Where there’s smoke, there’s fire?

An interview with a Carbondale marijuana dealer

By Brett Wilcoxson, DE Investigative Reporter

(Editor’s note:This is the second installment of a three-part series exploring the prevalence of marijuana cultivation, sale and use in Carbondale. The first story in the series can be found on-line at www.dailyegyptian.com).

Under the lazy glare of the descending late-afternoon sun, John, a local marijuana dealer, sits on the leafy floor of Thompson Woods and nervously paints a colorful portrait of the marijuana culture in Carbondale a topic on which he seems to be a reliable authority.

I have been affiliated with people, for sure, who have been running the whole (marijuana) scene down in Carbondale and have major distribution networks pouring in, he says, a descending fog of tension choking his breath to a near whisper. Being privy to that kind of information kind of qualifies where I sit. I’m in the know about a lot of things.

At one time or another over the past eight years, I’ve sold to pretty much everyone in Carbondale that buys dope one way or another, mostly indirectly.

John says he does not approach people at parties or on street corners to peddle his product not anymore. Through the years he has become more of a wholesaler than a retailer.

I don’t sell quarters or dime bags or eighths, he says. Whenever I have sold it in the past year, I have sold quarter pounds.

For the sake of clarity, John estimates how much dope he has sold in his career.

Maybe $30,000 over the past eight years, something like that, he adds, a deer-in-the-headlights look crossing his face as he hears fast-paced footfalls approaching from behind. But it is not a police officer, it is merely a passing student hurriedly heading to class.

Seeing this, John seems to relax a bit. John knows what it is like to be in a rush to get to class because until he recently graduated, he was a student at SIUC.

Genesis of a dealer

John did not start out making big-money deals. In fact, he began on the other end of the baggy.

I think it was just other people who smoked pot, he says. After I became a tap on their resources, they turned me on to their contacts so I could go and get some more dope. And one thing leads to another after that. You meet all kinds of different people.

It is impossible at this point not to wonder how many people in Carbondale are selling the drug. John will not venture a guess, but instead he numbers his acquaintances who are in the business.

I could probably recognize about 60 people, he says, at least 60.

A city in smoke, but not in flames

When sparked to discuss the overall magnitude of the local marijuana culture, John makes a vivid generalization.

I would say it’s incredibly widespread in Carbondale, he offers with no apparent reservation.

You’ve heard the tip-of-the-iceberg theory, right? he asks.

After a quick glance at his surroundings, John leans forward and confides.

You see what gets reported and confiscated in town. I think it’s logical to assume that’s the tip of the iceberg, he says. In a year here, hundreds upon hundreds of pounds [go through Carbondale]. And there are a ton of people in town that move it a [lot] faster than I do, or that have in the past. I mean a lot 20 pounds in a weekend.

After a short pause, John straightens his posture and elaborates.

It baffles me the scope of what (marijuana and other drug sales) is going on in town. It is incredibly large, he says quietly. There are a lot of people that have serious hook-ups in Chicago; they do a lot of running up and down (Interstate) 57.

I would say over 100 pounds a month are smoked in Carbondale. And with a genial laugh John adds, I’m not responsible for all of it. I’m not a kingpin.

John estimates that the street value of 100 pounds of marijuana is more than $150,000.

Here in town [marijuana] is about $1,600 a pound, he says. So the people who are doing the heavy quantity business are making a whole lot of money. Other people set up boundaries and don’t ever get to that point.

John says Carbondale has an earned reputation for being a marijuana hot spot, and that, in fact, people travel long distances to procure the drug here. He says this is largely because of the stance the city seems to take against the substance, or the lack thereof.

It’s like hippyville almost, he brags. The paraphernalia shops around here give everyone that impression. I think they say something about the level of acceptance in the town. Obviously they’re not being driven out; they haven’t gone out of business.

Windy City smog floating south

John will not divulge the geographic origin of his supply, but he is willing to discuss some general Carbondale sources. He says that while there are some local growers producing small amounts of marijuana, the majority is being brought in from out of town, and even out of country.

There are local growers, and there are people who have their indoor thing going on, but they don’t produce quantity, they produce quality and they make a lot more money for that, he says.

John says some of the marijuana that people in Carbondale regularly buy and sell is from Texas or Mexico. But he adds that the vast majority is imported from Chicago.

Tom McNamara, an officer of the Southern Illinois Enforcement Group, supported John’s statement that a large portion of the marijuana in this area does come from Chicago.

In many instances it’s people who bring it along with them when they come to school, McNamara said. There are entrepreneurs who certainly have the interest in making money, and you can buy it cheaper in urban areas than you can here and sell it here for more money.

