The Ghosts in the Files: How the Feds Buried Medical Cannabis and Called It Science
They buried it. Sworn affidavits, court testimonies, clinical studies, VA contradictions—shoved into dusty archives and forgotten like last year’s war. Not by accident. Not out of ignorance. But by design.
I know because I’ve seen the receipts.
I'm a veteran. I’ve danced with death in Baghdad, sparred with PTSD back home, and watched the government try to shove my medicine into a cage of stigma. Years ago, I found myself elbow-deep in archival documents—forgotten files Alice O’Leary Randall entrusted to me, back when she was laying groundwork for Project 50. The kind of documents you don’t expect to find unless someone wants you to find them. These weren’t conspiracy theories scribbled on napkins. These were federal court files, transcripts, and affidavits—some typed on old Selectric IIIs, ink barely holding on.
And what they said was simple: Cannabis works. The government knew. They just didn’t want you to.
Cue the chorus of bureaucratic denial:
“It’s anecdotal.”
Not when it’s a sworn affidavit. Not when it’s Dr. Robert Hepler, a UCLA ophthalmologist, testifying under oath that cannabis was the only thing keeping Robert Randall from going blind. Not when veterans are prescribed poison cocktails of pills but get punished for lighting a joint that helps them sleep.
“We need more research.”
You had it. In the ‘70s. You ran it through the FDA. You let scientists at Howard and UCLA run clinical trials, then slammed the doors shut when the results threatened your war on drugs. You didn’t want answers—you wanted obedience.
“Today’s cannabis is too strong.”
So is fentanyl, but it’s in every hospital in America. Funny how potency only becomes a moral panic when it’s wrapped in a joint and not a prescription bottle.
“People just want to get high.”
Tell that to John Roe, who started going blind at 8 and kept his vision by rolling six joints a day. Tell it to the Vietnam vet who smoked fed-grown cannabis from the VA while his brothers in arms were arrested for doing the same thing. Tell it to me—someone who used cannabis to walk away from the edge and live to raise hell about it.
The real kicker? The government grew the damn weed. At a farm in Mississippi. Packaged it in metal tins. Sent it through the VA. Then turned around and told the rest of us it had no medical value. That’s not just gaslighting. That’s policy malpractice.
And while they were handing out awards and building new wings on hospitals, patients were being told to shut up, suffer, or go blind. Veterans like me were handed a diagnosis instead of a treatment—labeled with “Cannabis Use Disorder” for trying to survive on something that works.
Here’s the truth:
This was never about science. It was about control.
The affidavits are real. The testimonies are documented. The files exist. We’ve got Dr. John Merritt, Dr. Ben Fine, patients like John Foe, Jane Poe, and the legendary Robert Randall himself—all saying the same thing: cannabis saved their sight, their sanity, their lives.
The government didn’t just ignore them—they disappeared them.
But here we are. Pulling the receipts out of the fire. Speaking the names they tried to erase.
If that makes them uncomfortable, good. This isn’t a plea. It’s a reckoning.
🗂️ Source Integrity Statement
Every summary, breakdown, and historical analysis published in this series is rooted in authenticated primary documents archived within the Project 50 directory. These materials include—but are not limited to—official correspondence, press clippings, federal filings, FOIA records, and scanned mono series from the original medical cannabis pioneers.
If you have questions about the origin of any document, you are encouraged to:
Visit the Project 50 directory, where the source material is maintained and curated.
Verify descriptions and timelines against the original scans, file names, and archival order.
Engage respectfully if you spot a gap—this is a living library, and contributions or corrections are welcomed with good intent.
This archive is built not for gatekeeping, but for guardianship. We share because the truth was buried—and now it’s time to unearth it together.
So to the Feds, the gatekeepers, the legacy pharma bootlickers:
Save your breath. We know what you’ll say. We’ve heard it for 50 years.
This time, we brought the receipts.
Now let’s see you lie with the lights on.
Ricardo "Rico" Pereyda is a U.S. Army combat veteran turned cannabis truth-digger, political dissident, and reluctant archivist of America’s forgotten sins. He once walked the streets of Baghdad with a rifle and now roams the bureaucratic graveyards of federal cannabis policy with a flashlight and a middle finger.
After nearly losing himself to VA meds and government gaslighting, Ricardo didn’t just turn to weed—he turned to history. He unearthed a mountain of affidavits and medical testimony that the feds tried to bury, digitizing decades of evidence while helping Alice O’Leary Randall breathe life into Project 50. He didn’t ask for permission—he asked for the records. And when they gave him nothing, he found them anyway.
With one class left at the University of Arizona, he walked out to fight for truth in the shadows of broken systems. He’s tangled with think tanks, organized garden-based healing movements, and been blackballed from civic fellowships for saying what needed to be said.
Featured in Rolling Stone, VICE, CNN, and the haunted corners of your conscience, Ricardo isn’t here to beg for reform. He’s here to remind us that we already knew the truth—we just didn’t have the guts to read it.
