“Bath Salts Arrests”

This was the headline, and accompanying photograph, seen after our recent hearing in the Mineral County, WV felony prosecution of John and Tonya Cozatt.  They are being prosecuted for several felonies for selling potpourri in their nutrition stores which allegedly contained “synthetic marijuana”.  The newspaper just couldn’t resist labeling the products as “Bath Salts”, which of course have been all over the national news due to incidents such as the face-eating incident in Florida.

The actual article makes it clear that the case has nothing to do with “bath salts”.  But if you look at the link I provided above under the photograph, you can see how they mentioned “Bath Salts” or “Salts” in three different areas surrounding the article.  It’s like the media labeling every gun, regardless of what it actually is, an “AK-47” or an “assault rifle.”  In the end, it poisons the jury pool.  In all of these pre-trial articles, people are seeing “bath salts, bath salts, bath salts.”  And in the national media they are seeing endless stories on people on bath salts doing crazy things.  Is it really necessary to sensationalize something that is innocuous as a nutrition store selling potpourri?  As the article notes, law enforcement had no idea the potpourri may have contained illegal compounds prior to having it analyzed by a laboratory:

Attorney John H. Bryan, representing the Cozatts, questioned Paterline about the packaging of the substance, noting that none of the packages said it was synthetic marijuana or meant to be smoked.

Bryan also asked Paterline if he could tell when he purchased the substances if they were illegal or not, and he said he could not.