The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency has filed a notice of intent (PDF) to place the southeast Asian plant called kratom to the most restrictive classification of the Controlled Substances Act. The plant, Mitragyna speciosa, and its two primary constituents, mitragynine and 7-hydroxymitragynine, will be temporarily placed onto Schedule I on September 30, according to a filing by the DEA at 8:45 am Eastern time today. The full announcement is scheduled to be published in the Federal Register tomorrow, August 31

Seeing as the DEA is not scheduling M. Speciosa itself, but instead only two of its chemical constituents, I couldn't help but see why this would stop the kratom industry at all; So as long as they stamp a great big "NOT INTENDED FOR HUMAN CONSUMPTION" label all over their products and plants, it would be just about as legal as it always was before this BS ban goes into effect (hell, just take a look at the san pedro cactus, poppyseed and psychotria shrub/leaf cutting markets as they are; so as long as human consumption isn't an intended use, it's perfectly fine to possess and grow as long as they can't prove you are intending to consume it!)

(c) Unless specifically excepted or unless listed in another
schedule, any material, compound, mixture, or preparation, which
contains any quantity of the following hallucinogenic substances,
or which contains any of their salts, isomers, and salts of isomers
whenever the existence of such salts, isomers, and salts of isomers
is possible within the specific chemical designation:
(1) 3,4-methylenedioxy amphetamine.
(2) 5-methoxy-3,4-methylenedioxy amphetamine.
(3) 3,4,5-trimethoxy amphetamine.
(4) Bufotenine.
(5) Diethyltryptamine.
(6) Dimethyltryptamine.
(7) 4-methyl-2,5-diamethoxyamphetamine.
(8) Ibogaine.
(9) Lysergic acid diethylamide.
(10) Marihuana.
(11) Mescaline.
(12) Peyote.
(13) N-ethyl-3-piperidyl benzilate.
(14) N-methyl-3-piperidyl benzilate.
(15) Psilocybin.
(16) Psilocyn.
(17) Tetrahydrocannabinols.

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Kratom Schedule I in 24 Hours Help Us Fight It

We regret to tell everyone that uses Kratom to improve their life whether it be mental or physical, that one of the most corrupt actions we have ever witnessed has occurred and the result will be this amazing plant being added to the list of Schedule I drugs in the USA. In advance I would like to apologize for any spelling or grammar errors in this email but due to the time-sensitive situation here, we're not going to spend a bunch of time editing as we want to get the facts out there ASAP! I am going to lay out the facts of what has happened to lead to this terrible event and the majority of it is based on complete government corruption under the spell of the pharmaceutical industry. Quickly, for those of you who do not know Kratom has been praised for its incredible pain relieving abilities as well as helping people with mental issues, anxiety, depression etc. It also is very well-known for its ability to assist in getting people off hard drugs as well as addiction to pharmaceutical drugs (which right away we all can see the first problem for Big Pharma with this plant).

So without fear of their intimidation tactics we are going to step up and tell you all exactly what has happened. A group of companies have now gotten together with their lawyers to assist in exposing these criminals, and we are all going to work together, because this is about far morethan money - its about the right to use nature to heal ourselves and not be forced on to dangerous pharmaceutical drugs. I will break it down as best I can to make it easy to take in the whole scope, it has been a two year battle against the FDA, Customs and now DEA is involved all on behalf of the greed-driven pharmaceutical industry that has somehow managed to get a stranglehold on the US Government.

