"The illegal cigarette trade costs the state hundreds of millions of dollars a year in lost revenue."
That's all bankrupt government cares about anymore, be it casinos, pot, or anything else.
"Crackdown on illegal cigarette sales eyed" by Kevin Hartnett | Globe Correspondent, March 01, 2014
With sales of illegal cigarettes in Massachusetts booming, a legislative commission recommended measures Friday to combat cigarette traffickers and capture hundreds of millions of dollars in lost tax revenue.
Why aren't the death sticks banned and prohibited?
The recommendations from the state’s Illegal Tobacco Commission include increased fines and penalties for selling untaxed cigarettes, more money for enforcement, and creation of a task force to address cigarette trafficking.
Officials on the commission reviewed a series of studies and estimated that up to 28 percent of the cigarettes consumed in Massachusetts are bought and sold illegally in order to avoid the state’s tax, which increased last year from $2.51 to $3.51 a pack. The illegal cigarette trade costs the state hundreds of millions of dollars a year in lost revenue, and officials expect it to grow following last year’s increase.
Yeah, I really feel sorry for this bankrupt government grabbing for any pile of loot it can so it can fund lavish political lifestyles, well-connected corporations and friends, and make debt interest payments.
“You see people saying why deal drugs when I can smuggle cigarettes,” said Amy Pitter, commissioner of the state Department of Revenue and chairwoman of the Illegal Tobacco Commission, which was created last year by the Legislature. “The profit is just as good. The chance of getting caught is smaller. Fines and penalties are not comparable.”
We have the best of both worlds: massive drug problems and cigarettes.
Enforcement agencies have found that most of the illegal cigarettes are brought into the state by organized traffickers, who buy inexpensive packs in states such as Pennsylvania that have lower cigarette taxes, sell them under the counter, and pocket the difference.
It is a profitable enterprise that state agencies have largely overlooked until now.
Yeah, they were too busy going through the medical marijuana to smell anything else, but now that they need money they are going to crack down on cigarettes.
The state attorney general’s office said in January that there had been no indictments in the last two years for cigarette tax evasion, even as trafficking schemes have grown in scale and sophistication.
Under Massachusetts law, it is illegal to bring even a single pack of cigarettes into the state without paying the state cigarette tax, which is the second highest in the nation after New York’s. Still, Pitter said any increased enforcement activity is not designed to target individual smokers.
“You don’t want to turn everyone who lives north of [Interstate] 495 and goes to New Hampshire to buy cigarettes into a criminal,” Pitter said.
Why not?
Instead, the Illegal Tobacco Commission wants more law enforcement resources devoted to stopping organized traffickers, who in some cases have switched from selling illegal drugs to selling untaxed cigarettes. Cigarette tax evasion cases can take a year or more to build, and state agencies have not made those cases a priority.
Well, that is one way to get them out of business.
“You may start with some corner store [selling untaxed cigarettes], and we’d like to shut that corner store down,” Pitter said. “But that will not stop the problem. You have to start following the money.”
But they are pro-business in this state.
Related: From Where is the Killer Heroin Coming?
You follow the money there and you end at banks.
--more--"
"Philip Seymour Hoffman died of toxic mix of drugs, medical examiner says" Associated Press, March 01, 2014
NEW YORK — A toxic mix of heroin and other drugs killed Oscar-winning actor Philip Seymour Hoffman, New York City officials said Friday.
Notice the overdose epidemic didn't receive so much attention from my pre$$ until someone from the upper and important class had something tragic happen? They don't care about that junkie in the street, and never did.
A spokeswoman for the New York City medical examiner said Hoffman died from a mix of heroin, cocaine, amphetamines, and benzodiazepines, which are drugs such as Xanax and Valium that are widely prescribed for anxiety, trouble sleeping, and other problems. His death was ruled an accident.
Gee, he was loaded up on all kinds of stuff, huh?
Law enforcement officials have said Hoffman was found Feb. 2 with a needle in his arm, and tests found heroin in samples from at least 50 packets in his Manhattan apartment. Authorities also found unused syringes, a charred spoon, and various prescription medications, including a drug used to treat heroin addiction, a blood-pressure medication, and a muscle relaxant.
Hoffman, 46, who won an Oscar for ‘‘Capote’’ and starred in numerous other movies and stage productions, had been frank about struggling with substance abuse. He told CBS’ ‘‘60 Minutes’’ in 2006 that he had used ‘‘anything I could get my hands on’’ before getting clean at age 22. But in interviews last year, he said he’d relapsed, had developed a heroin problem and had gone to rehab.
Investigators have been looking at how Hoffman may have obtained the heroin.
Yeah, where might it have come from?
Tests of the heroin in his apartment have found that it was not cut with a dangerous additive such as fentanyl, a synthetic form of morphine used to intensify the high that has been linked to deaths in other states.
Musician Robert Vineberg has been charged with keeping a heroin stash in a Lower Manhattan apartment amid the inquiry into the actor’s death. Vineberg, who has said he was a friend of Hoffman, hasn’t been charged in his death and said he didn’t sell him the heroin found in his apartment.
--more--"
(Blog editor exhales)
I'm sorry I'm no longer interested in all this shallow and superficial $hit coverage, folks.
