Re: AP report: Drug gangs taking over US public lands
Excerpts from October 10, 2003 testimony before the US House of Representatives, by the Forest Supervisor, Sequoia National Forest, California.
Since 1997, over three million marijuana plants, which equates to over 3000 metric tons, have been eradicated from NFS lands. Along the Southwestern U.S. border with Mexico, over 250,000 pounds of processed marijuana were seized on NFS lands in calendar years 2000 and 2001. In 2002, almost 598,000 plants were seized nationally from outdoor cultivation sites on NFS lands, of which seventy percent (around 420,900 plants) were seized from National Forests in California. The preliminary statistics for 2003 indicate this trend has continued. Over 300,000 plants have been seized on NFS lands in California to date, with eradication efforts still occurring for the remainder of the year. In addition to marijuana gardens, over 300 clandestine methamphetamine laboratories and 500 dumpsites were found, and 246 pounds of methamphetamine seized, on NFS lands in calendar years 2000 and 2001....
...The drug trafficking organizations are going to great lengths to protect their production sites, including camouflaging the marijuana gardens to prevent detection, posting lookouts and armed guards, placing traps that can injure or kill, and planting more gardens to allow for the losses that may occur if a garden is found.
The Forest Service believes organized efforts by drug trafficking organizations headquartered in Mexico, continue to supply workers, most of whom are illegal aliens, to tend marijuana gardens on NFS lands throughout California. These cultivation sites are occupied full-time from April through October, with twenty or more armed workers. The impacts of this residential occupancy are apparent....
...Another alarming trend with the increase in illegal drug activity on NFS lands has been the heightened amount of violence used by growers. Most recently, three separate shooting incidents occurred between law enforcement and growers within a three-week period in California. These incidents resulted in four suspects being shot and killed by law enforcement officers. Some officers have come under fire from growers, and a Forest Service K-9 dog was assaulted and injured while attempting to apprehend a grower during a marijuana raid. Compared to previous years, the number of officer-involved shootings and public confrontations with armed growers doubled in 2003. Violence among marijuana growers has also increased in the last two months, with one grower found shot to death at a marijuana site camp in Fresno County and a second grower found hacked to death in Mendocino County.
Armed growers are also confronting Forest visitors. Marijuana is typically harvested during the months of September and October, hunting season on many Forests, resulting in some armed confrontations between marijuana growers and hunters. The most recent reported incident occurred about two weeks ago when Mexican citizens on the Mendocino National Forest in Glenn County confronted two hunters at gunpoint after they inadvertently stumbled into their marijuana garden. Fortunately the hunters escaped without incident. In September 2003, in the Los Padres National Forest north of Ojai, three men with automatic weapons fired upon a hunter walking near a marijuana grove. ...
http://www.fs.fed.us/congress/108/house/oversight/gaffrey/101003.html
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