This story is pretty crazy…literally speaking. It was back on October 16th, 1933 when 21 year old Victor Licacta murdered both his parents, his brother and his sister with an ax at their home in Ybor City.
On October 17, 1933, the Tampa Bay Times wrote:
W. D. Bush, city chief detective, said he had made an investigation prior to the crime and learned the slayer had been addicted to smoking marijuana cigarettes for more than six months.
However, a day later the Chief of Tampa Police Department downplayed the role the drug had in the murders, although he pledged himself to the cause of marijuana prohibition:
Maybe the weed only had a small indirect part in the alleged insanity of the youth, but I am declaring now and for all time that the increasing use of this narcotic must stop and will be stopped.
— October 18, 1933