American millionaire Jonathan Lehrer denied bail after being charged with killing Canadian couple
American millionaire Jonathan Lehrer, one of two men charged in the killings of a Canadian couple in Dominica, has been denied bail.
A chemical cousin of pot's main intoxicating ingredient has rocketed to popularity over the last year, and the cannabis industry and state governments are scrambling to reckon with it amid debate over whether it's legal.
The chemical, called delta-8 THC, is billed as producing a milder high than the better known delta-9 THC, and delta-8 is often marketed as being legal even where marijuana is not. That argument stems from the fact that most delta-8 is synthesized from CBD, a popular non-intoxicating chemical that's prevalent in hemp, a form of cannabis that U.S. Congress legalized in 2018.
Delta-8's rise is “a phenomenon that has taken the industry quite by storm,” says John Kagia of cannabis industry analysis firm New Frontier Data, and it offers “fascinating insight into some of the growth and growing pains.”
There are no hard-and-fast statistics on sales of delta-8, which is available in vapes, gummies and other forms. It has been the fastest-growing segment of the market for hemp chemicals for roughly the last year, after wholesale CBD prices plummeted amid oversupply and other issues, says Ian Laird of data analytics company Hemp Benchmarks.
After a few years in the CBD business, William Goodall and partner Katiana Kay began selling delta-8 products through their online shop Bay Smokes in December. It quickly became a main source of revenue.
Goodall said that after talking to lawyers and suppliers' chemists, he's confident Bay Smokes products are safe and federally legal (other attorneys divide on how risky it is to sell delta-8). But the Miami-based company has had to filter out customers from a growing list of states that are prohibiting delta-8.
Still, he's sticking with it, figuring that legal markets for it will endure at least in states where marijuana is permitted.
“Ultimately, I think delta-8 is a great product,” he says.
But some other hemp businesses are steering clear.
“The easy money is tempting, but that's not an avenue we wanted to go down,” says Gair Laucius, the chief scientific officer of Southbridge, Massachusetts-based CBD producer High Purity Natural Products. “There were too many unknowns.”
The 2018 federal law that OK'd hemp products said they couldn't be more than 0.3% delta-9, but it said nothing about delta-8.
Enthusiasts interpret that silence as a green light for delta-8, and some officials also see an opening for it. Wisconsin's Legislative Council, a research service for lawmakers, concluded last year that delta-8 products may qualify as hemp if they're below the delta-9 threshold, though the council cautioned it wasn't giving legal advice.
But within the last year, the federal Drug Enforcement Administration has said that “synthetically derived” THC and delta-8 specifically are top-level controlled substances - effectively illegal, except for strictly limited research.
There's not much research on delta-8, especially in people, though a small 1995 study said it showed promise as an anti-nausea treatment in child cancer patients. But officials in states such as Colorado and Washington worry that converting CBD to delta-8 could produce harmful byproducts, at least in some cases.
This spring, regulators in Washington said producing or selling synthetically derived delta-8 is against state law, while Colorado said manufactured delta-8 isn't allowed in food, dietary supplements or cosmetics and doesn't qualify as hemp. Kentucky and Vermont told hemp growers that selling delta-8 risks criminal prosecution.
Over 10 other states' controlled substance lists include delta-8, sometimes under a different name. Lawmakers in more than a dozen other states, from Alabama to Hawaii, have made or considered some move on delta-8 this year.
Some sought effectively to ban it. Others aimed to allow but regulate it much like their legal marijuana markets, concerned that intoxicating delta-8 items were being sold at gas stations, convenience stores and elsewhere without the same standards and limits that apply to pot dispensaries.
“It is still a form of cannabis that can get you high, and it is unregulated and untested,” says Jacqueline McGowan, a California cannabis licensing consultant and candidate for governor. Proposed legislation in California would require testing and taxation of consumable “noncannabis cannabinoids,” including delta-8.
In Oregon, newly passed legislation gives the state Liquor Control Commission authority to limit THC - of any kind - in products sold to minors, among other provisions. Commission research director TJ Sheehy says it will ensure consumer safety without outlawing delta-8 for adults.