Although about half of John’s clientele are SIUC students, he says his buyers are a much more diverse and wealthy group.

There are so many different professors and people that are smoking pot out there that I personally know, he says in a matter-of-fact manner. Professors, business people, authority figures I know at least of one police officer in Carbondale that smokes marijuana. I won’t say which police force they are connected with.

Ethics of a dealer

On the topic of morality, John’s confession is especially telling of the aloof personality he exudes.

I really think marijuana is the least harmful of all illegal drugs. I don’t really even consider it a drug, he says. It’s more of a sacrament. I feel that helping people get [marijuana] is in a sense almost like communion. I don’t take it that far in my mind, but to a lot of people it’s a spiritual event.

Although he seems to believe his justification, John’s eyes betray a hint of regret.

I consider the biggest wrong thing about it is the possibility of exposing my parents to some sort of if I would get incarcerated it would crush them, John says, and for the first time his intense gaze momentarily leaves his surroundings and falls to the earth. They’re old, they have health problems, and I may be no, I am putting them at risk. That’s my major concern.

On the topic of imprisonment, John says he has seen an increase in the number of people in the Carbondale marijuana culture getting arrested.

This observation is supported statistically by the fact that the number of drug arrests by SIUC and Carbondale police have increased sharply over the past five years from 114 in 1993 to 323 in 1996. And about 90 percent of these arrests are marijuana-related.

I’ve known a lot of people that have gotten arrested, he says, as if he expects to at any moment make a personal contribution to the increased drug-arrest numbers. But most of the people that get arrested for marijuana get arrested for some other drug as well.

Case in point, John crucifies a former associate of his who was caught with a pound of cocaine as well as 5 pounds of marijuana.

One of my former suppliers is in jail for a long, long time, he says. He was absolutely stupid [messing] with the white devil.

John says he does not use or sell any kind of powder and has no interest in ever doing so. Although John does not deal hard drugs, he does not consider himself immune to the legal system.

Jail is a very serious thing anal rapes and [such] I don’t need to deal with that, he says before once again questioning the actual identity of his interviewer.

What’s in it for him?

John says a number of dealers in the area, like him, are not trying to become wealthy. They just want to pay for their own use and come up with money for their living expenses.

Some people use it to make rent or to get grocery money to feed children, he says. I don’t know how much McDonald’s is paying these days, I’m pretty sure it’s still minimum. It wouldn’t put enough food on the table for one person living in a trailer, let alone kids.

However, John is quick to add that not all students who get into the business become entrepreneurial successes.

It pulls some people out of school, he says. Some people get all stoned and don’t do well in school because they’re too baked to study or remember what was said in class.

While some are in the business for pocket change, John says some big-time dealers are doing quite well.

I know people that have paid for their whole lifestyle that way, he says. They have a nice boat, nice cars and stuff like that.

Although these people are living large, John says they also carry a more burdensome monkey on their collective backs than do the small-time dealers.

To do that with marijuana, you’ve got to do a huge quantity of dealing, and there’s that (high)-risk level, he explains. Once you cross a certain threshold, it becomes pretty spooky, and a lot of people don’t want to cross that threshold.

John adds that the more affluent dealers are relatively easy to spot.

John’s statement regarding the presence of colossal dealers in Carbondale is indirectly documented by a federal agency.

Shirley Armstead, a spokeswoman for the Carbondale office of the federal Drug Enforcement Agency said that for the DEA to take on a marijuana-related case, 1,000 kilograms (2,205 pounds) of the drug or 1,000 plants must be involved.

And since 1993, the DEA has been involved in 16 such cases in Carbondale.

Nearing the finish, or just out of the blocks?

As the conversation goes on, it becomes apparent that John does not consider himself a major player. One might even get the impression that he deals to provide for friends rather than to make money. But John is a businessman at heart.

I have aspirations to have a legitimate business in the very near future, he says. You learn a lot about doing business from doing business with people that are shaky business people to begin with or shaky individuals all over.

And with a burst of laughter he adds, I’ll love some day to be a businessman and be able to call a lawyer when somebody does me wrong!

In a gentle voice, John explains that he is not a violent person, and that when someone rips him off he simply refuses to do more business with them. But John neither professes nor covets sainthood.

When asked if he would refuse to sell marijuana to someone who has a terrible drug habit and is spiraling downward, he answers simply and concisely, Probably not. Probably not.

(On Friday, the third and final installment of this series will explore the increased use of marijuana in University residence halls and will pinpoint what policies are being enacted by SIUC Police and University officials to halt such activity).