Previously on "Weed Country"...
That's the best meds we have right now.
Dealer Matt Shotwell and grower Mike Boutin took the first steps toward making a deal.
If we're gonna do something and do it right,
we got to start planning it now anyway.
Cops raided their first grow of the season
and took over $1 million worth of weed off the streets.
It's a huge win for us 'cause we get 2,000 plants off the street.
And Mike Boutin had a tense standoff close to home.
You lost again?!
---
It can make things really tense.
You could get one little ticked off neighbor
making a phone call on you could bring the cops over here.
Whoa, that is ferocious!
Deep in the heart of the northern California mountains,
marijuana growing season is under way.
You're growing in your front yard?
Oh, yeah.
This is the Emerald Triangle...
Ground zero for a multi-billion-dollar marijuana industry.
Originally comprised of three counties
covering 10,000 square miles, it's now growing out of control.
I mean, look at the size of that.
It's a decades-old battle between cops...
It is a problem of epidemic proportions.
Dealers... - It's just a business that can't fail.
And growers.
There's nothing more American than a man producing a product that people want.
They stand to make millions
or be locked up for years.
Arguably, I just committed a felony.
We got somebody running.
This is Weed Country.
Yeah, I'm breaking the law on TV.
So what?
Police department! Get on the ground! Get on the ground!
- Don't move! Show me your hands. - Show me your hands behind your back!
All right, here we go. H2c Vallejo raid coming up.
There's a raid going on in there right now.
Do not move. We have a search warrant.
It's the middle of the marijuana growing season.
There they are... black squad car, white S.U.V.
Dealers are struggling to keep their dispensaries open
as the cops continue to shut them down.
Things are going crazy here in California right now.
Every single day there's a dispensary being raided or there's a grow house being raided.
Everybody's scared... Growers, patients, operators.
People are scared to turn the open sign on a dispensary every day.
Another dispensary bites the dust.
25.
27.
We need help funneling them up and getting them out of here.
Sergeant Mike Gilley and the SWAT team
are stepping up their efforts to eradicate marijuana from illegal grow sites.
900.
All over the Emerald Triangle,
cops are working overtime to shut down anyone associated with weed.
Marijuana season obviously has its time frame during the year,
and right now I get kind of jacked up and excited,
and it's like, "all right. We're moving in on the good stuff."
I do enjoy taking the gardens out, but
I will not be satisfied until I'm busting people.
I'm gonna go meet up with my buddy Morgan,
who is one of the managers of "better health group,"
a dispensary that's been raided three times.
For a convicted dealer like Matt Shotwell,
the constant police presence means always looking over his shoulder
to avoid being busted and sent back to jail.
Oh [Bleep]
You never know.
I'm kind of nervous about even going to better health group because
if the cops see my car there they're gonna think I'm in cahoots with him in some way
and they could link me with him.
Shotwell is meeting with another local dispensary owner
who has also lost everything to Vallejo's intensifying drug war...
Wow, look at all that. Signs in the window.
But refuses to stay closed.
What's up, dude?
Good, man. Good to see you.
They've been raided three times.
I got to give it to them... They keep opening,
and that's what this movement needs is courageous people that will not give up
because of what they believe in.
Don't touch anything because internal affairs is doing an investigation.
They trashed everything.
Wow. That's crazy, man. So they took all your equipment in the back, too,
so you guys can't grow anymore now?
- Exactly. - People need their cannabis,
and they're either gonna get it from a dispensary
or they're gonna get it from the street.
It's not going away.
What's your plan? You gonna run this place, or what?
Well, I don't know if we're gonna be able to reopen, man. It's gonna be a minute at least.
You don't have any medicine, do you?
Hell no.
Well, I'm working on that, dude. I'm working on trying to get some medicine back down here
to the people that are willing to put the fight up, so if you're willing to put the fight up,
- I can find some medicine for you. - I've got patients calling me all the time.
