United Liberty

Most of us at United Liberty are huge beer fans. Some of the staff here participate in Free the Hops, an organization to open up the laws restricting specialty beers in Alabama.  I brew beer quite regularly here in California. In fact, the beer at my wedding this summer was homebrew and I have plans to make a batch or two this weekend.

So it came as a shock to me this morning to read that a gentleman in our home town of Santa Cruz, CA was just arrested on suspicion of opium production because he was brewing a poppy seed beer.

From our local Santa Cruz Sentinel:

SANTA CRUZ — Police raided a Westside house Friday morning where they suspected people were producing opiates and arrested a UC Santa Cruz doctoral candidate who said he used dried poppy pods to flavor home-brewed beer a month ago.

“All I did was make a poppy beer,” said Chad Renzelman, 28, who was arrested at his Bay Street home Friday. “I spent all morning in jail for brewing beer. I had no idea what I was doing was illegal.”

But police reported that Renzelman, who studies chemistry, allegedly had used a chemical process to extract opium from poppy plant pods, then converted the opium to morphine.

Morphine is the active opiate in heroin.

Police reported finding a pressurized canister of homemade beer laced with morphine in Renzelman’s garage, as well as lab equipment contaminated with opium alkaloids and other hazardous chemicals.

Pressurized canister? A keg?

Renzelman said in a phone interview Friday that he bought the dried poppy pods on eBay and used them more than a month ago to make beer. He and some friends have a “home-brew co-op” and brew beer together on the weekends.

“Then we just have it always for us to drink,” he said.

Now I suppose that he could have been producing heroin, but if the police are raiding your house because you have disposed of poppy seeds, shouldn’t poppy seeds be what is illegal? Apparently that is the case.

However, just having poppy plants in a flower bed is technically a violation, though officers usually just seize the plants without making any arrests.

“It’s pretty common for people to grow poppy flowers around the city because they’re pretty,” Said Capt. Clark

So be forewarned, growing poppies is, in fact, illegal here in Santa Cruz. But, Chad Renzelman wasn’t growing the poppies, he threw out the seeds after he was done with the fermentation process. This is a very normal part of the brewing process which I’m sure police could have knocked on his door and asked him about before raiding?

Police suspected the poppies were used in the beer production, but that’s still illegal, Capt. Steve Clark said.

So using poppies is illegal?

Police got a search warrant after informants tipped them off to suspected poppy processing at the house, Clark said. Renzelman said he thinks officers found the poppy stems he put in the trash last month.

So all you Starbucks, Bakeries & Bagel Shops beware: You are liable for your poppy processing.

Renzelman was arrested on suspicion of possessing and manufacturing a controlled substance.

If convicted, Renzelman faces up to seven years in prison.