Editing Timothy Leary (section)

== Legal troubles ==
[[File:Leary-DEA.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs|BNDD]] agents [[Howard Safir]] and Don Strange arrest Leary in 1972.]]

Leary's first run-in with the law came on December 23, 1965, when he was arrested for marijuana possession.<ref>Harvard Crimson. [http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1966/1/3/leary-arrested-on-drug-charge-ptimothy/ "Leary Arrested On Drug Charge"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171215083857/http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1966/1/3/leary-arrested-on-drug-charge-ptimothy/ |date=December 15, 2017 }}, ''Harvard Crimson'', January 3, 1966</ref>{{sfnp|Graboi|1991|pp=140–146}}{{sfnp|Leary|1983|pp=234-241}} On December 20, 1965, Leary took his two children, Jack and Susan, and his girlfriend Rosemary Woodruff to Mexico for an month-long vacation to rest and write an autobiography. Two days later they had crossed into [[Nuevo Laredo]], Mexico, in the late afternoon and discovered that they would have to wait until morning for the appropriate visa for an extended stay. They decided to cross back into [[Texas]] to spend the night, and were on the US–Mexico bridge when Rosemary remembered that she had a small amount of marijuana in her possession. It was impossible to throw it out on the bridge, so Susan put it in her clothes. On their return from Mexico to the United States, a [[United States Customs Service|US Customs Service]] woman officer searched Susan and found a silver snuffbox with marijuana.<ref name="Drugs: The Silver Snuffbox">{{Cite web |url=https://time.com/archive/6875062/drugs-the-silver-snuffbox/ |title=Drugs: The Silver Snuffbox  |publisher=Time |date=1966-03-16 |access-date=2024-12-22 |archive-date=2024-12-22|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241222133146/https://time.com/archive/6875062/drugs-the-silver-snuffbox/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Leary Gets 30 Years On Marijuana Charge">{{Cite web |url=https://www.thecrimson.com/article/1966/3/12/leary-gets-30-years-on-marijuana |title=Leary Gets 30 Years On Marijuana Charge |author=Stephen D. Lerner |publisher=The Harvard Crimson |date=1966-03-16 |access-date=2024-12-22 |url-status=live |archive-date=2017-12-10|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171210162307/https://www.thecrimson.com/article/1966/3/12/leary-gets-30-years-on-marijuana/ |quote="While the prosecution contended in the indictment that three ounces had been found, a government witness said that Miss Leary carried only 11 grams and the total amount found in the car was less than one-half ounce." }}</ref> After taking responsibility for the controlled substance, Leary was convicted of possession under the [[Marihuana Tax Act of 1937]] on March 11, 1966, sentenced to 30 years in prison, fined $30,000, and ordered to undergo psychiatric treatment. He appealed the case on the basis that the Marihuana Tax Act was unconstitutional, as it required a degree of [[self-incrimination]] in blatant violation of the [[Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution|Fifth Amendment]].

On December 26, 1968, Leary was arrested again in [[Laguna Beach, California]], this time for the possession of two marijuana "roaches". Leary alleged that they were planted by the arresting officer, but was convicted of the crime. On May 19, 1969, the [[Supreme Court of the United States|Supreme Court]] concurred with Leary in ''[[Leary v. United States]]'', declared the Marihuana Tax Act unconstitutional, and overturned his 1966 conviction.{{efn-ua|{{harvnb|Higgs|2006|p=99}}: "His lawyers took the appeal against the Laredo arrest all the way to the Supreme Court, and on May 19, 1969 succeeded in getting the antiquated marijuana tax law declared unconstitutional."}}

