https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2024-01-30/massacre-adds-to-grim-toll-of-illegal-pot-violence-in-the-desert

I heard from a friend a while back that Adelanto was where the sketchy stuff happened in the space. I’d liken it to Alderpoint in Humboldt. It even had a podcast done about it by the Crooked Media team, called Dreamtown: The Story of Adelanto.

While this didn’t happen in Adelanto exactly, 6 people shot to death at a desert crossroads a little outside of town made my spidey senses go off that it had to be cannabis related.

The space doesn’t like to talk about the “Traditional” market up to a point. This is that point. “Trapping” is illegally selling cannabis. It’s how most of us for most our lives got it before any states were legal. And California has always produced the Champagne of cannabis. At least the modern culture of it. But this is the reality of it on scale. People will hurt you for money not exchanged.

The LA Times is the best newspaper for cannabis news. And it states it clearly. “”It doesn’t matter what the product is…If there’s sufficient demand and the thing is valuable enough, you’ll get a black market.””

When you have even the biggest players in the space with allegations of illegally selling, what is the logical outcome here? People will eventually hurt and get hurt.

I’m likely one of the most risk averse people in this space, but it is generally risky to be in this space. If we don’t have federal legalization, this only goes further the way of the Mafia and alcohol. Or we can stop this with policy and have cannabis shops similar to wine shops. But you can venture a guess when there are greater policy topics in the world like the War in Ukraine or the War in Gaza, this isn’t top of mind for any politician trying to get through the next election cycle. It will take a 2nd term administration with a united congress to get anything substantive done. In the mean time, the traffickers will continue to traffic and people will continue to get hurt, because “Traditional” cannabis is likely the only truly profitable aspect of the current legal market. But at this cost.