By Daniella Segura
Merced Sun-Star (Merced, Calif.)
LAKE ELSINORE, Calif. — A “suspicious package” mailed to a California business led authorities to a property with more than 2,800 bags of psilocybin mushrooms, deputies say.
The package, delivered to a Lake Elsinore business in August, had “psilocybin mushrooms and marijuana products,” the Riverside County Sheriff’s Office said in a Nov. 27 news release.
Deputies processed the evidence and forwarded the case to the Lake Elsinore Special Enforcement Team, the sheriff’s office said.
Three months later, deputies identified a 43-year-old Lake Elsinore man as the suspect who shipped the package, according to the sheriff’s office.
While serving a search warrant at the man’s home, deputies “discovered a large-scale psilocybin mushroom cultivation operation,” the sheriff’s office said.
Deputies said they found “separate structures used for the cultivation, processing, and storage of large amounts of psilocybin mushrooms” on the man’s property.
Within those structures, deputies found about “445 pounds of vacuum sealed psilocybin mushrooms,” also known as magic mushrooms, and more than 2,800 bags of “psilocybin mushrooms in various stages of growth.”
The Lake Elsinore man was booked into jail on multiple felonies stemming from drug-related offenses and weapons violations, according to deputies.
An investigation is ongoing, deputies said.
Lake Elsinore is about a 70-mile drive southeast from Los Angeles.
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