iStock/Thinkstock(NEW YORK) — Seventeen people have been indicted in New York after a takedown of a drug ring that trafficked in the herbal stimulant khat.
Shipments of khat were showing up at UPS stores in New York and were being distributed in several states.
Chewing the plant’s leaves induces a euphoric high, like with amphetamines, and it’s popular in the Mideast and Africa.
In this case, authorities say it was cultivated in Kenya and Ethiopia, shipped through Europe and stored in the U.S. — among other places, in a mosque in Brooklyn — before it was delivered to customers in New York, Massachusetts and Ohio.
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