Weed Reveal

Oregon First Lady Bought Land for Pot

News follows admission about sham marriage.

Cylvia Hayes, fiancée of Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber, was involved in buying a property she admits was intended to be used for an illegal marijuana-growing operation, Portland TV station KOIN 6 reports. Public records show that Hayes and a man bought the $245,000 piece of property with a $15,000 downpayment in November 1997, the station reported. The purchase of the property, in remote Washington state near the Canadian border, came four months after Hayes married an Ethiopian man to help him become a United States citizen. Last Thursday, she admitted publicly to the secret sham marriage, for which she was paid $5,000 and which lasted from 1997 to 2001. Hayes and Kitzhaber, who is a Democrat, announced ther engagement in August. The Oregonian reports that Kitzhaber has asked the Oregon Government Ethics Commission to issue a formal opinion on Hayes’s private consulting work and how it affects her role as first lady.