http://www.wbaltv.com/education/22739368/detail.html

Sarah Palin shopping reality show about Alaska with 'Survivor' producer Mark Burnett

Sherryl Connelly
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

 

Thursday, March 4th 2010, 2:20 PM

 

Reinke/AP

Sarah Palin addresses attendees at the National Tea Party Convention in Nashville, Tenn., Feb. 6, 2010. The politician is currently shopping a reality series.

No one ever doubted that Sarah Palin was a survivor, but she's taking that a step further by pitching a reality show with "Survivor" producer Mark Burnett.

Palin and the master of reality television have been shopping a docudrama about Alaska to all the major broadcasters, multiple sources told EntertainmentWeekly.com. She and Burnett have taken meetings at ABC and CBS, with plans to stop by NBC.

They also confabbed with reality chief Mike Darnell at Fox, where the Palin family seized the opportunity to visit "American Idol," though the former vice-presidential candidate stayed in the green room.

One executive joked that "she's pitching a sequel to 'Commander in Chief,' " a defunct show that starred Geena Davis as the first female president.

The former governor of Alaska and her family would appear on the show, which was described by an insider as "'Planet Earth' meets Alaska meets her family." "Planet Earth" is the Discovery channel's high-definition nature series hit.

"There's an awful lot of interest in her," said an executive. "As a short-order series, it might work. It would depend on what kind of footage you get."

Palin started her week in Los Angeles appearing on "The Tonight Show," where she joked with Jay Leno that the difference between Alaska and L.A. is that "Here when people have a frozen look on their face, I find out it's Botox."

She also swept through the Oscar week gift suites. 

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/tv/2010/03/04/2010-03-04_sarah_palin_shopping_reality_show_about_alaska_with_survivor_producer_mark_burne.html#ixzz0hGjUoyfM

http://www.nydailynews.com/real_estate/galleries/celebrity_homes/celebrity_homes.html

Could L.A. throne be fit for a King?

As unlikely as it probably is, Lakers franchise has been quite fortunate when it comes to landing elite talent

Vincent Bonsignore

Staff Writer

03/04/2010 12:02:55 AM PST

Cleveland Cavaliers' LeBron James (23) and Los Angeles Lakers guard Kobe... ((AP Photo/Tony Dejak))

LeBron James playing for the Lakers next year is such a far-fetched, preposterous, outlandish fantasy we have no other choice but to completely and utterly embrace it.

And we have every right to, every reason to, because this is Hollywood. Crazy, whimsical dreams like this come true all the time for the Lakers.

Just look at their history.

They acquired Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the greatest player in the game at the time, from Milwaukee for four players in 1975. They lucked into Magic Johnson and James Worthy after acquiring draft picks (which turned out to be No. 1s overall) from lowly Utah and Cleveland.

The Lakers have always been fortunate like that, and probably always will be. It's part of their charm, and the main reason they've been the most glamorous team in the NBA since arriving here in 1960.

Players want to come here, star here. They understand they'll perform on one of sports' biggest stages, and they'll contend for championships every year.

So when the opportunity to come here presents itself, they do whatever it takes to make it happen.

Remember when there was no chance the Orlando Magic would allow Shaquille O'Neal to leave as a free agent at the height of his game in 1996?

Yet that is exactly what happened.

These are the Lakers, and this is where the biggest stars in the game come to play.

O'Neal went on to lead the Lakers to three consecutive championships from 2000-03.

While we're on the subject of the summer of 1996, keep in mind that was the same offseason the Lakers shipped Vlade Divac to Charlotte for the draft rights to a 17-year-old kid from Lower Merion High outside Philadelphia.

That's how the Lakers ended up with Kobe Bryant.

Yeah, dreams come true for the Lakers.

Crazy, impossible dreams that have no business even being talked about; yet somehow, someway, always seem to come to fruition.

You think the Pau Gasol trade just happened? Do you think someone just acquires a spectacular talent like Gasol for Kwame Brown and Javaris Crittenton?

Absolutely not.

Unless you're the Lakers, who always seem to bask in good fortune.

This brings us to James, and the crazy notion of him joining forces next year with Bryant and Gasol in Los Angeles.

For any other team, obtaining the greatest young player in the game is a fantasy too outrageous to even consider, and that includes the clubs currently jockeying for cap space to make a run at James when he becomes a free agent this summer.

