Pot Is The New Meth

That's it, no more posting about meth-- it's so two days ago. Weed is where it's at, baby. So today, for your reading pleasure, pot as a new wrinkle on gambling debts. If you please:

Police in Pennsylvania yesterday-- responding to a report of "an open door" (Who the hell calls the police about open doors? Where does this guy live, exactly?) at a former funeral home-- stumbled upon a massive marijuana growing, harvesting, and processing operation. The building, now home to Russian-of-the-day Boris Petrov and his son and elderly mother, also housed to roughly 200 marijuana plants of various size, not to mention piles of already-processed weed, and a whole lot of cash. Though Petrov had moved into the house fairly recently, he'd already done so much weed-oriented renovating that it's a little unclear exactly where he and the fam slept. In the car, possibly. Or maybe in the bathrooms-- I don't think there was any pot in there.

...The three-story home was organized into a high-tech marijuana manufacturing facility with solar lights, humidifiers, timers, fans and a ductwork system that ensured the plants had optimal growing conditions...The plants were located on one floor, which was outfitted with several high powered solar lights and a humidification system. The second floor was used to dry the plants and the third floor for processing the finished product.

So far, so good, right? Nothing but another Russian, just tryin' to make it in this crazy, mixed up country of ours. But wait-- it gets much, much better. See, according to Petrov, he didn't want to be growing (and processing, and drying) the weed. In fact, he was being forced to do so. By-- wait for it-- yes, that's right: the Russian mafia. (Oh hell yes. And you people wonder why I love the Russians?! Like Don Corleone could have come up with something like this. Please.)

After losing $60,000 to Russia mobsters in a poker game, Petrov, unable to raise the money, was told that he would have to take care of some pot in order to work off the debt. While it doesn't appear that anyone ever threatened Petrov himself, murky allusions were frequently made to "taking care of" his family (for some reason he interpreted these things as threats, rather than offers to look after his elderly mother). So far, though, he's not getting a lot of sympathy: Boris and his poor mom are rotting in jail, while the mobsters, though lower on weed than they were a few days ago, are playing poker in Brooklyn.