There's money to be made in the middle, and I'm gonna make it.
It's on the table, and I'm taking it off the table.
Far to the north, in the Emerald Triangle...
"Welcome hunters."
Someone has ventured onto Boutin's land with a message.
Hey, see what I'm talking about?
- Oh, it's a pretty big sign. - Right.
The invitation for hunters to shoot deer on Boutin's land
is an escalation in an ongoing property dispute.
What's up, hillbilly?!
---
Are you lost again, man?! What's up?
A claim that could lead to an unwanted visit from the police.
Are you kidding me?
So, I have these deer that I take care of.
My neighbor with his empty grudge has set up big signs that say,
"come hunt the deer."
Now my deer friends are gonna suffer.
That was priceless.
When you have "no hunting" signs for 6 and ½ years and you put up signs that say,
"hey, come on in and kill 'em, hunters,"
you're just doing that to be cruel and mean and stupid.
- It's just [Bleep] - I know, but...
We didn't do anything to those [Bleep] people for them to act the way they are.
You haven't done anything to these [Bleep] people.
They've got me backed into a corner.
They've got you backed into a corner.
Please, don't give yourself permission to make it worse.
That's all I'm asking you to do, please.
Tawni doesn't get it.
You take offense to something,
then draw authorities to your property
who then want to talk about your marijuana
who wouldn't have otherwise been there.
Sometimes you could be your own worst enemy.
Never wrestle with a pig.
You're only gonna get muddy,
and the pig likes it.
Back in Vallejo,
Matt Shotwell is packing some of Boutin's weed while out on bail.
Mike gave me a sample of the royal kush.
If he's caught, he could be immediately thrown in jail.
I need to find out if Mike Boutin's pot is the best.
It's gonna help me out financially. It's gonna help Mike out.
Shotwell is taking a gamble that he hopes will pay off.
If Boutin's weed is good, it could save his business.
- Hey. How are you doing? I'm Don. - Good. How are you?
Hey, Don. I'm Matt.
Nice to meet you, Matt. What can I do for you?
I have a test I want to run on this... A little cannabis test on this.
So, I'm here at Halloo labs.
Halloo has the full spectrum of testing going on here.
Thc is one of the active ingredients in marijuana.
It's the high for the user.
In the '60s, the active marijuana level of the thc was 3% to 5%.
Thc levels today average between 10% and 15%.
The higher the thc in Boutin's weed,
the more money in Shotwell's pocket.
Pretty much everything's riding on the test here.
- We got your results. - Great.
Come on in, and we'll have a look at them.
Okay.
It says that it's a purple royal kush.
The main ingredient you see here is the thca and the thc that that will convert into.
Royal kushes that we've seen around here
will be somewhere in the neighborhood of about 8.6%.
This is something around 23%.
This thc number skyrockets.
That's what I'm looking for.
While Shotwell still needs to keep an eye out for cops,
at least now he knows he's in business with the best.
Mike knows a lot about growing, and
he's been growing pot longer than I've been walking the planet.
I appreciate it. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
So, this next trip up to Trinity's gonna be awesome.
I really can't wait to go see Mike.
I can't wait to get his medicine because it's fire.
That's what they say in the industry. "When the smoke's good, it's fire."
Back up in the Emerald Triangle...
So, I don't really get what's going on here.
I'm trying to get an airline ticket, and I can't even access my bank account.
Saying the transaction's declined.
Mike Boutin's bank account has been mysteriously shut down.
I don't really know what to do
except I could maybe call the bank and find out what's up.
Every year it's a minefield growing marijuana.
It really is just a myriad of things that can go wrong.
Every day you wake up, you could be a failure the next.
I'm having some trouble with my account.
I'm not able to access it online,
and I'm not able to purchase online.
Well, closed by who?
Oh, by the bank?
Really? Why?
And what does that mean?
So, you're saying it was closed yesterday by the bank
and you don't know the reason?
We'll do a covert approach
and try to pick up on the suspects.
