Disir
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- Sep 30, 2011
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Timothy Anderson admitted that he sold heroin, lots of it. And that he didn’t intend to stop. But he said he did so as “a student of Esoteric and Mysticism studies,” and that he had created a religious nonprofit group to distribute heroin to “the sick, lost, blind, lame, deaf and dead members of God’s Kingdom.” So prosecuting him criminally would be a violation of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, passed in 1993 to prohibit the government from unduly burdening a person’s exercise of religion.
Anderson was on to something here. (Except for the part about distributing to the dead. That may have been a bit off.) The Supreme Court previously ruled under the religious freedom act that a small sect of a Brazilian religion could import ayahuasca, containing the hallucinogen dimethyltryptamine, because a sect in New Mexico used it as part of a sacramental tea. And the government has also given an exception to Native Americans for peyote, even though both it and ayahuasca are Schedule 1 drugs, considered the most dangerous in the narcotics pyramid.
Heroin dealer cites religious freedom as his defense. Court says yeah, but what about the buyers?
Yes, he did. No, it didn't fly.
Anderson was on to something here. (Except for the part about distributing to the dead. That may have been a bit off.) The Supreme Court previously ruled under the religious freedom act that a small sect of a Brazilian religion could import ayahuasca, containing the hallucinogen dimethyltryptamine, because a sect in New Mexico used it as part of a sacramental tea. And the government has also given an exception to Native Americans for peyote, even though both it and ayahuasca are Schedule 1 drugs, considered the most dangerous in the narcotics pyramid.
Heroin dealer cites religious freedom as his defense. Court says yeah, but what about the buyers?
Yes, he did. No, it didn't fly.