On that same day, Leary announced his candidacy for [[governor of California]] against the Republican incumbent, [[Ronald Reagan]]. His campaign slogan was "Come together, join the party." On June 1, 1969, Leary joined [[John Lennon]] and [[Yoko Ono]] at their [[Montreal]] [[Bed-ins for Peace|bed-in]], and Lennon subsequently wrote Leary a campaign song called "[[Come Together]]".<ref>{{cite web |url=http://oldies.about.com/od/thebeatlessongs/a/cometogether.htm |title=The Beatles - Come Together - History and Information from the Oldies Guide at About.com |publisher=Oldies.about.com |access-date=May 19, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140412224327/http://oldies.about.com/od/thebeatlessongs/a/cometogether.htm |archive-date=April 12, 2014 |url-status=live }}</ref>

On January 21, 1970, Leary received a ten-year sentence for his 1968 offense, with a further ten added later while in custody for a prior arrest in 1965, for a total of 20 years to be served consecutively. On his arrival in prison, he was given psychological tests used to assign inmates to appropriate work details. Having designed some of these tests himself (including the "Leary Interpersonal Behavior Inventory"), Leary answered them in such a way that he seemed to be a very conforming, conventional person with a great interest in forestry and gardening.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.researchpubs.com/books/prankexc2.shtml |title=RE/Search Publications – Pranks! – Timothy Leary |access-date=June 28, 2006 |url-status=bot: unknown |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050328092027/http://www.researchpubs.com/books/prankexc2.shtml |archive-date=March 28, 2005 }}</ref> As a result, he was assigned to work as a gardener in a lower-security prison from which he escaped in September 1970, saying that his nonviolent escape was a humorous prank and leaving a challenging note for the authorities to find after he was gone.{{sfnp|Wilson|1991|p={{page needed|date=July 2021}}}}

For a fee of $25,000, paid by [[The Brotherhood of Eternal Love]], the [[Weather Underground|Weathermen]] smuggled Leary out of prison in a pickup truck driven by [[Clayton Van Lydegraf]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Rudd |first=Mark |author-link=Mark Rudd |title=Underground: My Life with SDS and the Weathermen |year=2009 |publisher=[[William Morrow and Company]] |location=New York City |isbn=978-0-06-147275-6 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/undergroundmylif00rudd/page/225 225–7] |url=https://archive.org/details/undergroundmylif00rudd/page/225 }}</ref> The truck met Leary after he had escaped over the prison wall by climbing along a telephone wire. The Weathermen then helped both Leary and Rosemary out of the U.S. (and eventually into Algeria).<ref>{{cite video |people=[[Brian Flanagan]] |year=2002 |title=The Weather Underground |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kg7N6lhjZeA | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150519210045/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kg7N6lhjZeA| archive-date=2015-05-19 | url-status=dead|publisher=The Free History Project |access-date=August 9, 2016}}{{cbignore}}</ref> He sought the patronage of [[Eldridge Cleaver]] for $10,000 and the remnants of the [[Black Panther Party]]'s "government in exile" in Algeria, but after a short stay with them said that Cleaver had attempted to hold him and his wife hostage.{{sfnp|Leary|1983|pp=304-306}}<ref name="Coleman2009">{{cite news |last=Coleman |first=Kate |title=Acid Trips and Frozen Heads at San Francisco's Trippiest Party |url=https://www.thedailybeast.com/acid-trips-and-frozen-heads-at-san-franciscos-trippiest-party |website=Daily Beast |date=February 18, 2009 |access-date=February 16, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170910035850/http://www.thedailybeast.com/acid-trips-and-frozen-heads-at-san-franciscos-trippiest-party |archive-date=September 10, 2017 |url-status=live }}</ref> Cleaver had put Leary and his wife under "house arrest" due to exasperation with their socialite lifestyle.<ref name="Coleman2009"/>

In 1971, the couple fled to Switzerland, where they were sheltered and effectively imprisoned by a high-living arms dealer, Michel Hauchard, who claimed he had an "obligation as a gentleman to protect philosophers"; Hauchard intended to broker a surreptitious film deal, and forced Leary to assign his future earnings (which Leary eventually won back).<ref name=Sante/><ref name=Rein2017>{{cite web |last=Rein |first=Lisa |url=https://boingboing.net/2017/08/30/interview-with-timothy-leary-a.html |title=Interview with Timothy Leary Archivist Michael Horowitz |publisher=Boing Boing |date=August 30, 2017 |access-date=February 17, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180217141920/https://boingboing.net/2017/08/30/interview-with-timothy-leary-a.html |archive-date=February 17, 2018 |url-status=live }}</ref> In 1972, Nixon's attorney general, [[John N. Mitchell|John Mitchell]], persuaded the Swiss government to imprison Leary, which it did for a month, but refused to extradite him to the U.S.<ref name=Rein2017/>