But there is no dream too big for the Lakers, as they have proved throughout their charismatic existence.

The rumor has been out there for a few months now, with longtime NBA reporter Sam Smith floating it out of Chicago back in November. It picked up steam this week when a source close to Phil Jackson told Hoopshype.com that James had expressed interest in playing for the Lakers next year.

Within hours, talk radio and Internet message boards were buzzing with the possibility.

Some people dismissed it as far-fetched. The Lakers are too far over the salary cap, they argued, and there is no way James and Bryant can possibly coexist on the same team.

Details, I say, details.

Not only can it happen, if James really wants it to, it will happen.

Stay with me here.

First, the Cavaliers will do everything in their power to make sure he stays.

But if James wants to leave, he will. And it just so happens his desire to play for the Lakers also gives the Cavaliers a decent fallback plan should he go.

First, the Lakers have enough young talent to work out a sign-

and-trade deal with the Cavaliers. Instead of letting James walk away for nothing, Cleveland can reap something in return.

For the Cavs, getting Andrew Bynum and Lamar Odom or Ron Artest, plus a couple of first-round picks, looks a whole lot better than the nothing they'll get if James signs with New York or New Jersey.

Second, it keeps James out of the Eastern Conference.

If you're the Cavaliers, losing James is easier to digest if you have to play him only twice a year compared with the handful of times they'd see him if he stayed in the same conference.

As far as James and Bryant not being able to coexist, that is nonsense.

Bryant coexisted with O'Neal well enough to win three championships with him, and James and Bryant played brilliantly together in the 2008 Olympics, leading Team USA to the gold medal.

It's the perfect situation for both.

Bryant has only a few more years left, and the opportunity to add to his championship collection is immediately enhanced with the addition of James.

By the time Bryant gets fazed out, King James will be entering his prime, ready to take over the franchise. Kareem once passed the torch to Magic, and Bryant took over for Shaq.

That's the way the Lakers do it. One great player turns over control to the next one. It's how they've managed to hang 10 championship banners over the past 40 years and become the NBA's flagship franchise.

So how does this all come about?

That's the easy part.

James goes to the Cavaliers and gives them an ultimatum. Trade me to the Lakers, or I will sign with the New York Knicks or Chicago Bulls - with you getting nothing in return - and I will haunt you five or six times every year for the next decade.

If you are the Cavaliers, what choice do you really have but to comply? If you're going to lose James, wouldn't you want something valuable in return, and don't you want him as far away from Cleveland as possible?

If you're the Lakers, you gladly deal Bynum and either Odom or Artest and a couple of first-round picks to ensure your dynasty continues for the foreseeable future.

Crazy? Far-fetched?

Certainly.

Possible? Absolutely.

Sarah Palin and entourage descend like 'locusts' on Oscar swag suite

Brian Kates
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

 

Originally Published:Thursday, March 4th 2010, 10:10 AM
Updated: Thursday, March 4th 2010, 10:26 AM

 

Reinke/AP

An entertainment website is reporting that Sarah Palin and her entourage descended like 'locusts' onto an Oscar swag suite.

Sarah Palin and her entourage descended "like locusts" on the Oscar swag suite, scarfing up freebies in a binge that "practically cleaned the place out," celebrity gossips reported Thursday.

The former Alaska Gov's Wednesday pigout included jewels from Pascal Mouawad, watches by Skagen and a fancy new hairdo for her daughter Willow. The new coiffure came courtesy of Erick Orellana, Jennifer Aniston's longtime hairstylist, witnesses said.

The Los Angeles Times reported Palin was supposed to donate all of her gift items back to the Silver Spoon Oscar Suite for auction, as well as $1,700 of her own cash, in support of Red Cross efforts in Haiti and Chile.

But E! Online insisted, "we can assure you she did not give up any of her swag."

The entertainment news outlet quoted an unnamed vendor who said that as many as 20 people from the Palin camp swarmed the event.

"They were like locusts," he said.

News of Palin's grabfest ignited the blogosphere.

"She insisted every person in her huge entourage get something, and there were assistants, nannies, security - insanity!," an unnamed HollywoodLife.com source said.

HollywoodLife.com also reported that Palin picked up a blue Kenya robe from designer Jenna Leigh, facewash and a pair of foam Bandal sandals.