We got somebody running.
I'm having some trouble with my account.
I'm not able to access it online, and I'm not able to purchase online.
Mike Boutin is trying to figure out why his bank account was closed.
Closed by who?
Oh, by the bank?
Really? Why?
And what does that mean?
The federal government routinely hunts down
and seizes accounts involved in the marijuana trade,
cutting off funds from both the bank and the client.
For Boutin, this is an indication that he might be under investigation.
I was just there Monday, and no one said a word.
I made a deposit.
So, you're saying it was closed yesterday by the bank
and you don't know the reason?
The bank closed down my account.
When people don't get their money, then they come after you.
So, you're closing out my account.
All right. Thanks.
Wow. That's, like, crazy.
This definitely has something to do with my marijuana advocacy.
I'm starting to think to myself,
"is there somebody on their way here?"
I'm not going anywhere. I don't feel like I'm guilty of anything.
Everyone's making money in the cannabis industry right now, except for me.
Dealer Matt Shotwell tries to get his girlfriend, Soraya,
to support his decision to get back in the weed game
despite the substantial risks.
Sticks is in, and there's a good chance Skweaz will do it, too.
As much as I don't support this, and you know that,
now you're dealing with a whole other facet of people
that you're trusting that have already broken your trust.
Well, I'm not driving it. I can't drive it because I've got charges
and I'm not gonna do that, but I still know everybody.
You've got pot, we've got patients, we've got cars.
They're gonna drive it.
I'm connecting them.
You know, I can make money with my connections.
I got to do something with all this crap I learned at Greenwell.
I don't like that he is still entertaining the idea
of the industry.
So you're not gonna have your hands in it at all, period?
That's why I've got these guys,
and that's why I'm meeting them in the garden in 20 minutes.
You just shouldn't have anything to do with it
until your court, all that, is cleared.
I'm not really tripping too much because I think what I'm doing is legal.
Soraya is not interested in anything to do
with anything green or that's smokeable.
She wants nothing the [Bleep] to do with my schemes.
She doesn't want me going up north.
I'm gonna go out to the garden and wait for them outside, okay?
Shotwell hopes to recruit former Greenwell associates Sticks, Skweaz, and Curtis
for his plan.
So, man, how are things?
Dude, it's been rough, man. It's been rough. But, you know,
they raided another dispensary the other day.
Police department! Get on the ground!
Some of the club owners have kind of run out of connections,
so these dispensary owners need new suppliers that
are willing to take a risk to make some money.
Shotwell is trying to start up a "weed syndicate"
that would bring marijuana down from the Emerald Triangle
to supply local dispensaries.
I know some growers that don't have an outlet for their medicine anymore, okay?
I'm on bail, so I can't do anything illegal,
but you guys are free and clear and no one knows who you are.
With charges pending,
Shotwell needs his associates to serve as mules
where the rewards can be great.
You need some money. There's money to be made.
But so is the risk of going to jail.
You guys can make some money transporting it.
I mean, we're talking getting hash from Grace farms at like 6 bucks a gram.
They're selling it in the dispensaries for 40 bucks a gram.
There's a $34 profit margin there that can be divvied up between
you, me, and the dispensary.
I'm thinking about going up there this week
to meet these guys, and maybe you could come, too.
Yeah.
I'm down.
You're down? You down, Skweaz?
All right. Let's do it.
You're in? You down, Sticks?
- Yep. - You're in?
That's what's up.
That's how we do.
All right.
I've got all these puzzle pieces in my head,
and I'm just trying to piece them all together into a smooth operating machine.
I think I can do it. It's what I do best.
Let's go inside. Let's get something to drink.
All righty, then.
Sergeant Mike Gilley and deputy Jason Jones follow up on a hot tip.
You're a piece of [Bleep] you'll get what you deserve!
A suspect taken into custody during a recent drug bust turned informant.
It turns it into kind of a cat-and-mouse game with us and the growers.
