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The son of late reggae legend Peter Tosh, died in his Boston area home on July 17 at the age of 40. He had never fully recovered from a brutal 2017 beating in a New Jersey jail, where he was serving time on a cannabis charge.<\/p>\n
Gamal Jawara McIntosh, who performed<\/a>\u00a0under the stage name\u00a0Tosh 1<\/a>, was Peter Tosh\u2019s youngest son. He shares his legendary father\u2019s fate, as they both faced violent deaths.<\/p>\n McIntosh was serving a six-month sentence for marijuana possession when he was attacked by another inmate. As noted by the Jamai<\/a>c<\/a>a Observer<\/a>, the beating left him in a coma for over a year with full rehabilitation a long way off.<\/p>\n Following his death in July, McIntosh\u2019s older brother Dave Tosh confirmed a month later to the\u00a0Jamaica Gleaner<\/a>\u00a0that his brother\u2019s remains had been cremated.<\/p>\n Peter Tosh, who co-founded\u00a0the Wailers<\/a>\u00a0in 1963 along with Bob Marley, was murdered during an armed robbery of his home in Kingston in 1987. He was\u00a0repeatedly targeted by police<\/a>\u00a0in Jamaica for his anti-establishment views and open use and advocacy of ganja and on one occasion in 1978 was\u00a0badly roughed up<\/a>.<\/p>\n When Tosh 1 finally regained consciousness more than a year after the February 2017 jailhouse attack, he was sent home from the New Jersey hospital to Boston, where his mother, Melody Cunningham, and sister, Niambe Tosh, cared for him.<\/p>\n Last November, Niambe, a cannabis activist who works as a teacher in Boston, told the audience<\/a>\u00a0at the\u00a0Peter Tosh Music Festival<\/a>\u00a0in Kingston that her brother was slowly making progress. \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cHe still has a lot of healing to do still, so I appreciate and know that Jamaica is praying hard for him,\u201d she said from the stage. \u201cThe prayers are definitely working so please continue to send out your prayers for him because he is definitely missing from the stage tonight, but I know his spirit is with us at the same time. So please, continue to pray for my father\u2019s youngest son.\u201d<\/p>\n Reggae fans can now only pray for his peace in the afterlife.<\/p>\n In June 2013, McIntosh was arrested in Mahwah, NJ, for allegedly having more than 65 pounds of cannabis in the trunk of his rental car.\u00a0Billboard<\/a>\u00a0reported that Mahwah Police Chief James Batelli said McIntosh had an arrest record that included charges for \u201cdisorderly persons offenses, assault, resisting arrest and promoting prostitution.\u201d However, the New Jersey activist group\u00a0Cannabis Patriots Unite<\/a>\u00a0refuted Batelli\u2019s claims, calling them \u201cslanderous and completely without merit.\u201d<\/p>\n McIntosh spent more than six months in the Bergen County jail before pleading guilty to possession with intent to distribute. He received a one-year sentence in August 2016. With six months left to serve, he was sent back to the county jail in January 2017. Just one month later, he suffered the debilitating attack.<\/p>\n New Jersey\u2019s\u00a0Hackensack Daily Voice<\/a>\u00a0reported that a fellow inmate \u2014 a New York resident from Queens awaiting trial in a home break-in named Kyrie Baum \u2014 was charged in the brutal beating. He faces a count of aggravated assault for the attack.<\/p>\n In February 2019, Melody Cunningham filed a federal lawsuit against Bergen County, alleging that authorities, including ex-sheriff Michael Saudino and a group of his officers, condoned a \u201cfight club culture\u201d in the Hackensack prison. The county is arguing that it does not oversee the jail and does not control the sheriff or his officers and therefore has no liability in the case.<\/p>\n NorthJersey.com<\/a>\u00a0reports that county counsel filed a brief with the court last July, stating: \u00a0\u201cThe county does not operate the Bergen County jail, nor is the county the custodian of the prisoners there\u2014instead, the sheriff is.\u201d<\/p>\n Saudino, who was sheriff at the time of the attack,\u00a0stepped down<\/a>\u00a0in September 2018 after secretly-recorded racist comments that he made were\u00a0released to the public<\/a>. On the tape, aired by radio station WNYC, Saudino speaks with members of his staff about then newly elected Gov. Phil Murphy\u2019s proposal to legalize cannabis. He is heard saying that legalization would \u201clet the blacks come in [presumably from New York], do whatever the f*** they want, smoke their marijuana, do this do that, and don\u2019t worry about it. You know, we\u2019ll tie the hands of cops.\u201d<\/p>\n The\u00a0Justice for Jawara<\/a>\u00a0page at the\u00a0Peter Tosh website<\/a>\u00a0now states: \u201cJawara, you are a true soldier and we are blessed to have you as a son, a brother, a father, and a friend. Please hug and kiss our ancestors for the family. Your legacy lives on through your children, Jahzarah, Jeremaiah, Nazare, and Azariah.\u201d<\/p>\n It also makes note of his commitment to cannabis activism: \u201cWithin the Rastafari faith, marijuana is a sacramental and sacred herb and has many known medicinal properties and values. Jawara has consistently used his own voice as an advocate for legalization, speaking at events like the Freedom Rally in Boston, Massachusetts, as well as in front of the New Jersey State House.\u201d<\/p>\n Among his musical contributions as Tosh 1, McIntosh recorded a version of his father\u2019s classic anthem of cannabis liberation, \u201cLegalize It<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n As the\u00a0Bergen Record<\/a>\u00a0recalled, Tosh 1 performed the song outside the New Jersey statehouse at an April 2014 rally calling on state and federal lawmakers to legalize or decriminalize cannabis.<\/p>\n Veteran High Times music editor Steve Bloom, who covered the passing of Jawara McIntosh for his website\u00a0CelebStoner<\/a>, also offered the following comments to Cannabis Now: \u201cIt\u2019s terrible what happened to Jawara. Clearly, he was a victim of the War on Drugs<\/a>. Marijuana possession with intent to distribute charge was the beginning of the end for him,\u201d he said. \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cLike his father Peter, Jawara was persecuted for his love of ganja. He should be alive and well today. Say his name: Jawara McIntosh.\u201d<\/p>\n TELL US<\/strong>, should anyone be in jail for cannabis?<\/p>\n The post Son of Peter Tosh Dies Due to Injuries from 2017 Prison Beating<\/a> appeared first on Cannabis Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n
The son of late reggae legend Peter Tosh, died in his Boston area home on July 17 at the age of 40. He had never fully recovered from a brutal 2017 beating in a New Jersey jail, where he was serving time on a cannabis charge. Gamal Jawara McIntosh, whoContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":190,"featured_media":44348,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[984,50,99,13192,900,89,381,4013,347,14297,97],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44347"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/190"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44347"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44347\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44349,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44347\/revisions\/44349"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44348"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Peace in the Afterlife<\/strong><\/h4>\n
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<\/figure>\nGanja Bust Becomes Death Sentence<\/strong><\/h4>\n
A Voice for Cannabis Liberation<\/strong><\/h4>\n
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\nRead More: Son of Peter Tosh Dies Due to Injuries from 2017 Prison Beating<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"