Life Before Politics and Activism
In his online autobiography, Forchion claims smoking his first marijuana cigarette at age 16; he "instantly was impressed with its medicinal healing powers, in regards to his ". He also states in interview by The Trentonian: "I was 15 when I first got busted for smoking weed by my parents. And to this day my mother is against it, and just wishes I would shut up about it."
In 1982, upon graduation from Edgewood Regional High School in Atco, New Jersey, he enlisted in the New Jersey National Guard and enrolled at Claflin College, Orangeburg, South Carolina. In 1986 he received an honorable discharge from the NJ National Guard and enlisted in the United States Marine Corps, and without marijuana, he had an asthma attack and was medically discharged. After being discharged from the Marine Corps, he changed his name to Edward and enlisted in the United States Army. While in the army he used cannabis despite the warnings from the government, to control his asthma. On April 18, 1988 he married his first wife Pam in Fort Bliss, Texas, and in 1990 he receive an honorable discharge from the army. He became a coast-to-coast trucker using his own truck he purchased in 1994.
According to his website, Forchion is a practicing Rastafarian.
He proudly admits he was a "marijuana smuggler", driving hundreds of pounds of cannabis from Arizona border towns to east coast cities such as Cleveland, Ohio, Philadelphia, New York City and Camden, New Jersey. His Mexican/Cuban suppliers in Arizona were the first to dub him The New Jersey Weedman, because while other drugs were available for transport he only wanted to transport cannabis.
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