Virgil Hales is a marijuana legalization activist who was said by friends to believe pot was a “cure all” whatever that means. He ran for office and most recently garnered 316 votes out of 17,000 cast. Hales was also active in a brain injury support group and there is some talk of him having suffered a brain injury himself.

One day it seems Hales wanted to prove to his friends that pot was a miracle drug so he made a pot laced cake to give to his friends. Unaware of his little experiment they partook of the cake in which the chronic pot smoker might have used too much cannabis for people unused to getting high:

One woman who ate two pieces of the cake says she collapsed and was taken to the hospital. Roxanne Loget tells Action News, she felt she was going to die. “There was a point when I really did believe I was dying. I actually began to get back to normal, and I started to think about this, that I was tripping on cannabis.”

As a town council candidate, the legalization of marijuana was Hales’ primary platform, and according to support group members, it was about all he talked about at their meetings.

District Attorney Mike Ramsey says Hales “was not a well person.” While group members feel badly for Hales, they feel violated and want him to pay for his crime.

Before the comments even start I grew up in the 70s and 80s and I have seen people who have smoked too much pot “trip” and have bad reactions so no crap about it being harmless.

Hales was declared incompetent to stand trial and sent to a hospital.

There is a Virgil Hales listed in as a Green party Parliamentarian in the crank “mini-state” project in California. There are references to Hales on several legalization websites, maybe if he spent as much time on his mental health as he did on crazed hippydom he’d be a free man now.

The question for legalization advocates is won’t there be more crimes like this after legalization?

KHSlTV has video.