"She kind of cleaned the place out," Ben Russo of EMC/Bowery told AOL's Pop Eater. The website said swag-grabs included 40 pairs of AIAIAI earphones.

One witness said security swept the venue and would not allow photos.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2010/03/04/2010-03-04_sarah_palin_and_entourage_descend_like_locusts_on_oscar_swag_suite.html#ixzz0hEejAq9S

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0310/33866.html

http://www.nationalenquirer.com/grand_jury_indictment_john_edwards_hunter_coverup/celebrity/68250

Obama Health Care Speech: It's Time To Act

ALAN FRAM

AP

03/ 3/10

02:24 PM 

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama urged Congress Wednesday to vote "up or down" on sweeping health care legislation in the next few weeks, endorsing a plan that denies Senate Republicans the right to kill the bill by stalling with a filibuster.

"I don't see how another year of negotiations would help. Moreover, the insurance companies aren't starting over," Obama said, rejecting Republican calls to begin anew on an effort to remake the health care system.

The president made his appeal as Democratic leaders in Congress surveyed their rank and file for the votes needed to pass legislation by majority vote – invoking rules that deny Senate Republicans the right to block it through endless stalling debate. Obama specifically endorsed that approach.

The outcome will affect nearly every American, either making major changes in the ways they receive and pay for health care or leaving current systems in place. There is still no certainty about the final result in Congress – or even that Democrats will agree to the series of changes that Obama said he was including as Republican contributions.

GOP leaders were unmoved.

The Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, said a decision by Democrats to invoke rules that bar filibusters would be "met with outrage" by the public, and he said Obama was pushing a sweeping bill that voters don't want.

"They've had enough of this yearlong effort to get a win for the Democratic Party at any price to the American people," McConnell said on the Senate floor.

At its core, Obama's proposal would extend health care to tens of millions of uninsured Americans while cracking down on insurance company practices such as denying coverage on the basis of a pre-existing medical condition.

With his remarks, delivered at the White House, Obama took the lead in a bid by congressional Democrats to mount a party-line rescue mission for the health care legislation that appeared on the cusp of passage late last year, only to be derailed when Republicans won a Massachusetts Senate seat that gave them the ability to block it.

Story continues below

Obama's remarks were replete with criticism of the insurance industry as well as dismissive asides about GOP critics.

Insurers are "continuing to raise premiums and deny coverage. For us to start over now could simply lead to delay that could last for another decade or more," he said.

As for calls for additional debate, he said that in the year since he inaugurated his campaign for health care changes, "every idea has been put on the table. Every argument has been made."

"Everything there is to say about health care has been said, and just about everyone has said it," Obama said as murmurs of laughter swept through his receptive audience of invited guests in the White House East Room.

The president's appearance appeared part of an endgame strategy put in motion last week, when Obama presided over a bipartisan summit meeting with leaders of both parties and both houses. After seven hours of discussion, he said he had heard ideas for changes from sides, and he signaled that the time may have come for Democrats to proceed on their own if GOP critics were not ready to join them.

While his spokesmen and Democratic congressional leaders joined in calls for an up-or-down vote – a simple majority, no filibusters allowed – the White House announced with fanfare on Tuesday he was asking lawmakers to incorporate four GOP suggestions.

Obama said he was exploring GOP proposals for cracking down on fraudulent medical charges, revamping ways to resolve malpractice disputes, boosting doctors' Medicaid reimbursements and offering tax incentives to curb unnecessary patient visits to doctors.

The ideas included an experiment that would establish special courts in which judges with medical expertise would decide malpractice allegations. The idea has been criticized by the Center for Justice & Democracy, a consumer group that prefers the current system of awarding damages. It said health courts would be "anti-patient."

In a speech that reprised many of the points he has made in the past year, Obama cast the battle over health care as something more.

"At stake right now is not just our ability to solve this problem, but our ability to solve any problem. The American people want to know it is still possible for Washington to look out for their interests and their future. They are waiting for us to act."

"They are waiting for us to lead. And as long as I hold this office, I intend to provide that leadership."

Immediately after Obama finished speaking, the White House made good on his promise to "do everything in my power to make the case for reform," saying he would travel to Pennsylvania on Monday and to Missouri next Wednesday to press the issue.

