A Jamaican-born musician was sentenced to eight years in prison without parole for transporting marijuana he says he obtained legally.
Patrick Beadle, 46, was sentenced Wednesday by Madison County Circuit Judge William Chapman after a jury in July convicted him of drug trafficking, the Mississippi Clarion Ledger reported.
He had 2.89 pounds of marijuana in his vehicle when he was stopped by a Madison County deputy in March 2017.
Beadle, who has a medical marijuana card, said he obtained the marijuana in Oregon, where medical marijuana was legalized in 1998.
He says he uses the drug to treat chronic pain in both knees where his cartilage is worn down after years of competitive basketball.
Recreational marijuana was approved in Oregon in 2014.
The musician, known as BlackFire, had no large sums of money, measuring scale or other drug paraphernalia that would suggest he was a drug trafficker on him when he was arrested, according to the report.
Beadle was stopped for allegedly crossing over a fog line — a claim he disputes.
Beadle was travelling through Mississippi — to explore its music heritage — after having visited in 8-year-old son in Ohio.
He believes he his dreadlocks made him a racial profiling target.
inRead invented by Teads
His mother, Tommy Beadle, said Jamaicans sometimes wash themselves in marijuana for therapeutic purposes.
She begged Chapman not to sentence her son to prison.
“Judge, I’m asking for mercy for my son,” she said. “I wouldn’t stand here before you if my son was trafficking in drugs. As a mother, I’m asking you to please don’t lock him up behind bars,” she said, according to the report.
Chapman said he would not reduce Beadle’s charge to simple possession because he’d been convicted by a jury under the state’s drug trafficking law.
Interesting. Best thing some a unno can do is to travel wid some live chickens in cages, couple rabbits and bags of manure when unno on di move. The farm smells should turn off any traffic cop, and disguise the smell of the herb. Meck sure unno actually live out in the rural area.
Them really teck Jamaicans for eediats, mi see a white man a pose inna magazine/newspaper how him have a million dollar marijuana industry in USA…
Them make it legal when it suits them when they are in control of it… Marijuana is a herb just like Rosemary thyme or any other all made by the creator and the devils a talk bout illegal, what massa Most Hi created…
It is illegal to send a man to prison for marijuana…
Mankind need to be free from the devils rulership…
Dat Mi Seh
Yet a cop go inna a Blackman house guh kill him an only get ten years, wid a bunch a hugs an kisses an a bible smfh
Di state him get ketch when yuh have certain amount pan yuh is automatically distribution. So sad! Always my ppl an mi know most dus a try feed family still. But jah jah.