Owners Face Identity Crisis--of Sorts : ‘Head Shops’ Try to Head Off Convictions

Back in 1967, when the “head shop” was a counterculture institution, a Van Nuys merchant named his store Heads & Highs. But last week five of the old brown letters above the door came down and the five leftovers were reshuffled into a new name: Ed’s H & H.

A storefront on Burbank Boulevard in Van Nuys has undergone a similar identity shift. A sign reading High Country is gone. Another will soon go up in its place: Tobacco Country.

The name changes reflect the jitters the stores’ owners have developed recently regarding their images. And they are nervous for good reason.

On Tuesday, Jack Herer, owner of High Country, became the first San Fernando Valley businessman convicted under a 1983 state law making it a misdemeanor to sell drug paraphernalia. On Thursday, the owner of Ed’s H & H, Irving Silverman, pleaded no contest to the same charge.

2 Other Stores Targeted

Two other San Fernando Valley businesses are also being prosecuted. Ed Korbel, owner of Auditory Odyssey in North Hollywood, is expected to be tried in March. And the owner of a Canoga Park store called Lions Lair is due in court in early February.

There have been four similar cases involving five Valley stores. Silverman also owns a store in Reseda, and police raided both shops.

Deputy City Atty. Jessica Perrin Silvers, who is handling all the Valley cases in Van Nuys Municipal Court, said that, in order to make the charges stick, a prosecutor must persuade jurors that aspects of a store’s decor or sales technique are aimed at drug users. She used High Country’s name against the store owner in court. By Friday, name changes were under way at High Country and Heads & Highs.

“They’ve taken the words away from us,” said Ed Adair, who manages Silverman’s Van Nuys store. Adair said he is the Ed of the new name. He said Silverman’s Reseda store also will undergo a name change.

Shifted Gears in Presentations

Owners and managers of the four Valley businesses say they began recasting the presentation of their wares after a series of police raids. Thousands of pipes, spoons, vials and other items were confiscated in raids in 1983 and 1984. The raids were part of a nationwide sanitization of head shops during the past decade.

Laws prompting this trend are vague and too broad, argue attorneys representing Valley defendants.

“The problem with the law is that the owners of the stores are compelled to be clairvoyant, and to know what the customers’ use of the items will be,” said Bob Barta, a lawyer for Lions Lair.

“But it’s impossible. Because the store owners can’t know what is in their customers’ minds, their marketing approach becomes an important part of making sure they don’t run afoul of the law.”

Label Shunned

Most people who own or work at the stores shun the “head shop” label. They prefer being called tobacco stores or gift shops. And they attach tiny bags of tobacco or snuff to their goods just to prove their law-abiding intentions.

“I don’t think it is possible to describe a head shop,” said Steven Hollowell, executive director of the California Progressive Businesses Assn.

He says his organization’s members--119 in the state, including about 20 in Los Angeles--have nothing to do with head shops or drug paraphernalia. “They are stores that sell smoking accessories,” Hollowell said. “Period.”

In the 1970s he might have described his members as head shops, he says, but not in the 1980s. “Mention drugs to one of my members and they will throw you out,” Hollowell said.

Police don’t quibble about semantics. Sgt. Mike Celmer of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Narcotics Division said there are an estimated five to 10 stores in the Valley that police consider to be head shops, including the stores involved in the current wave of prosecutions.

He said no new raids are planned until those prosecutions are resolved.

A sign on one of Herer’s counters is typical of those that appear at many such stores these days: “Any Reference To Illegal Usage Will Result In Refusal Of Service.” The sign has been there since the paraphernalia law went into effect Jan. 1, 1983, Herer said.

Eclectic Wares

Showcases in Herer’s wood-paneled store offer an eclectic selection. He sells water pipes and briefcases, Gumby dolls and greeting cards, vitamins and sunglasses, hand-held cigarette rolling devices and posters. He also offers cigarettes and pipe tobacco, and says he has put in large orders for more tobacco products and accessories.

“I don’t know what people will do with the things they buy after they leave here, and it’s none of my business,” he said.

He said he plans to appeal his conviction. Meanwhile, he is scheduled for sentencing Tuesday, and faces up to a year in jail and a $2,000 fine.

Attorneys for the owners of Valley stores involved in drug paraphernalia prosecutions say the cases can’t be compared because each store is different. Korbel said he thinks he has a better chance of winning his case than Herer did.

“Anybody who is going to name his store High Country is looking for trouble,” the owner of Auditory Odyssey said.

At Lions Lair, manager Scott Fisher said: “We feel that we’re going to win, and if we don’t, there’s something wrong. We went to Jack Herer’s trial for High Country . . . his name hurt him.”

Lions Lair has a full range of ceramic and water pipes, spoons, straws and measuring scales. Barta, who represents Lions Lair owner David Nenkervis, said items the police consider drug paraphernalia constitute about 25% of the sales at the Canoga Park store. The other 75% consists of sales of coffee, tea, jewelry, post cards and other items.

‘Play by the Rules’

At Ed’s H & H, manager Adair said: “All I know is we’re trying to work with the Police Department. We’re trying to play by the rules.”

There are plenty of rules for Silverman to play by. For one, he has to sell his stores in accord with a condition of his plea bargain. Silvers said Silverman must show proof by April 1 that he has divested himself of any business interest in the sale of drug paraphernalia.

Meanwhile, Silverman was sentenced to three years’ probation, in lieu of six months in jail he could have received for each of the three counts against him. Silverman also must pay $750 into a crime victims restitution fund maintained by the municipal court.

Silverman was not at his Van Nuys shop Friday to talk about his case. And Adair seemed uncomfortable speaking about it in detail.

Standing under the reconstituted sign, he said: “I don’t know what words to use anymore. These days, you’ve got to talk to lawyers about words.”