**Part 2 of “Barely Legal”: The Assembly’s deep Take a look at North Carolina’s unregulated hemp market.** This is the hidden truth affecting our communities. Discover the full investigation here.

In Onslow County, a silent crisis was unfolding right under our noses. For Lt. Jay Floyd, leader of the sheriff’s narcotics division, the initial complaints about local vape shops seemed minor—just teenagers getting tobacco. But by 2023, the calls grew desperate, painting a terrifying picture of a much darker reality.

“My kid is in the hospital because his or her lungs are messed up from these vapes,” parents pleaded. Then came “multiple reports” of students overdosing. Floyd’s confidential informants echoed a chilling suspicion: shops were “selling weed” masquerading as legal hemp. The fallout? More than 1,200 Marines from Camp Lejeune allegedly booted for failing drug tests – a figure Camp Lejeune couldn’t “reliably verify,” but the implication alone is staggering.

But it wasn’t just marijuana. Floyd testified that a young woman purchased gummies containing psilocin and psilocybin—the hallucinogenic compounds in magic mushrooms—from a vape shop, consumed them, and “went absolutely crazy.” Even more tragically, a Marine consumed the same product, “thought he could fly,” and died after taking a dive off a third deck. (A Camp Lejeune spokesperson later confirmed a 2024 fatality “involving the consumption of psychotropic drugs.”)

For Lt. Floyd, the evidence was clear: all of Onslow County’s vape shops were operating illegally. It was time for a crackdown.

On April 3, 2024, law enforcement launched “Operation Vapor Trail.” Seventy-one Onslow County vape shops were raided, yielding roughly 3,000 pounds of suspected marijuana and psilocybin in “just a few” locations. Sheriff Chris Thomas declared at a press conference, “Many of these products come from China, with little or no regulation… Most of these items are packaged in packaging that’s appealing to children.” (The raids, however, sparked a federal lawsuit, leading to Floyd’s deposition.)

The raids led to over 40 felony arrests. Yet, two years later, only five plea bargains for misdemeanor marijuana possession have been secured. The rest? Awaiting trial or dropped. This isn’t just an Onslow problem; similar operations have followed in Brunswick, Cumberland, Lenoir, and Fayetteville counties across eastern North Carolina. But officials are learning a frustrating truth: amid hemp’s murky legal waters, making charges stick is proving nearly impossible.

State laws are confusing, contradictory, and search warrants sometimes rest on shaky legal ground. Prosecutors face an uphill battle, often struggling to prove…