The Drug Laws featuring Peanut Pete 1990



Our first drug laws leaflet for this group, ‘Call the Cops’ was based on advice from Release to say nothing before speaking to a solicitor.



The most common problem among young ecstasy users coming into our service in the early 1990’s was the fact that they had been charged with ‘Possession’ or ‘Possession with Intent to Supply’. So, the first Peanut Pete drug law leaflet focused on explaining this issue.



By 1994 when the leaflet was redesigned (with a brand new gadget called a computer), times had changed. The police had told us they couldn’t cope with the numbers of drug users and saw it as a waste of time filling out the 50 odd bits of paper involved in arresting someone for simple possession, so wanted to save time by giving people a caution - which was better for them and the person they had just nicked*.



A target driven decade or so later - after the creation of a criminal justice industry and an obsession with criminalizing young people - the MODA leaflet reflected the drug laws as a brainless monster.



*NOTE: There were also two posters based on this leaflet, which sadly we don’t seem to have any copies of.

> Read leaflet online

> Peanut Pete - The Rave Years



