Irish Head Shops Face Terrorist Assault

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DUBLIN, Ireland ─ It started with an explosion that destroyed the Nirvana shop in Dublin’s Capel Street on Feb. 12.

Five days later a Molotov cocktail was thrown into the Happy Hippy store in North Frederick Street.

Since then seven retail outlets with similar exotic names have been attacked with incendiary devices in different parts of Ireland, the latest being the Magic Bus Stop in Dundalk on April 15.

They are all so-called "head shops," which specialize in the sale of legal drugs and associated paraphernalia. There are 70 such stores in the Republic of Ireland, and clearly some organization or group of citizens wants to put them out of business.

The head shops' products have become something of a craze among Ireland’s middle-class youth. This makes them lucrative business ventures in recession-hit Ireland. In a two-hour period on a recent Friday night, a television crew recorded 400 young customers lining up at a head shop to pay an average of 40 euros ($53) for drugs with names like Snow Blow and Wild Cat. These substances often contain mephedrone, a chemical in white powder form that mimics cocaine and is completely legal in Ireland.

...The police do not know who is behind the attacks on the head shops, Quilter said. The chief suspects include local drug dealers who are losing business or vigilante groups worried about the effect of the shops on their neighborhoods.

...Twenty-four new, legal, chemical-based drugs emerged in Europe last year to satisfy a continent-wide demand for synthetic highs, according to a report from the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction. Nine of these are marketed as plant foods or spices but can be smoked to give a similar effect to cannabis.

...Because of the adverse publicity they have received recently, some head shops have begun distributing leaflets offering home delivery. In some parts of Dublin it is now as easy to get artificial cocaine or cannabis delivered to your door as it is to order a pizza.