CORRUPT ACTIONS OF GOVERNMENT AGENCIES:
1.
We have witnessed many actions all documented by our lawyers. It all started with the Import Alert that was put on importation of Kratom whereby any entity importing kratom as a dietary supplement or bulk dietary ingredient is subject to detention of their shipment without notice. Meaning, in simple terms that the FDA does not want this brought in as a consumable. They state it is unsafe, many side effects etc. (with all sarcasm intended; we all know that the drugs they deal do not have side effects right?). What is so disturbing about this is that they have absolutely no statistics of abuse, dangers or anything, so who is telling them to say it is dangerous? hmm. There has never been a single death or accident resulting in injury or death due to Kratom use, while their drugs kill millions of people.
2.
The FDA and Customs have violated several laws in their efforts to stop the import of Kratom. When importers brought the material in for other uses that were not for consumption, everything was done properly within all FDA regulations, the FDA began stealing shipments. We have evidence of over 80 metric tons of material that was confiscated illegally. Also, there are clear laws that they should abide by such as providing a formal legal letter tothe importer informing them about the shipment being detained so that they can provide any assistance to the FDA/Customs to assist in the release of the material, but instead the FDA took it on themselves to not provide this letter and simply steal the materials. We are quite confident that material was likely offered to pharmaceutical companies for free research of development (this will be followed up with as we go along). Their were also several instances where they had a time limit that they legally needed to release, destroy or return the shipments and they violated the law. As it is very important for importers to abide by the laws of the country, I think it is just as important for them to do likewise, no?
3.
FDA entered into the warehouse of one or more companies without a warrant. With very unethical behavior of one agent especially, obviously the person put in place to throw her "power" around- Melanie Small in her efforts to prove she was right stated several times unprofessionally to the owner that Kratom was illegal, and he is not allowed to sell it. As the owner rebutted with the truth about the law, she continued to demand he stop selling it. Which of course, all this was intimidation only, but to those who know the laws and abide by them, she wasn't really all that scary, sorry Melanie, that kind of behavior is not appropriate.
4.
The FDA intercepted a shipment going from one warehouse to a client that was in the hands of FedEx. They did not have a warrant to search the shipment but along with local law enforcement (so was told to us by an FedEx worker), they sat and discussed how they could get into the boxes. The sender was not informed of any stoppage of the shipment, and lets not forget, why is it being stopped when its not even an illegal material? Something not right about that...
5.
Using DHL, the FDA attempted to have a box delivered to one recipient when it should have gone to a completely different State, they misdelivered a package to prove that these two individuals were linked somehow, since one had been added to the import alert without any cause. The manipulation of couriers without any court order is completely immoral and illegal.
6.
With the FDA clearly failing at stopping the import and sale of this plant material, and probably getting in major sh*t from whichever pharmaceutical company was paying them to interfere with free trade between Indonesia and USA, which again is a serious international criminal offense, they brought in the DEA to take over and introduce the "Intent" document to add Kratom to the list of Schedule I drugs in the USA. Now, interesting how this formal intent document was created in mid May 2016 but somehow remained hidden from the public until two days ago where we and other companies were bombarded with warnings from lawyers letting us know they delayed the publicity of this so that there was no time to fight back against such corruption. Literally 36 hours before the law would be introduced they knew this wouldn't be much time for people like us to raise hell over it. As they say the substance is so dangerous, why would they hide such a document from the public, all those people could be getting hurt, or killed or whatever crap they are feeding the public... its because they know this is not a dangerous substance!
7.
Let me set the scene of this one. An innocent employee of a large Kratom supplier is opening the door to the warehouse when several FDA and Police cars come skreetching in, jumping out and pointing guns at the scared employee. Forcing him to open the door at gunpoint he couldn't get the key to work, whether it was because something was wrong with the key or he was just to nervous and not used to having guns shoved in his face. He requested they lower the guns since he's not armed and all do except one hero who keeps aiming the gun at him. They finally get into the warehouse and walk in and take the material they came for, walking out without arresting anyone. A simple theft, Gestapo style. What is so pathetic about this is if the agents told him the material was under bond and they were confiscating it, he would have simply handed it over to them without problems, but to make themselves feel like heroes and tough guys, they used this intimidation tactic. It was soon discovered why they did this, it made the media about what they did, making the supplier look like a criminal, but again let me remind everyone KRATOM IS NOT ILLEGAL. How disgusting is that? Torment and intimidate innocent people to swindle the perspective of the public.

NOW THE MEAT AND POTATOES
"Schedule I" means that the substance has absolutely no medicinal value, is addictive and a major threat to the public. Strangely though, the FDA along with Universities are doing studies on the benefits of this plant. They have been synthesizing the alkaloids and there has even been a Drug released containing the actives of Kratom. This drug is called "PZM21". So, what the DEA is now stating will be in place is Kratom shall be listed as Schedule I, but what is super important for everyone to understand is they are setting it up so that this scheduling has a two year length, meaning, anyone who imports, possess, sells or distributes this plant material will suffer the same penalties as if it were heroin, crack cocaine or meth. So, lets look at it from the DEA, FDA and most importantly Pharmaceutical industries perspective and its very simple... bye bye Kratom. Bye bye competition and hello opportunities! You may ask, how is this an opportunity if its Schedule I and even the drug companies aren't allowed to handle the alkaloids or their analogues, well, remember the two year expiry on that ban, so its simple once all the competition (Kratom suppliers) are out of the picture, the drug companies pay the DEA to change the Kratom Schedule to lower schedule where the plant is still illegal, but they can now use the alkaloids and their analogues under prescription and BOOM market takeover and they get all the profits from the now outlawed Kratom, but in this movement they have also turned the natural safe chemicals in the plant into synthetic, addictive, dangerous ones and what does that mean for them, big surprise, even more profits! Ah yes, Fascism at its worst... we often end our emails with "The true meaning of Fascism is not being able to see a clear line between Government and Corporate interest" and once again this stands true. And how many people are going to suffer from having this plant taken away from them? How many people is their new dangerous version of Kratom going to kill or addict, only time can t