LINK TO STORY AND AUDIO TAPE OF BOY:

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/2010/03/03/2010-03-03_now_landing_your_plane__a_schoolboy.html

March 02, 2010

Oh, baby! Surprise guest joins wedding party

CLAUDIA BOYD-BARRETT
BLADE STAFF WRITER

Invitation or not, Tova Phillips wanted to be at his parents' wedding reception.

He didn't quite make it, though.

By the time he arrived on Saturday, the wedding party had moved to Flower Hospital in Sylvania, where his mother gave birth to the precocious party-crasher.

"I don't think anybody expected it," Jamie Phillips said as she held her tiny son in her arms yesterday, her wedding veil still lying next to the sink in her hospital room. "It was a running joke, but when it actually happened everybody was like, 'You've got to be kidding!'•"

Tova's surprise arrival was a possibility the newly married Mr. and Mrs. Phillips of South Toledo hadn't taken too seriously when they planned their wedding two weeks ago. Both said they wanted to "do the right thing" and get married before the baby was born. The little boy was due March 7, so the couple thought they had a few days to spare. Still, Mr. Phillips had packed two hospital bags in the car, just in case.

Mrs. Phillips said she started feeling contractions as she walked down the aisle with her father at Calvary Assembly of God. She dismissed them as Braxton Hicks contractions, the type that are felt throughout pregnancy but do not signal labor.

Even when her water broke while she sat down to eat at the reception table, Mrs. Phillip imagined she might have a bladder problem. "I didn't have any pain, so I thought: Did my water just break, or am I having trouble controlling my bladder today?" Mrs. Phillips said, laughing.

As discreetly as she could, Mrs. Phillips described how she got the attention of her best friend and maid of honor, Mary Anthony, who, by pretending to fix the bride's shoe, confirmed that the baby was indeed on the way.

The news took even Mrs. Phillips by surprise. "Try to pretend nothing's going on when you've got 100-plus people in front of you!" she said. "All I could think was, 'How can I get out of here?'•"

It didn't take long for the word to get out, though. A few minutes later, Ms. Anthony announced the impending birth to the guests.

Mrs. Phillips' sister, Jessica Meyers, said she couldn't believe what was happening. "I really thought they were kidding," Ms. Meyers said. "Everybody had been joking about it since before the wedding. I thought it was a joke."

When Mrs. Phillips arrived at the Flower Hospital maternity ward in her wedding dress and veil, the nurses were surprised too.

"We'd never seen anything like it," nurse Meghan Junga recalled. "We were excited. It was very fun. She made my day."

Clinical Manager Cindy Ziemkiewicz, who has worked at Flower Hospital since 1975, said she'd never seen anyone arrive at the ward in a wedding dress before.

"I thought I'd seen all the firsts," Ms. Ziemkiewicz said. "This shows you just never know."

Yet despite the unexpected end to their wedding, the new Mr. and Mrs. Phillips said they wouldn't have wanted it any other way.

"I'm absolutely thrilled, I'm still floating," said a beaming Mr. Phillips, as he cradled his son. "I've got my wife and my son and I couldn't be happier. It's all I need."

LINK TO PHOTO:

http://www.toledoblade.com/article/20100302/NEWS16/3020359

Cape Cod on Line

STAFF WRITER

March 02, 2010

HYANNIS — A newlywed couple's honeymoon got off to a rocky start Monday when they were forced to spend their first night as husband and wife in separate jail cells.

The bride, Marissa Ann Putignano-Keene, 22, of 77 Winter St., Hyannis, was charged with assault and battery with a dangerous weapon — a car — after she allegedly tried to run over another woman and that woman's son. The other woman later told police that she had previously been in an intermittent intimate relationship with the groom. The groom, Timothy Keene, 37, also of 77 Winter St., was charged with disorderly conduct and taken into protective custody. Keene is a Level 2 registered sex offender and was convicted of lewd and lascivious behavior in 2000.

Putignano-Keene was also charged with disorderly conduct and injury to property — a fence — and taken into protective custody.

Police said the couple was intoxicated.

According to the Barnstable police, the incident took place Monday evening in the parking lot near the intersection of North Street and Barnstable Road. Patrol Officer David Foley was driving in the area when he spotted what appeared to be a disturbance in the parking lot with a crowd starting to gather and traffic slowing as drivers and passengers turned to watch.

Patrolmen John Pass and Jason Sturgis arrived and the three officers separated the people involved. According to the police report, Putignano-Keene and Keene told police they were married at Barnstable Town Hall and afterward split a bottle of champagne.

