Although with every passing second I get a little bit older, I can't imagine what it's like to be known as a
. In life, we're so focused on moving forward and looking to the future, so how do you cope when the
more likely than not won't involve you in any shape or form?
Whatever the answer is to that question, it looks as if the elderly population on the whole aren't too fussed. When I picture a typical old person, I picture someone who might be struggling with a world that has somewhat passed them by, but someone with an otherworldly knowledge who sometimes performs Breaking Bad-levels of
smuggling.
Wait, what?
Yes, you read that right. This drug dealing couple could probably give Walter White and Nancy Botwin a run for their money, if they hadn't been arrested for carrying more than 60 pounds of weed in their car while driving from California to New England earlier this week.
So how exactly did 80-year-old Patrick Jiron, and his wife Barbara, 70, get into this decidedly strange situation? It all started with what the York County Sheriff’s Department in South Carolina thought would be a routine traffic stop.
Noticing their pickup truck drive over the central lane without signalling, they decided to pull the truck over, and according to Paul Vrbka with the Sheriff's Department, that's when the strong smell of raw marijuana started to waft through the airwaves.
As you might do as a law enforcement official in that situation, an immediate probable cause search was initiated, and canines were brought on just to make sure the Sheriff's Department weren't barking up the wrong tree. Sure enough, underneath the pickup's topper was the offending green, in bags upon bags upon bags, with an estimated street value of over $330,000. the Jirons were immediately brought in.
"They said the marijuana was for Christmas presents," Vrbka said. Patrick Jiron was jailed on charges of possession of marijuana with the intent to deliver without a drug tax stamp (in the state of Nebraska, marijuana dealers are required to purchase a stamp from its Department of Revenue, in order to prove that the state’s drug tax has been paid).
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His wife Barbara remained out of jail "due to some medical issues", Vrbka says, and after posting 10 percent of a $100,000 bail bond, Patrick was released as well.
At this moment in time, it's not clear whether this was an epic drug scheme nipped in the bud or simply an elderly couple who wanted to spread some Christmas cheer in an extremely unique way, but I've got to be honest, I don't know how you'd be able to procure that much weed without shaving your head, adopting a fake name and declaring to whoever will listen that you are the "one who knocks".
Either way, you kind of have to admire the sheer audacity shown here by Patrick and Barbara Jiron, who drove across the country with the kind of blithe indifferent you'd expect from an elderly couple who just want to blaze.