Texas lawmakers hit an impasse this spring over a measure that producers said would have barred delta-8 from consumable hemp products.
House sponsor Rep. Tracy King, a Democrat from a rural district, says he “just wanted to do something to help the growers and the processors” by stripping that measure out of proposed hemp legislation that was heading toward passage. It ultimately stalled as the legislative session ended.
The U.S. Hemp Roundtable, an industry group, fears that portraying delta-8 products as hemp with a high could jeopardize the plant's hard-won federal legal status. But another group, the Hemp Industries Association, worries that lawmakers are rushing to crack down.
Delta-8 is getting onto law enforcement's radar, too, prompting raids of shops in multiple states.
In Wisconsin, Waukesha County authorities alleged in April that a CBD shop was offering products labeled as delta-8 THC that actually contained illegal amounts of delta-9. Authorities say they started investigating after two children accidentally ingested products their parents got at the Superstar Buds store in Menomonee Falls, near Milwaukee.
Shop owner Chris Syrrakos denies the allegations and says authorities haven't given him detailed testing results. No criminal charges have been filed to date, though prosecutors have brought a civil forfeiture case involving about US$14,000 seized in the probe.
“Delta-8 came to the rescue and saved our life” as a business, enabling six new hires, Syrrakos said. “Then, all of a sudden, everything came crashing down with the police raid.”
He has since closed the shop but opened a new one in Milwaukee.
Associated Press writer Scott Bauer contributed from Madison, Wisconsin.
American millionaire Jonathan Lehrer, one of two men charged in the killings of a Canadian couple in Dominica, has been denied bail.
Cabinet minister Dominic LeBlanc says he plans to run in the next election as a candidate under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's leadership, amid questions about his rumoured interest in succeeding his longtime friend for the top job.
A male columnist has apologized for a cringeworthy moment during former University of Iowa superstar and college basketball’s highest scorer Caitlin Clark’s first news conference as an Indiana Fever player.
The United States has vetoed a widely backed UN resolution that would have paved the way for full United Nations membership for the state of Palestine.
A group of suspects that allegedly defrauded seniors across Ontario and other parts of Canada using a so-called emergency grandparent scam appear to have ties to 'Italian traditional organized crime,' according to an investigator involved in the OPP-led probe.
Health Canada will change its longstanding policy restricting gay and bisexual men from donating to sperm banks in Canada, CTV News has learned. The federal health agency has adopted a revised directive removing the ban on gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men, effective May 8.
Prince Harry, the son of King Charles III and fifth in line to the British throne, has formally confirmed he is now a U.S. resident.
Kevin the cat has been reunited with his family after enduring a harrowing three-day ordeal while lost at Toronto Pearson International Airport earlier this week.
Technology from the 19th century has been brought out of retirement at a Newfoundland gardening store, as staff look for all the help they can get to fill orders during a busy season.
Kevin the cat has been reunited with his family after enduring a harrowing three-day ordeal while lost at Toronto Pearson International Airport earlier this week.
Molly Knight, a grade four student in Nova Scotia, noticed her school library did not have many books on female athletes, so she started her own book drive in hopes of changing that.
Almost 7,000 bars of pure gold were stolen from Pearson International Airport exactly one year ago during an elaborate heist, but so far only a tiny fraction of that stolen loot has been found.
When Les Robertson was walking home from the gym in North Vancouver's Lower Lonsdale neighbourhood three weeks ago, he did a double take. Standing near a burrow it had dug in a vacant lot near East 1st Street and St. Georges Avenue was a yellow-bellied marmot.
A moulting seal who was relocated after drawing daily crowds of onlookers in Greater Victoria has made a surprise return, after what officials described as an 'astonishing' six-day journey.
Just steps from Parliament Hill is a barber shop that for the last 100 years has catered to everyone from prime ministers to tourists.
A high score on a Foo Fighters pinball machine has Edmonton player Dave Formenti on a high.
A compound used to treat sour gas that's been linked to fertility issues in cattle has been found throughout groundwater in the Prairies, according to a new study.
While many people choose to keep their medical appointments private, four longtime friends decided to undergo vasectomies as a group in B.C.'s Lower Mainland.