Quick survey: Raise your hand if you’ve ever indulged in an illegal substance at a music festival. Oh, you haven’t and think this story doesn’t matter to you? Guess again.
“The Man” is starting to mess around with music festivals in a big, big way. The most recent attack: Camp Zoe in Missouri was raided by a slew of government agencies including the DEA, ATF, and for some reason the IRS. According to a press release on the Camp Zoe site, their assets have been seized, no arrest warrants have been made, and most insane of all, they’re trying to seize the the property. From the Camp Zoe site —
They confiscated gate receipt money from the weekend that was not already deposited in the bank. They also confiscated some computers and some paperwork from the file cabinets in the offices onsite. One patron was arrested for previous warrants unrelated to Camp Zoe. The same day the DEA seized all the money in the Camp Zoe bank account – which included most of the gate receipts for the Spookstock 9 weekend. This money was to be used to pay staff, artists, security, production (lights & sound), trash pickup, etc. for the festival weekend. It was also to be used for the basic bills for Camp Zoe to get the business through the winter – mortgage, electric, insurance, phones, advertising, staff, etc. On November 8 they also filed an application to seize the Camp Zoe property. No arrest warrants have yet been issued for any of the Camp Zoe staff or owners.
In an even more bizarre twist, the assholes behind the raid have been working this case for four fucking years! There’s your tax money at work, folks. Paying cops to go to music festivals and buy drugs. And you’re going to tell me that Special Agent Utah didn’t drop one hit of ecstasy while listening to a Jerry Garcia cover band?
Stay tuned…