Later as Putignano-Keene drove through the North Street parking lot she spotted a woman familiar to her husband.

That woman told police she had just left work and was cutting through the parking lot, accompanied by her son, when the newlywed couple drove by. The woman told police Putignano-Keene rolled down the driver's side window and began swearing and using sexually-charged language.

The woman said she and her son were walking away when she heard the car engine roar and saw the car heading directly towards them, causing them to jump out of the way. She said Putignano-Keene then backed the car up, turned and in the process crashed into a fence behind Alberto's Ristorante, which backs onto the parking lot.

Police charged Putignano-Keene and took her and her new husband into protective custody. They spent the night in separate cells at the Barnstable police station and were released Tuesday.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/01/3d-sidwalk-art-that-will_n_478649.html

Police: Girl, 13, Attacks Principal

KOCO 5

LINK TO VIDEO:

http://www.koco.com/news/22710823/detail.html

Naomi Campbell's model misbehavior: Cops hunting for supermodel after assault on limo driver

Rocco Parascandola, Kerry Burke and Bill Hutchinson
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS

 

Originally Published:Tuesday, March 2nd 2010, 4:43 PM
Updated: Tuesday, March 2nd 2010, 6:25 PM

 

Grant/AP

Cops are hunting for Naomi Campbell after she assaulted her limo driver in Midtown on Tuesday afternoon, police sources said.

Wanted: Supermodel with a short fuse.

Cops are hunting for Naomi Campbell after she assaulted her limo driver in Midtown on Tuesday afternoon, police sources said.

Campbell slapped and slugged the 27-year-old driver, then bolted from the black Cadillac Escalade at E. 58th St. and Second Ave. just after 3 p.m.

She was last seen running away from the scene.

"There has been a criminal complaint made out against her. She's obviously aware of it," a police source said. "She will either turn herself in or we'll go out and get her like anybody else."

The driver reported the incident to police, who were canvassing the area.

Campbell's spokesman, Jeff Raymond, cautioned against "a rush to judgment."

"Naomi will cooperate voluntarily, and there is more to the story than meets the eye," Raymond said without elaborating.

It was just the latest tantrum thrown by the temperamental beauty.

In 2008, she pleaded guilty to assaulting a pair of police officers during a fit at Heathrow Airport.

The previous year, she pleaded guilty to tossing a cell phone at her maid in Manhattan and was sentenced to anger management classes and community service.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2010/03/02/2010-03-02_naomi_campbell_in_trouble_again_cops_hunt_supermodel_after_assault_on_limo_drive.html#ixzz0h4AB9Owg

Drug gangs taking over U.S. public lands

The Associated Press

March 1, 2010

SEQUOIA NATIONAL FOREST, Calif. - Not far from Yosemite's waterfalls and in the middle of California's redwood forests, Mexican drug gangs are quietly commandeering U.S. public land to grow millions of marijuana plants and using smuggled immigrants to cultivate them.

Pot has been grown on public lands for decades, but Mexican traffickers have taken it to a whole new level: using armed guards and trip wires to safeguard sprawling plots that in some cases contain tens of thousands of plants offering a potential yield of more than 30 tons of pot a year.

"Just like the Mexicans took over the methamphetamine trade, they've gone to mega, monster gardens," said Brent Wood, a supervisor for the California Department of Justice's Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement. He said Mexican traffickers have "supersized" the marijuana trade.

Interviews conducted by The Associated Press with law enforcement officials across the country showed that Mexican gangs are largely responsible for a spike in large-scale marijuana farms over the last several years.

Local, state and federal agents found about a million more pot plants each year between 2004 and 2008, and authorities say an estimated 75 percent to 90 percent of the new marijuana farms can be linked to Mexican gangs.

In 2008 alone, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration, police across the country confiscated or destroyed 7.6 million plants from about 20,000 outdoor plots.

Growing marijuana in the U.S. saves traffickers the risk and expense of smuggling their product across the border and allows gangs to produce their crops closer to local markets.

Distribution also becomes less risky. Once the marijuana is harvested and dried on the hidden farms, drug gangs can drive it to major cities, where it is distributed to street dealers and sold along with pot that was grown in Mexico.

About the only risk to the Mexican growers, experts say, is that a stray hiker or hunter could stumble onto a hidden field.

