OKEECHOBEE, Fla. — An Okeechobee County man was sentenced Thursday after he was arrested last summer for concocting a drug-laced tea using mushrooms and giving it to two teenage girls.
Shawn Matthew Pyper, who was 47 years old at the time of the crime, will spend 10 years in prison.
The children said that they went into a nearby cow pasture to collect the mushrooms for Pyper. They said they filled up a plastic shopping bag with the mushrooms and then gave them to Pyper.
Investigations said Pyper then used a pot and stove to prepare the mushrooms into a tea, mixing in fruit-flavored Kool-Aid.
At the time of the arrest, Sheriff Noel Stephen said the 13-year-old girl's mother thought she was at a friend's house and the 14-year-old was a chronic runaway.
Pyper was found guilty on all eight counts, including two counts of delivery of a controlled substance to a minor.
Prosecutors said they were hoping a judge would sentence Pyper to a maximum of 60 years.