Gilley and Jones roll up on a site where, allegedly,
there are growers tending over 600 plants.
Looks like it's locked up.
We got two iron gates that are locked with a padlock.
With only a suspect's word to go on,
Gilley and Jones don't have enough evidence
to go through the locked gate and onto private property.
Let's try a little farther up, see if they've got another access into this.
Well, they obviously don't want to have any trespassers, huh?
No. They got it fortified pretty good, but
let's see what we got up here.
Well, we're gonna take a little walk up the hill here see if we can get a visual on anything.
Heard there's multiple people living there,
so, you know, we'll kind of take a risk assessment when we get in there,
and see what we've got and see what's going on.
Did you catch a skunky whiff back there?
There should be plants out that way.
Gilley gives the order to stop, and Jones has a closer look.
Half-a-dozen abandoned school buses make up a bizarre compound.
Kind of wonder why someone wants all these buses.
Seems a little strange.
You look at that and go,
"Wonder what the reason is for that."
I'm not fond of this scenario at all.
Gilley's instincts are telling him to be on full alert.
I can think of numerous times in my career
where they've actually been using buses as a mobile lab.
They're maybe running a meth lab.
You see that in a lot of isolated areas like where we're at.
From their vantage point, they can see plants but no suspects.
It smells pretty skunky back there.
And out in the open, without backup nearby,
they are vulnerable to ambush.
Is that movement over there?
Going 101 north, all right? That's where we're going, 101 north to trinity.
---
Is that movement over there?
Mike Gilley and Jason Jones are staking out a suspected illegal marijuana grow
surrounded by abandoned school buses.
Something flapping in the wind.
People could be hiding anywhere.
Multiple suspects are allegedly hiding inside the compound,
and they could be armed.
Well, we could do it one of two ways.
We can either get a search warrant here
or try to get their attention, have them come out and talk to us.
Gilley risks losing the suspect if he waits for a search warrant.
He decides on a more direct approach...
Hello!
Coaxing them out.
Sheriff's office!
Could you guys come out and talk to us?
Gilley hopes this tactic will minimize the possibility of violence.
Hello! Sheriff's office! I want to talk to you!
But it also leaves them
easy targets if the suspects choose to take a shot.
Sheriff's office! Anybody there?
Hello!
Ohh, man.
I made numerous attempts to call somebody out, you know, shouting,
and no response to that.
I think we need to do another over-flight.
Yep.
Before we go any farther with this.
Without a search warrant, Gilley can't legally enter the property.
So, we got to do some more digging here.
- Hello. Hi. - Woman: Hi.
Then, a break.
A neighbor flags them down.
I'm detective Jones. This is sergeant Gilley of the sheriff's office.
How you doing?
Who's living over here on this one?
---
You don't know?
---
Okay.
---
You guys call in, you guys complain about something, we keep the information anonymous.
We don't take anybody's name.
---
This must be flooded out here with this kind of a deal going on, huh?
---
We got some pretty good intel on a grow operation.
Our next step will be to put the operational plan together to take this thing down.
So, certified mail... The sheriff's office.
"Return receipt requested."
They want to make sure I got this.
Things have been going downhill for Mike Boutin,
and they're about to get worse.
I came home today, and I have a registered letter.
It's from Bruce Haney, who's the sheriff.
"Dear Mr. Boutin,
"my office has been notified of a traffic stop
"performed by United States forest service
law enforcement officer Cruze."
You mean a tree cop.
"It is my understanding that you were transporting cannabis while carrying a weapon".
"I am hereby revoking
the concealed-carry weapon permit issued to you by the sheriff's office."
Well, isn't that special.
So, a couple months ago I get pulled over by the forest service cop, right?
And I was in possession of cannabis.
He gives me a citation.
So, basically, he's using that as an excuse to take away my concealed weapons permit.
This is such a load of [Bleep]
Without his guns,
Boutin and his wife, Tawni, are defenseless sitting ducks.