Leary and Rosemary separated later that year; she traveled widely, then moved back to the U.S., where she lived as a fugitive until the 1990s.<ref name=Rein2017/><ref name=RL /> Shortly after his separation from Rosemary in 1972, Leary became involved with Swiss-born British socialite [[Joanna Harcourt-Smith]], a stepdaughter of financier [[Árpád Plesch]] and ex-girlfriend of Hauchard.<ref name=Rein2017/> The couple married in a hotel under the influence of cocaine and LSD {{citation needed|date=January 2023}} two weeks after they were introduced, and Harcourt-Smith used his surname until their breakup in 1977. They traveled to [[Vienna]], then [[Beirut]], and finally ended up in [[Kabul]], Afghanistan, in 1972; according to [[Lucy Sante]], "Afghanistan had no extradition treaty with the United States, but this stricture did not apply to American airliners."<ref name=Sante/> American authorities used that interpretation of the law to interdict Leary. "Before Leary could deplane, he was arrested by an agent of the federal [[Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs]]."<ref name=Sante/> Leary asserted a different story on appeal before the [[California Court of Appeal for the Second District]], namely:<ref>People v. Leary, [http://law.justia.com/cases/california/calapp3d/40/527.html 40 Cal.App.3d 527] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131224110651/http://law.justia.com/cases/california/calapp3d/40/527.html |date=December 24, 2013 }} (1974)</ref>

{{blockquote|He testified further that he had a valid [[United States passport|passport]] in Kabul and that it was confiscated while he was in a line at the American Embassy in Kabul a few days prior to the day when he boarded the airplane; after his passport was confiscated, he was taken to "Central Police Headquarters"; he did not attempt to contact the American Embassy; the Kabul police held him in custody and took him to a "police hotel". The cousin of the King of Afghanistan came to see him and told him that it was a national holiday, that the King and the officials were out of Kabul, and that he (the cousin) would get a lawyer and see that Leary "had a hearing". On the morning the airplane left Kabul, officials of Afghanistan told him he was to leave Afghanistan. Leary replied he would not leave without a hearing and until he got his passport back; they said the Americans had his passport, and he was taken to the airplane.}}

Leary's bail was set at $5 million.<ref name=Rein2017/>{{sfnp|Greenfield|2006|pp=436-467}} The judge at his remand hearing said, "If he is allowed to travel freely, he will speak publicly and spread his ideas".<ref>and also reportedly declared, "He has preached the length and breadth of the land, and I am inclined to the view that he would pose a danger to the community if released." [[Jesse Walker]] (2006) "The Acid Guru's Long, Strange Trip" ''The American Conservative'', November 6, 2006.</ref> Facing 95 years in prison, Leary hired criminal defense attorney [[Bruce Margolin]]. Leary mostly directed his own defense strategy, which proved unsuccessful: the jury convicted him after deliberating for less than two hours.<ref name=Rein2017/> Leary received five years for his prison escape, added to his original 10-year sentence.<ref name=Rein2017/> In 1973, he was sent to [[Folsom Prison]] in California, and put in solitary confinement.<ref name=Rein2017/><ref>{{vague|reason= was he awaiting trial, found guilty, or confined for in-court behavior|date=March 2017}} [[Nick Gillespie]], "[https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/14/AR2006061402139_pf.html Psychedelic, Man], {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170226074050/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/14/AR2006061402139_pf.html |date=February 26, 2017 }}" ''Washington Post'', June 15, 2006</ref> While in Folsom, he was placed in a cell next to [[Charles Manson]]'s. They could not see each other, but they could talk together. In their discussions, Manson found it difficult to understand why Leary had given people LSD without trying to control them. At one point, Manson said to Leary, "They took you off the streets so that I could continue with your work."<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.rawstory.com/2017/11/he-was-no-hippie-remembering-manson-prison-scientology-and-mind-control/|title=He was no hippie: Remembering Manson, prison, Scientology and mind control|date=November 26, 2017|website=Raw Story|access-date=November 27, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171126164330/https://www.rawstory.com/2017/11/he-was-no-hippie-remembering-manson-prison-scientology-and-mind-control/|archive-date=November 26, 2017|url-status=live}}</ref>

