KOB 4 News (Albuquerque, NM) reports that a federal grand jury has indicted a Navajo man, Dineh Benally (48); his father, Donald Benally (74); and a California business partner, Irving Rea Yui Lin (73); on charges they were running illegal marijuana grow operations in New Mexico and on the Navajo Nation to supply the black market.
Last week, local, state and federal authorities executed a search warrant at the home of one of the defendants and two farms in Torrance County, New Mexico, which are no longer permitted by the State of New Mexico for the growing of marijuana. Officials seized 8,500 pounds of marijuana, methamphetamine, two firearms, $35,000 in cash, illegal pesticides and a bulletproof vest.
The KOB News 4 article may be read in its entirety HERE.
KRQE News 13 (Albuquerque, NM) reported on January 23, 2025 about the above-mentioned illegal marijuana operations in Torrance County, New Mexico, including one of the farms which was the target of a Larry Barker investigation last fall. Barker’s investigation determined that former Navajo Nation presidential candidate Dineh Benally had been issued a cannabis license by the State of New Mexico for the massive marijuana operation.
State of New Mexico regulators subsequently determined that “Native American Agricultural Development Company” was a renegade operation and determined it was in egregious violation of several New Mexico statutory requirements, according to Todd Stevens with the New Mexico Cannabis Control Division (“CCD”).
The State of New Mexico revoked the company’s license and assessed a $1,000,000 civil penalty; however, because the CCD did not have law enforcement powers, there was no further action that the state could take.
The KRQE News 13 article may be read in its entirety HERE.
My brothers and sisters, when New Mexico makes the incredibly ill-advised decision to embrace all things marijuana, including loosely-restricted ‘medical’ distribution and freewheeling recreational use, it is no surprise that the unscrupulous will be attracted to our state.
We need to vote in God-fearing governmental representatives, starting at the gubernatorial level and on down! We need to be more concerned about those who will bring the future of our state and nation, our children, and less concerned about our personal ‘right’ and pleasure to smoke or eat a drug that is illegal at the federal level. It is illegal for good reason.
This writer has reported on this several times and it should be remembered, as previously addressed HERE, that marijuana is an illegal drug under federal law because it remains a Schedule I drug under the Controlled Substances Act (“CSA”), 21 USC 812(b)(1)-(5), Schedules of Controlled Substances.
According to the CSA, Schedule I drugs or substances: 1) have a high potential for abuse; 2) have no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States; and 3) lack accepted safety for use of the drug or substance under medical supervision. The CSA’s list of Schedule I-V substances may be reviewed HERE – which continues to list Tetrahydrocannabinols as a Schedule I drug.
First, marijuana meets the first criteria of CSA Schedule I drugs because it has a high potential for abuse, a position which the Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”) agreed with until recently, despite marijuana being a ‘gateway drug’ and the potential for abuse actually increasing because of rising THC concentrations making it more potent.
Second, marijuana is highly addictive, with a third of persons using marijuana in 2023 meeting the criteria for addiction and half of its daily users becoming dependent on the drug.
And, marijuana has wide-ranging negative effects on mental and physical health, with long-term cannabis use credibly linked to increased risks of psychosis, suicide, hallucinations or paranoia, which is especially harmful to our children and teenagers.
As followers of Jesus Christ, let’s never forget that we are the temple of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit lives within us! Why would we want to knowingly take a harmful drug that clouds our minds, inhibits good judgement, and is an affront to the Holy Spirit?
1 Corinthians 6:19-20 (NKJV)
Your Body Is the Temple of the Holy Spirit
“…[d]o you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.”