It could mean my right to survival,
having my right to defend myself taken away.
Our county is roughly the size of Rhode Island
and because there are no
full-time law enforcement down here in this part of the county,
they can't get here quick enough
to protect me from thugs who want to hurt me or my family.
[Bleep] I might as well give you my weapons, too,
because if they come here they'll try to say,
the minute they find a weapon, no matter where,
no matter how much dust is on it, no matter what,
they're gonna say that I was using it
in the commission of a crime,
and that's gonna be a factor for a longer sentence.
I hate to say that because it makes us vulnerable, but
I'm being attacked in my own county.
What, is this all like preemptory strikes?
My brother's a cop, and he told me that
"there's a bull's-eye on your back."
He's basically telling me to watch out for myself.
It's like, "oh, let's take your bank account.
Let's take your permit."
I'm the kind of guy that likes to string dots together,
and when the dots start looking like they're heading in a certain direction,
I don't like that.
For Boutin, turning over his guns is equal to surrender.
It's all the duplicity, all the hypocrisy,
all the [Bleep] in this stupid war on drugs,
all rolled into one.
300 miles south,
Matt Shotwell is having problems of his own.
I just don't understand why you just don't trust me
that I haven't gotten in trouble since I went to jail.
- Why you think I'm gonna get in trouble? - I don't care.
Soraya is threatening to leave.
Why don't you care? How is that not valid?
Because you didn't think you were gonna get
shut down on your dispensary. You're delusional.
Pretty much everything is on the line...
My freedom, Soraya, and my finances is in there, too.
So I've got to fix a lot of things real quick,
or I'm gonna lose everything I've got.
I'm not doing anything illegal, so come on!
You said that about your dispensary, Matt, and they still found reasons.
- Okay, you're right. They did find re... - Let's not have this conversation
because I'm really tired of it.
Soraya is just pissed about this trip up north.
She just doesn't like the whole pot lifestyle. She wants nothing to do with it.
She wants me to be Ned Flanders and stay at home and "okily dokily!"
And that's not me.
So, I'm gonna go up north.
That's not illegal, to go up north and talk to Mike.
It's not. To take my buddies, it's not illegal.
Stop thinking it is.
Matt, I just want to leave.
I'm trying to find a legal way I can make some money in this business
so I can help build the lifestyle that,
will make her happier but,
she's not believing what I say.
She doesn't trust me anymore.
Let me leave!
Move the gl, please!
Un-[Bleep]-believable.
I hope that he has a plan for himself outside of this industry.
That's what he needs to do,
because I can't continue to live my life being in this place.
It's not where I want to be.
He was last seen heading down slope.
Copy that.
We had a runner. The helicopter's doing some recon over top.
Rides are all ready, man. I just got the new engine put in the gl.
And got a new clutch in there.
I got the 7-inch screen in there so you all can watch movies on the way up.
Against his girlfriend's wishes,
Shotwell gathers his mules for a run up north to pick up some of Mike Boutin's marijuana.
They plan to profit by delivering Boutin's premium weed to dispensaries in Vallejo.
Should be good to go. I'll be riding behind you,
and, yeah, we'll, you know, we got walkies and stuff for when we get up into the woods
'cause our cellphones won't be working.
- Sticks, you're the captain. - All right.
Curtis, you're the navigator. Skweaz, you're the muscle.
- Hey, let's do it. - Let's do this.
We're going 101 north, all right?
That's where we're going, 101 north to trinity.
All right?
---
Hey, hey!
Without warning, an unmarked cop car rolls up.
Yo.
---
I thought you guys already gave me that paperwork.
We gave you some because we took money from the business,
- but each time we take money from the bank... - One's my rental property from Virginia.
Yeah, but we took it. I got to have you sign it.
Do I have to sign it, or is it the lawyer?
- No, you have to sign it, - I have.
and I'll give you the form so you can make the claim.