Leary became an FBI informant in order to shorten his prison sentence and entered the witness protection program upon his release in 1976.<ref>{{cite web |title=Timothy Leary was FBI informer |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/380815.stm |website=BBC World News |access-date=December 25, 2019}}</ref><ref>{{cite magazine |last1=Menand |first1=Louis |title=Acid Redux |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2006/06/26/acid-redux |magazine=The New Yorker |date=June 18, 2006 |access-date=December 25, 2019}}</ref> He claimed that he feigned cooperation with the FBI investigation of [[Weatherman (organization)|Weathermen]] by providing information that they already had or that was of little consequence. The FBI gave him the code name "Charlie Thrush".{{sfnp|Lee|Shlain|1992|p=274}} In a 1974 news conference, Allen Ginsberg, Ram Dass, and Leary's 25-year-old son Jack denounced Leary, calling him a "cop informant", "liar", and "paranoid schizophrenic".<ref>{{cite news |last=Fosburgh |first=Lacey |title=Leary Scored as 'Cop Informant' By His Son and 2 Close Friends |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1974/09/19/archives/leary-scored-as-cop-informant-by-his-son-and-2-close-friends.html |newspaper=The New York Times |location=New York, NY |date=September 10, 1974 |access-date=February 15, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180216204642/http://www.nytimes.com/1974/09/19/archives/leary-scored-as-cop-informant-by-his-son-and-2-close-friends.html |archive-date=February 16, 2018 |url-status=live }}</ref> No prosecutions stemmed from his FBI reporting. In 1999, a letter from 22 "Friends of Timothy Leary" sought to soften impressions of the FBI episode. It was signed by authors such as [[Douglas Rushkoff]], [[Ken Kesey]], and [[Robert Anton Wilson]]. [[Susan Sarandon]], [[Genesis P-Orridge]] and Leary's goddaughter [[Winona Ryder]] also signed.<ref name="Coleman2009"/><ref name="Letter1999">{{cite web |title=Open Letter from the Friends of Timothy Leary |url=http://www.konformist.com/1999/leary.htm |access-date=July 4, 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090207180329/http://www.konformist.com/1999/leary.htm |archive-date=February 7, 2009 |url-status=live }}</ref> The letter said that Leary had smuggled a message to the Weather Underground informing it "that he was considering making a deal with the FBI" and he then "waited for their approval". The reported reply was, "We understand."<ref name="Letter1999"/>{{sfnp|Higgs|2006|p=273}} The letter writers did not provide confirmation that the Weather Underground okayed his cooperation with the FBI.

While in prison, Leary was sued by the parents of Vernon Powell Cox, who had jumped from a third-story window of a Berkeley apartment while under the influence of LSD. Cox had taken the drug after attending a lecture by Leary promoting LSD use. Leary was unable to be present due to his incarceration, and unable to arrange for legal representation; a default judgment was entered against him in the amount of $100,000.<ref>{{cite news |title=Notes on People |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1975/01/25/archives/notes-on-people-ford-to-name-judge-for-jersey.html |newspaper=The New York Times |location=New York, NY |date=January 25, 1975 |access-date=June 22, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171001165412/http://www.nytimes.com/1975/01/25/archives/notes-on-people-ford-to-name-judge-for-jersey.html |archive-date=October 1, 2017 |url-status=live }}</ref>