{"slug": "california-man-admits-to-dosing-his-pre-teen-children-with-psilocybin-mushrooms", "title": "California man admits to dosing his pre-teen children with psilocybin mushrooms", "summary": "A California man, Randal Vance, pleaded guilty to dosing his pre-teen children with psilocybin mushrooms and recruiting them to produce and distribute the drug. Vance admitted to giving capsules to his 9- and 11-year-old children every other day starting in October 2023, and providing another son, age 12, with mushrooms to sell to friends. He faces sentencing on Sept. 18.", "body_md": "**Getting your**\n\n[Trinity Audio](//trinityaudio.ai)player ready...A Fallbrook man admitted in federal court on Friday to dosing his children with psilocybin mushrooms, a hallucinogenic drug that alters states of consciousness and creates vivid sensory experiences, and recruiting them to produce and distribute the drug.\n\nIn his plea agreement, Randal Vance, 43, admitted that two of his children were 9 and 11 years old when the conspiracy began at two locations, Ash Street in Fallbrook and Lilac Road in Bonsall. According to the agreement, he began dosing them with capsules in October 2023 every other day, increasing to every day by 2024.\n\nHe also admitted to providing another son, who was 12 at the time, with psilocybin mushrooms to sell to his friends.\n\nHis two co-defendants, his wife, Rebecca Vance, 42, and friend Keir Ceballos-Rivera, 34, also pleaded guilty and are awaiting sentencing.\n\nAccording to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Vance pled guilty to charges of conspiracy to use a minor to produce and distribute a controlled substance, conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance, two counts of distributing a controlled substance to minors and conspiracy to obstruct justice.\n\nHe also admitted in his plea agreement to maintaining two websites and an Instagram page where he sold whole- and freeze-dried psilocybin mushrooms, chocolates and capsules containing them.\n\nAccording to prosecutors, investigators carried out search warrants at the two locations on Oct. 4, 2024, and found about 204 pounds of fresh psilocybin mushrooms, 53 pounds of dried mushrooms, and 18 pounds of a growth medium called inoculated substrate to grow the psilocybin mushrooms, as well as equipment used to grow, harvest and process them.\n\nAt the Lilac Road location, law enforcement also seized six firearms.\n\nVance was arrested later that day. According to the plea agreement, after the arrest, he, his wife and Ceballos-Rivera conspired to destroy evidence by deleting phone messages and removing the websites.\n\nVance is scheduled to be sentenced Sept. 18.", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/california-man-admits-to-dosing-his-pre-teen-children-with-psilocybin-mushrooms", "canonical_source": "https://www.mercurynews.com/2026/06/29/fallbrook-man-admits-to-dosing-his-pre-teen-children-with-psilocybin-mushrooms/", "published_at": "2026-06-29 18:27:25+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-06-29 18:51:08.740736+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["ai-safety"], "entities": ["Randal Vance", "Rebecca Vance", "Keir Ceballos-Rivera", "Fallbrook", "Bonsall", "U.S. Attorney's Office"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/california-man-admits-to-dosing-his-pre-teen-children-with-psilocybin-mushrooms", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/california-man-admits-to-dosing-his-pre-teen-children-with-psilocybin-mushrooms.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/california-man-admits-to-dosing-his-pre-teen-children-with-psilocybin-mushrooms.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/california-man-admits-to-dosing-his-pre-teen-children-with-psilocybin-mushrooms.jsonld"}}