Why did you take the one that had nothing to do with pot?
That's my Virginia rental account.
Anything that you had associated with, we ended up taking.
How are we gonna remedy this?
Well, I have your phone number. I'll call you this week.
Roger that.
Due to his charges, the police have seized all of Shotwell's bank accounts,
leaving him desperate for cash.
They're taking more of my money.
He's like, "we're seizing your bank accounts in Virginia, just wanted to let you know."
We got some paperwork for you. We need you to sign it."
"Dude, that's got nothing to do with Greenwell."
And he's like, "I know, but we're taking it anyway."
That's what he just told me.
I've got cops still trying to take my money out of my bank accounts.
My mortgage is months behind.
All my student loans are late, all my credit cards, all my car payments.
Pretty much my entire financial picture is crashing down around me.
You know, we're about to leave and go up north with the boys,
and that didn't happen. Dude, it never stops.
Shotwell decides to delay the trip.
Nah, we got to cancel this for today, man. The cops are all over us right now.
Look at them just waiting over there.
I'm just not happy
having my concealed weapons permit taken from me.
I'm afraid of what it could mean down the road.
It's not about defending weed.
It's about defending yourself
against the people that will go after the weed at any expense.
As Boutin's wife, Tawni, and farmhand, Taylor, watch,
Boutin submits to the sheriff's mandate
and packs up his guns.
I was angry when I got that letter
because I felt betrayed,
and I still do.
Now I'm put in a position where
I'm being asked to give up the right to defend myself.
With his bank account shut down
and an escalating neighborly feud,
the former truck driver and axman can't afford any more trouble.
I don't like doing this,
but I think we're just gonna have to rely...
On good old bats...
And dogs,
because I'm just getting rid of all the firearms.
I don't want people trying to say that I was using firearms
in the commission of a felony,
and so I'm just removing them from the property.
I'm taking them to a trusted relative's house and leaving them there
for however long I have to leave them there.
It scares me.
There's no protection here from anything.
Now I don't have any way to protect me, to protect Taylor,
nothing.
I'm about freedom, and I'm about, you know,
"give me liberty or give me death."
And to pack up my only real ability to protect myself from bad people,
because if bad people are coming here to do us harm,
they're not coming with a rock or a 2x4.
They're going to be coming heavy.
Now I have nothing, unless you want to consider faith a defense against evil.
Just a few miles away...
Good to go.
Based on information gathered by officer Jason Jones and sergeant Mike Gilley,
the sheriff's department flies into a remote grow,
deep in the forest, where it is alleged
drug runners have been seen coming and going.
---
Sergeant Gilley and his SWAT team have touched down
alongside what they believe to be an illegal grow.
This is gonna be noisy and messy.
The suspects could be armed.
Be careful.
To keep the element of surprise,
Gilley's team must now hike three miles from the landing zone into the grow.
We'll do a covert approach
and try to pick up on the suspects,
possible locations of camps.
I've been doing this a lot of years
and have been involved in the eradication of millions and millions of plants.
With my experience over the years, this grow is occupied,
and this situation has considerable risk attached to it.
My biggest priority is the safety of my guys.
You never know what you're gonna come up against.
The team moves into place.
Their objective is to arrest the growers and take down the weed.
We got somebody running.
Go right down the main Ridge, through the plants, on the water... make it fast.
There's somebody running your way, coming down.
Looks like the southeast, toward the draw.
We got somebody running.
As sergeant Gilley and the SWAT team swarm an illegal grow,
a suspect crashes through the woods.
Let's go. Let's go. Let's go.
Go right through there into that splat.
Cover down into that hollow. We're going into that hollow.
Ok.
We got one runner headed to the southeast.
Did not get any clothing... Just dark clothes in the shadows there.
Tim, you copy?
Yes, sir.
Are you guys holding, or are you going in?
We're going airborne.
The chopper is standing by at the landing zone.
He was last seen heading down slope,
running to the southeast of that.
