01.04.2003 3.11 pm
SAN FRANCISCO – Two Californians who operated a drug laboratory that could produce as much as US$100 million ($180 million) of LSD in little over a month have been convicted on drug charges.
William Pickard, 57, and Clyde Apperson, 47, were arrested in Kansas in November 2000 as they transported an illegal LSD lab in a rented truck. The Drug Enforcement Administration called it the largest LSD lab seizure ever.
Both men were from the San Francisco area, once a hot bed of the 1960s drug counter-culture.
The jury in the 11-week trial at a federal court in Topeka, Kansas heard evidence that the two men previously had a laboratory in Santa Fe, New Mexico that could produce 2.2 pounds of LSD every five weeks – enough to make 10 million doses.
The two men face at least 10 years in prison on charges of conspiracy to manufacture and distribute more than 10 grams of LSD and on one count of intent to distribute the drug.
They are scheduled to be sentenced in Kansas in August. Pickard is already in federal custody and Apperson was remanded into custody on Monday.
– REUTERS
