HEMPSTOCK NUMBERS DOWN

Attendance Drops 75%; 1 Teen Hospitalized For Over Dose

STARKS - State troopers arrested about two dozen people and one teen- ager
was taken to a hospital after taking LSD during the four-day Hempstock
festival promoting marijuana legalization.

Maine State Police Lt. Dale Lancaster said those arrested face charges
ranging from motor vehicle violations to possession of the drug Ecstasy.

Troopers served search warrants on three vendors on the grounds of Harry
Brown's farm. The three were summonsed on charges of selling drug
paraphernalia, Lancaster said after the festival ended Sunday afternoon.

"We made a concerted effort to take aggressive enforcement on drug
violations," Lancaster said. State troopers, Somerset County sheriff's
deputies, and Maine Liquor Enforcement officers manned roadblocks on State
Route 43 near Brown's farm, handing out flyers warning Hempstock attendees
that if they drove drunk they would likely be picked up at a roadblock on
the way out.

Lancaster said only one person was charged with driving while under the
influence.

Organizers of the festival, sponsored by the pro-marijuana group Maine
Vocals, said the police presence amounted to harassment.

That acknowledged that the roadblocks and the Vocals own efforts to avoid
reaching crowd numbers that would trigger the town's mass gathering
ordinance kept attendance down to levels not seen in years.

In the past the festival had drawn as many as 4,000 people over its
four-day run. This time around only about 1,000 people attended over the
same period. And that included security, staff, volunteers and band
members, said Tara Friend, the daughter of Vocals president Donald Christen
of Madison.

Christen himself was barred by a judge's order from attending the festival
this year.

Christen and the Vocals had failed to get a permit for Hempstock under the
town's mass gathering ordinance. Under an order by Superior Court Justice
Joseph Jabar, Christen faced 25 days in jail and stiff fines if the
organization promoted a mass gathering in the town.

Vocals hoped to get around that by keeping attendance down, and apparently
succeeded.

The town's ordinance defines a mass gathering as more than 750 people for
six hours.

Friend said the number of people attending this year may have hit 1,250 -
over all four days.

"We were used to seeing 4,000 people for the weekend," she added. "It did
not feel like Hempstock."

Friend said organizers sold 578 camping passes in all. Day pass sales
ranged from 63 on Thursday to 300 on Saturday. Sunday people got in for a
donation and perhaps 200 people listened to the music that day, she said.

In addition to fewer concertgoers, there were fewer bands. Instead of the
25 to 30 bands, there were only 18. Friend said there were no complaints
about noise.

Lancaster said one 17-year-old youth was taken to Franklin Memorial
Hospital in Farmington after he showed signs of overdosing on drugs. The
youth was a passenger in a car leaving the property on Friday when a
trooper noticed him.

"It was quite apparent to us that he was deteriorating physically, his
motor skills, his speech, his cognitive ability ... so much so that for his
safety" an ambulance was called and he was taken to the hospital.

At FMH the youth reportedly told hospital workers he had taken LSD. When
troopers visited him the next day "he had recovered," said Lancaster. The
lieutenant said he did not know where the youth was from.

The youth was charged with possession of Ecstasy and hashish, Lancaster said.