It looks like there's a good trail going out of the bottom of this living area.
I've got eyes on you. We're probably at about your 11 off your nose.
Copy that.
We have kind of a dangerous situation going on in this garden.
We had a runner go out the bottom of the site
in the living area
and head in kind of a southeast direction.
And right now, we have the helicopter doing some recon over top.
---
They just watered.
They were just here. He went out the back end here.
Three men managed to escape,
and with untold danger in the thick woods,
Gilley decides to focus on clearing the grow.
It looks like we had three subjects living here.
They've probably been out here about five days,
due to what we're finding left behind.
Very little personal property that would lead us to suspects at this point.
We did find some ammunition for weapons.
It looks like maybe a small-caliber holster.
There's an outstanding firearm with the guy that took off.
Oh, yeah. There's plants right out there.
Yeah, that's some good ones down there.
It was a pretty good operation.
I expect they've been in here for a couple years,
based on what I'm seeing.
Gilley and his men take to removing the plants.
It's a knockout punch to the growers,
but it comes too late.
Probably, about 1/5 of the plants had been already cut and processed,
but in the long run, I feel good about the last couple days.
We didn't catch the guy, but dope is gone.
We're done with this one.
We'll pick up and move on to the next and the next and the next.
And, you know, hopefully we'll be busting growers.
Got to go over here to weaverville and meet a guy.
I've never met him before.
I don't meet people at the farm unless I know them real well.
Despite having his bank account closed and his gun permit revoked,
a shaken Mike Boutin presses on
and heads to town to meet a potential new client.
There has been a few things here recently
that are kind of like upsetting my apple cart and giving me pause.
When you're in the game that I'm in, you have to be very careful
about the connections that you make.
- Hey, man. How's it going? - Mike.
There's no way of knowing if the new client is an undercover cop.
I got a contract for you, but I'm gonna need to see
and retain a copy of your recommendation
and also verify that, but what I like to do,
and most outfits will give, two of the ones with the seal.
Ok.
I like to have one with the seal.
Official copy?
With the embossed copy, yeah.
Part of the problem with copies
is that there could be 100 of them,
and they don't make people feel very comfortable.
Right.
And one of the ways that we try to make people feel more comfortable around here
is, you know, trying to have as many of our ducks in a row as we can,
so I like that embossed copy.
You don't have that with you right now?
I actually have a copy on my phone.
I don't have a physical copy with me.
Yeah, 'cause, see, without the physical copy
and all the paperwork and stuff,
then I can't really meet with you until I have all of that.
I had my bank account mysteriously closed for no good reason.
I had my concealed-weapons permit pulled for no good reason.
It kind of started occurring to me...
Wow, this is a whole new way I never thought of,
of being set up.
What about a police officer who goes and gets a fake I.D.,
and they go get a very real recommendation from a very real doctor,
and then attempt to join a very real collective like ours,
only to turn around and accuse us of
breaking the law because we didn't do diligence on their paperwork?
And if you're a cop trying to pretend like you're a marijuana guy,
I'm sorry, but you're not gonna fool me.
I'm gonna bug out. I'm gonna leave that with you.
You know what, there's such a thing called "Photoshop,"
and you're not gonna Photoshop your way into this collective,
and so I just had to cut that guy loose.
Yo, Shotty!
Yo!
What's up, man? It's Skweaz.
Hours after an unexpected visit from the cops,
Shotwell is gathering his crew again to head into the Emerald Triangle
and come back to Vallejo with pounds of Boutin's premium weed.
- Where's everybody else? - You know me. I'm just getting up.
So, I've come up with this rough idea
around supply and demand in the cannabis industry.
Dispensary owners down here don't have any more marijuana supply,
therefore they can't supply their patients.
I think I can make a penny on fixing that problem.
They're supposed to be here by now.
I got to put a crew together to do this.
I'm down.
- You down, Skweaz? - All right.
- You're in? - You down, Sticks?
