The Hometown Mystery
The first time I heard Gordon Todd Skinner’s name was in 2003. I was in my car, listening to a Tulsa radio station announce some horrifying news: an eighteen-year-old had been tied up at the Downtown DoubleTree and tortured for days. The broadcast suggested a drug-addled madman and his wife were responsible, and it was enough to turn my stomach. What I didn’t realize then was that Skinner—identified as the likely perpetrator—was rumored to be one of America’s most audacious underground figures, a man who would come to be regarded as both a psychedelic icon and a criminal mastermind.
Within a few years, everybody seemed to have a theory about the kidnapping.
Seven years later, in 2010, I had worked my way into a career as a writer and a journalist, and decided to launch a local magazine called This Land. Almost immediately, people began pitching the story to me. Local would-be journalists clamored to write about the kidnapping. Readers begged This Land to cover the story. Nobody, however, stepped forward with any contact with the victim or the alleged perpetrators.
Skinner graduated from one of Tulsa’s most prestigious prep schools, Cascia Hall, where he was already a notorious figure long before the kidnapping case. He was a shadowy figure in several high-profile money laundering and drug cartel investigations. Lawyers, bankers, business executives, federal judges—most of Tulsa’s elite seemed to have had a run-in with Skinner. On November 6, 2000, the world’s largest LSD bust occurred at a missile base that he owned in Kansas; it was later revealed that he was a central figure in the case. Skinner became the most whispered name around town.
In 2003, Skinner was cornered by law enforcement at Burning Man and soon transported to Tulsa to stand trial for the kidnapping charge. He never testified, claiming the whole thing was a set-up by federal prosecutors. Still, a judge gave him the maximum sentence for the crime—and then extended it to a life sentence based upon a prior marijuana conviction. He spent ten years quietly doing his time and appealing his case. Then I showed up.
A Magazine’s Mission
When two local writers approached me with the news that a friend of Skinner’s was willing to talk, I decided to assign the story.
Lee Roy Chapman and Chris Sandel seemed to have the connections to make it work—until the legal and scientific complexity of the story became apparent. They felt daunted by the research skills and the journalism training required. Overwhelmed, they asked me to step in as an author. As I began to pore through the filings and interview others, I developed a sense that Skinner’s story had significance far beyond what even Chapman and Sandel imagined. I joined the byline, and since then, my name has become inextricably intertwined with that of Gordon Todd Skinner.
In the course of researching the story, I interviewed several of Skinner’s friends, as well as the kidnapping victim Brandon Green. Brandon described the days of terror that left him psychologically scarred. Today, Green is a happily married father with children, and he’s been very open about sharing his story over the years.
Eventually, Skinner himself agreed to be interviewed in person. Here’s an image from that interview:
In 2013, This Land published Subterranean Psychonaut, which was Brandon Green’s full account of his kidnapping and included a brief profile of Skinner. What remained glaringly obvious, however, is that Skinner never offered his version of the kidnapping. The article left me with a gnawing sense that there was far more to the story. Twelve years, thousands of documents, and hundreds of interviews later, I’m finally ready to share what I’ve discovered.
Meeting Skinner
The excerpt below comes from my forthcoming book, Psychonaut, which explores Skinner’s life and the strange nexus of psychedelics, crime, and legend in America’s heartland. It recounts the first moments I met him:
Skinner is a tall man, 6'4, assembled by unusual angles and proportions: long arms against long legs, a wide torso, close-set bespectacled eyes, thin lips. The crest of his head forms a smooth bell and gray hairs outlie a reddish face that projects inquisitively from a mean stem of a neck. His manner is tempered and normalized, a contained sum of potential and kinetic energy. A nest of chest hairs peeks out from his shirt. When I approach him, his giant hand envelopes mine entirely. We take a seat across from each other at a cafeteria table under the breathing ductwork and look at each other for some time in silence. You don’t interview a man like Skinner. You enter into the equation.
Skinner has been down nearly two decades and rumors still circulate that he was a shaman or cult leader. Most think he lied about the chemistry, the money, the connections, and the size of the drug operations. Close friends aren’t so sure. In certain psychedelic circles, Skinner is royalty, an irrational god in others. Here, in his prison blues and unstylish glasses, there isn’t an element of madness or a shiver of instability about him, no Charlie Manson chi or serial-killer iciness. He drinks a Coca-Cola and picks at a ham sandwich while we talk.
The prime sentence is not related to drugs—not directly, anyway—but for the kidnapping and assault of an eighteen-year-old, a charge for which he maintains his innocence. It is the longest sentence issued for that charge in Oklahoma history. Under normal circumstances, he would have served about seven years, but his sentence was enhanced to life by a previous marijuana conviction. Skinner believes he is a political prisoner and his appeals argue as much.
To secure an interview with Skinner, I had to complete visitation request forms, pass a background check, convince the media grunt, and obtain the warden's permission, all under the assurance that I was investigating Skinner's life for an article I planned to write. Skinner locked eyes with me and I could sense his weariness and contrition and—to my surprise—his fear.
Our conversation, and the web of narratives around Skinner, would challenge my views of moral judgment and humanity and affect almost every area of my personal life. In exploring Skinner’s life, I found myself wrestling with the thin line between visionary experimentation and the responsible approach—a tension that still echoes in the American psyche around psychedelics today.
In the next post, for Founding Members, we’ll be diving directly into Skinner’s head when he reveals his thoughts about the psychedelic experience and his fascination with time, along with a psychedelic state he calls The Godhead.
Paid subscriber? Scroll down for exclusive content. There’s a mysterious additional excerpt from my book, a rare photo from 10th grade, and an audio clip: “The Teenager Who Ordered LSD Precursors Like Pizza.” Later this month, founding members will hear a 9-minute excerpt from a conversation between myself and Gordon Todd Skinner discussing his theories about psychedelic states, plus copies of never-seen search warrants and a seized inventory list that holds clues to the elaborate LSD lab processes involved.
Join me twice monthly for new revelations about this extraordinary case. Free subscribers will discover new characters and psychedelic compounds while exploring underground missile bases and tripping palaces. Paid subscribers receive additional benefits including exclusive audio files from interview subjects, images, and full archive access. Founding members get access to Skinner audio interviews and rare legal documents. Feel free to email me questions/comments at michaelpmason@gmail.com
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to The Psychonaut Files to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.