The remote plots are nestled under the cover of thick forest canopies in places such as Sequoia National Park, or hidden high in the rugged-yet-fertile Sierra Nevada Mountains. Others are secretly planted on remote stretches of Texas ranch land.

All of the sites are far from the eyes of law enforcement, where growers can take the time needed to grow far more potent marijuana. Farmers of these fields use illegal fertilizers to help the plants along, and use cloned female plants to reduce the amount of seed in the bud that is dried and eventually sold.

Mexican gang plots can often be distinguished from those of domestic-based growers, who usually cultivate much smaller fields with perhaps 100 plants and no security measures.

Some of the fields tied to the drug gangs have as many as 75,000 plants, each of which can yield at least a pound of pot annually, according to federal data reviewed by the AP.

The Sequoia National Forest in central California is covered in a patchwork of pot fields, most of which are hidden along mountain creeks and streams, far from hiking trails. It's the same situation in the nearby Yosemite, Sequoia and Redwood national parks.

Even if they had the manpower to police the vast wilderness, authorities say terrain and weather conditions often keep them from finding the farms, except accidentally.

Many of the plots are encircled with crude explosives and are patrolled by guards armed with AK-47s who survey the perimeter from the ground and from perches high in the trees.

The farms are growing in sophistication and are increasingly cultivated by illegal immigrants, many of whom have been brought to the U.S. from Michoacan.

Growers once slept among their plants, but many of them now have campsites up to a mile away equipped with separate living and cooking areas.

"It's amazing how they have changed the way they do business," Wood said. "It's their domain."

Drug gangs have also imported marijuana experts and unskilled labor to help find the best land or build irrigation systems, Wood said.

Moyses Mesa Barajas had just arrived in eastern Washington state from the Mexican state of Michoacan when he was approached to work in a pot field. He was taken almost immediately to a massive crop hidden in the Wenatchee National Forest, where he managed the watering of the plants.

He was arrested in 2008 in a raid and sentenced to more than six years in federal prison. Several other men wearing camouflage fled before police could stop them.

"I thought it would be easy," he told the AP in a jailhouse interview. "I didn't think it would be a big crime."

Stewart said recruiters look for people who still have family in Mexico, so they can use them as leverage to keep the farmers working - and to keep them quiet.

"If they send Jose from the hometown and Jose rips them off, they are going to go after Jose's family," Stewart said. "It's big money."

When the harvest is complete, investigators say, pot farm workers haul the product in garbage bags to dropoff points that are usually the same places where they get resupplied with food and fuel.

Agents routinely find the discarded remnants of camp life when they discover marijuana fields. It's not uncommon to discover pots and pans, playing cards and books, half-eaten bags of food, and empty beer cans and liquor bottles.

But the growers leave more than litter to worry about. They often use animal poisons that can pollute mountain streams and groundwater meant for legitimate farmers and ranchers.

Because of the tree cover, armed pot farmers can often take aim at law enforcement before agents ever see them.

"They know the terrain better than we do," said Lt. Rick Ko, a drug investigator with the sheriff's office in Fresno, Calif. "Before we even see them, they can shoot us."

In Wisconsin, the number of confiscated plants grew sixfold between 2003 and 2008, to more than 32,000 found in 2008.

Wisconsin agents used to find a few dozen marijuana plants on national forest land. Now they discover hundreds or even thousands.

"If we are getting 40 to 50 percent (of fields), I think we are doing well," said Michigan State Police 1st Lt. Dave Peltomaa. "I really don't think we are close to 50 percent. We don't have the resources."

Vast amounts of pot are still smuggled into the U.S. from Mexico. Federal officials report nearly daily hauls of several hundred to several thousand pounds seized along the border. But drug agents say the boom in domestic growing is a sign of diversification by traffickers.

Officials say arrests of farmers are rare, though the sheriff's office in Fresno did nab more than 100 suspects during two weeks of raids last summer. But when field hands are arrested, most only tell authorities about their specific job.

When asked who hired him, Mesa repeatedly told an AP reporter, "I can't tell you."

Washington State Patrol Lt. Richard Wiley said hired hands either do not know who the boss is or are too frightened to give details.

"They are fearful of what may happen to them if they were to snitch on these coyote people," Wiley said of the recruiters and smugglers who bring marijuana farmers into the U.S. "That's organized crime of a different fashion. There's nothing to gain from (talking), but there's a lot to lose."