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Tag: breaking bad

  • "Japanese Walter White” Accused Of Teaching Students To Make Ecstasy

    "Japanese Walter White” Accused Of Teaching Students To Make Ecstasy

    The teacher says it was all for the purpose of learning, and nothing else.

    A professor dubbed “the Japanese Walter White” has been accused of teaching his students to make ecstasy and another designer drug.

    In Japan, a government license is required to produce narcotics for academic research. Iwamura did have the license at some point, but it was expired at the time he was accused of having the students make the drugs.

    The Japan Times reports that Matsuyama University professor Tatsunori Iwamura, 61, was aware that he was breaking the law by conducting the class experiment despite his expired license.

    Iwamura allegedly instructed an associate professor and four students to produce MDMA in class—the first time being 2011-2013 and again from 2016-2017, according to the Times. Then, the professor would take the drugs “into his possession.”

    While multiple reports including from the Guardian claim that the professor also had students make 5F-QUPIC, a cannabis-like designer drug, the Times makes no mention of it. 5F-QUPIC, also known as 5F-PB-22, is a controlled substance in the U.S., UK and China.

    Iwamura says it was all for the purpose of learning, and nothing else.

    Authorities, acting on a tip, did not find ecstasy in a search of the professor’s home or lab at the university. But they did find traces of 5F-QUPIC, according to the Guardian.

    Authorities are now investigating the four students and associate professor involved in the illegal drug-making. President of Matsuyama University Tatsuya Mizogami said the university will pursue punitive action against Iwamura following the outcome of the investigation. “We sincerely apologize for causing major concern to students and their parents,” Mizogami said.

    Iwamura is facing prison time for his illicit class experiment. The Guardian reports that he could face up to 10 years in prison.

    Japanese culture is not at all forgiving about drug use. In March, Sega indefinitely halted sales of its new video game Judgment after allegations surfaced that actor Pierre Taki, who portrayed a yakuza crime boss in the game, was arrested for cocaine possession.

    According to the Japan Times, the penalty for cocaine use or possession carries a prison sentence of up to seven years.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Tunnel Beneath KFC Connects Drug Smugglers in Arizona, Mexico

    Tunnel Beneath KFC Connects Drug Smugglers in Arizona, Mexico

    The county sheriff’s department called the discovery a “heavy blow to that transnational criminal organization that built this tunnel.”

    A routine stop for an equipment violation led law enforcement in Arizona to an operation that numerous media outlets compared to the AMC series Breaking Bad, with a near-600-foot tunnel that connected a former fast food restaurant to a private home in Mexico for the purposes of trafficking narcotics.

    Police pulled over Jesus Ivan Lopez Garcia on August 13 after he was observed removing several containers from an abandoned Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) franchise located one mile from the U.S.-Mexico border; a search of the vehicle turned up more than 200 packages of various narcotics, including 6.8 pounds of fentanyl.

    This led to a search of the restaurant, where a tunnel traversed the border to a home in San Luis Rio Colorado, Mexico. The county sheriff’s department described the discovery as a “heavy blow to that transnational criminal organization that built this tunnel.”

    According to CNN, court documents showed that Lopez Garcia had purchased the former KFC location in San Luis, Arizona in April 2018. The structure was described as “vacant in recent years,” which raised the suspicion of police when Lopez Garcia was seen taking the containers, including a tool box from the former restaurant and loading them into a trailer attached to a pickup truck.

    Officers then pulled him over for what was described as an unspecified equipment violation, and during the traffic stop, a K-9 officer alerted authorities to suspected drugs in the two containers.

    A search of the containers yielded more than 261 pounds of methamphetamine, 14 pounds of cocaine, 30 pounds of white heroin, 13.7 pounds of brown heroin and 6.8 pounds of fentanyl.

    Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Special Agent in Charge Scott Brown told a CNN affiliate station in Arizona that the fentanyl “translates to over three million dosage units.” Authorities gave the total price of the drugs at more than $1 million.

    After obtaining a warrant, HSI conducted a search of the KFC location on August 14 and found an eight-inch hole with a depth of 22 feet.

    This led to a walkway that was five feet tall and three feet wide that ran 590 feet across the border to San Luis Rio Colorado in Mexico. Mexican authorities reported that a search of a residential property on August 15 found an entrance to the tunnel under a bed. 

    “There was no mechanism to physically come up to the small opening” in the KFC location, said Brown in a press conference. “The narcotics we believe were raised up by a rope [and] then loaded into the tool box and taken out of the abandoned restaurant.”

    Yuma Sector Chief Patrol Agent Anthony Porvaznik said that the tunnel will be filled with cement to keep others from using it.

    View the original article at thefix.com