A California man left psychedelic mushroom gummies out for trick-or-treaters on Halloween, and at least 15 children — toddlers among them — picked up the packages before parents intervened.
Shawn Michael Foster, 45, of San Diego's Ocean Beach neighborhood, was arrested after parents discovered psilocybin-laced candy outside his home on the 2100 block of Sunset Cliffs Boulevard. One father, Frank Cary, told NBC 7 that his 2-year-old son grabbed a package before he noticed the packaging: a giraffe with melting text, a five-gram dosage label, and the words "psilocybin mushrooms" on the back. Parents turned the packages over to police, who confirmed they contained the psychoactive compound.
This is what a culture that celebrates drug normalization produces: adults dosing children without a second thought.
A search of Foster's property turned up more than 2.5 pounds of cannabis, 25 grams of crystal methamphetamine, drug-sale ledgers, packaging materials, an illegally possessed rifle, ammunition, and a partially assembled pistol, the New York Post reported. This was not a mistake. This was a drug operation that handed its product to children on a holiday devoted to them.
Foster's daughter, Devilyn Foster, offered a defense that defies explanation. She told NBC 7 that neighbors have it out for her father because they consider the property a "witch house." "There's people in the neighborhood who don't like how the house appears, and think that it's the 'witch house' or that something bad," she said. "So I am willing to bet that specific people have it out for them." The implication that a neighborhood aesthetic dispute — not the drugs given to children — is the real story tells you everything about where accountability lands in this culture.
Foster pleaded not guilty to transporting controlled substances to a minor and two firearms-related charges. A judge released him on supervised bail with orders to avoid minors, stay in San Diego County, and refrain from drugs. He is due back in court November 17. An 80-year-old co-defendant, Michael Goff, faces a felony firearm-possession charge.
The press will call this isolated. But psilocybin legalization efforts have spread state by state, and the message that drugs are harmless has consequences — especially for a 2-year-old who nearly ate a five-gram dose of psychedelics on his own doorstep.
The question isn't whether Foster is an outlier. The question is how many more children have to be endangered before the adults in charge start acting like it matters.
