across the country without their knowledge. This illegal,
billion-dollar industry will no longer be ignored by law enforcement."

John P. Walters, who recently brought us those drug-use-helps-terrorists TV
ads as director of the National Drug Control Policy, called the marketing
of paraphernalia "an active affront to the efforts of parents, educators
and community leaders who are trying to help young people stay away from
dangerous drugs."

Walters-perhaps, as some suggest, in a backhanded slap to states with
medicinal marijuana laws on the books-also praised federal law enforcement
officials who "reaffirm the truth that no community, no city, no state and
no nation is better off with more drug use."

Patrick Dudley, a local attorney associated with NORML who has represented
medical-marijuana users, is like many who wonder about timing of the
indictments, while the fed's efforts to track down terrorists in this
country languishes. "The fact that they're spending this much time and
energy on drug paraphernalia seems ridiculous," he said. "They did this in
the early '90s, and they drove a lot of these big bong-making businesses
out of business. The feds will probably end up dealing with these people,
not having them serve any time and just forfeiting their assets.

"I think they simply want to put them out of business," Dudley said. "Very
strange."

Dudley also wonders what impact such an application of the federal
drug-paraphernalia laws will have on San Diego's needle-exchange program.
"Obviously, that could lead to dangerous consequences [increased disease
and so on], but given the hysteria and politicsŠ of this administration on
'the war on drugs,' nothing would surprise me here," Dudley said in a
follow-up e-mail. "And moreover, like medical marijuana, this would present
another case of the feds trumping local action on a particular drug policy
issue."

Discussion on the Internet almost exclusively pounds Ashcroft for the
crackdown as terrorists and white-collar criminals continue to run free.
"Ashcroft, you constipated freak, what are you hoping to achieve?" one
crackdown opponent wrote. "We can only hope that this kind of mass arrest
will lead to a court challenge of the law."

Ethan Nadelmann, head of the New York-based Drug Policy Alliance, which
promotes a rethinking of the nation's drug policies, chided Ashcroft and
his cronies: "It's an absurd waste of resources. Their drug war is really a
culture war that has nothing to do with creating a safer society. Referring
to marijuana as a poison, when no one has ever died of a marijuana
overdose, is absurd.

"These paraphernalia laws exist in no other advanced democracy," she said.
"They're uniquely American. There is no evidence that these laws have any
impact on reducing drug use whatsoever."