A cadet at the Air Force Academy pleaded guilty Friday to one specification of violating the Uniform Code of Military Justice for using psilocybin — a natural psychedelic compound found in certain mushrooms that remains a federally outlawed drug.
Seth Misukanis, the cadet, faced the special court-martial where he was was given a reprimand for violating the military's laws and agreed to leave the academy in an “unpaid status pending a decision on disenrollment,” according to a news release from the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
But even as the academy meted out the punishment, magic mushrooms and their active ingredient psilocybin were largely decriminalized in Colorado last year, and amended state laws allow for residents to grow, use and share them without any serious penalties.
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The incident is another example of how the military and the federal government are lagging behind states when it comes to legalizing and decriminalizing drugs. So far, the vast majority of states have legalized marijuana in a medical or recreational form, a trend that the Department of Defense is still grappling with when it comes to recruiting and disciplining troops who get high.
And while many of the service branches have only recently started to amend their policies to cope with the rise of legal marijuana,…