- Yep. - That's what's up.
I'm gonna put all these people to work,
and I'm going to make this run like a well oiled machine.
Yo.
Yo, where the hell are you, man?
What?!
What do you mean you're not going?
Dude, he's trying to [Bleep] bail.
Dude, get over here, bro. Dude, we're leaving right now.
Why are you doing this to me right now?
Yo.
Yo, where the hell are you, man?
What?!
What do you mean you're not going?
Dude, no.
Dude, we [Bleep] planned this, dude. Get your ass over here, dude.
2/3 of Matt Shotwell's crew have bailed on the plan to drive north
to pick up Mike Boutin's cannabis.
No. You're not gonna get in any trouble, dude.
Dude, he's trying to [Bleep] bail.
Dude, get over here, bro. Dude, we're leaving right now.
Why are you doing this to me right now?
It turns out that Shotwell's associates were spooked by their run-in with the law.
Don't ever ask me for another opportunity to make money again.
This is the last one, and you [Bleep] me on it,
so [Bleep] you, too.
---
It's you, then, dude.
You're gonna have to drive.
The last man standing with Shotwell is his former security guard, Skweaz.
When Matt told me about this proposal, I told him I was in regardless.
Even if he was selling sand to the beach, I was there.
He looked out for me when the world didn't.
Come on, man. Friends don't do that to friends. Where's the loyalty?
---
- For real? - Let's do it.
[Bleep] Yeah, dude.
---
The tags are good, dude. I got that from smog, man.
[Bleep] Yeah, dude. Thank you.
---
Did you [Bleep] see that rollers?
Eyeballing me and [Bleep]
They're always coming by my house.
It's like they [Bleep] know.
Just when we're getting ready to go north [bleep] cops got to roll by my house.
All right. 101 north.
Shotwell's plan is finally under way.
I'm pissed. My boys, they betrayed me in the 11th hour.
I'm too trusting sometimes, man. I trusted Skweaz,
I trusted Curtis, I trusted Sticks, and 2/3 of my crew just dissolved
in a matter of 30 minutes.
Everything is at stake with this because
I was going up there with three marijuana patients in one car,
and each one of them could have carried,
which would have made the run profitable and worth our time.
Without their associates,
they'll have to transport a lot less pot,
which means less money in Shotwell's pocket.
---
If you want to listen to hip-hop, it's 45, 46, 47.
---
You're welcome, sir.
It's time crunch. It's harvest time.
And if I don't get up there and get it back down here,
everyone else is gonna be harvesting. Once croptober hits,
the market's flooded and prices just plummet,
so timing is everything with this.
If we don't get up there at the right time and get back,
this whole trip is a waste.
Now there's just me and Skweaz.
Skweaz is my only hope, man. If he bails on me, I'm [Bleep]
Yeah, baby, it's go time.
It's go time.
It's halfway through the growing season in the Emerald Triangle,
and tensions are at an all-time high.
You can't have enough helicopters and enough pigs on the ground
to stop this cannabis movement.
You got guns? We got guns.
These are cannabis soldiers out here, and our balls are bigger than yours.
You're just doing a job. This is our life.
We will win.
Heads up!
To say to me, "well, this is a harmless flower"...
Well, I don't think so,
because I've devoted my life to dealing with this "harmless flower,"
and I've seen some carnage.
I feel like what I'm doing is a blessing to people.
I feel like what I'm doing is as American as it gets.
We still got a lot of season ahead of us,
so we'll be out here running the hills till the snow flies.
I'm not going to let this whole cannabis movement
just break off and fall into the Pacific Ocean
because the D.E.A. is hacking away at the coastline of cannabis over here.
It's not happening.
And as the war rages on,
even the strongest of heart are shaken to the core.
I'm either on a mission that's supported by the heart of the universe or not,
and if I am, they can do nothing to me,
but if I'm not...
Whoa, Nelly.
Synch & corrections by Vegemite.