Podcast: Keen On America (LS 42 · TOP 1.5% what is this?)
Episode: Californian True Crime: A Killing in Cannabis
Pub date: 2026-02-10

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“The black market exists only because we decided that this form of trade should be illegal.” — Scott Eden

In October 2019, Californian tech executive Tushar Atre was abducted from his Santa Cruz oceanfront home and found murdered on his own property in the redwoods — shot execution-style, hands bound. The serial entrepreneur had spent barely three years in the cannabis business. Investigative journalist Scott Eden’s new book, A Killing in Cannabis, traces how a charismatic Silicon Valley innovator, seeking to “disrupt” the newly legal weed industry, found himself entangled with a cast of eccentric and violent characters — hippie do-gooders, black-market operators, and, surprise surprise, professional killers. We discuss the murky zone between legal and illegal cannabis, why this supposedly booming industry has been such an economic disaster for most founders, and whether America’s half-pregnant approach to legalization created the conditions for Tushar’s death. While Santa Cruz isn’t quite in Silicon Valley, this is nonetheless a quintessential tech bro parable about the darkness of the American dream.

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