Shaahin Cheyene

Critics including health officials in Nassau County, New York claimed that the products Cheyene marketed were harmful and should not be used for recreation.[2][6] Herbal Ecstacy was sold in the form of a tablet and its ingredients include ephedra (key ingredient), guarana seed, kola nut, green tea, black ginseng, nutmeg, ginkgo biloba and Centella asiatica. From 1991 until its ban from sale in 2004, Herbal ecstacy was sold in the United States as an over-the-counter drug in drug stores, music stores and other shops in the United States.[7]

In 1996, an article in the New York Times[2] reported that legal herbal stimulants such as herbal ecstacy and other similar products were targeted by federal authorities in a campaign to prohibit selling them in stores. According to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the primary ingredient of these products known as Ephedra has been the cause of as many as 15 deaths in the United States.[2] Dr. Varro Tyler, professor of pharmacognosy at Purdue University has stated that ephedra should be taken only under medical supervision.[2] Mark Blumenthal, founder of the American Botanical Council was quoted in the Times article as saying that ephedra is extracted in laboratories from the Chinese herb ma huang, and that companies "make millions and millions of profit" on the chemical.[2] Dr. Tyler also said that it "is a very simple chemical, easy to make - it shouldn't be a high-priced drug."[2]

Following the statements in the media by the FDA in 1996, Shayan's company claimed a 25 percent sales increase due to the controversy, and said "if the FDA ever goes out of business, we'd like to hire them for P.R., because that's probably the only thing they're good at.".[8][9] He accused federal authorities of trying to discredit his product through media publicity. He said, "If a product is unsafe, they can pull it off the shelf and shut us down, right here and now,but they haven’t done that, because the product isn’t unsafe."[2] The companies Twin Laboratories in Ronkonkoma, L.I.and Weider Nutrition Group in Salt Lake City, both of which use ephedra in their products, also expressed their concerns over the possible crackdown of herbal supplements.[2]

In 1997, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission issued a cease and desist order against Cheyene's company Global World Media Corporation ordering the company to cease marketing the product as safe and free of side effects, on the grounds that "Ecstacy contains a botanical source of ephedrine alkaloids, which can have dangerous effects on the nervous system and heart. Thus, according to the complaint, the claim that Ecstacy is safe and side effect free is both false and unsubstantiated."[10] Seven U.S. states subsequently filed separate lawsuits to stop the sale of the product, on the grounds that it was a drug being sold without approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.[11]

In response to accumulating evidence of adverse effects and deaths related to ephedra, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) banned the sale of ephedra-containing supplements in 2004.[12] The ban was upheld in 2006 by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit.[13]

Dr. Charles Grob, Professor of Psychiatry and Pediatrics at the UCLA School of Medicine and Director of the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, conducted a government approved study on MDMA, and confirmed that herbal ecstacy had nothing in common with the real thing.[8] He said taking an herbal ecstacy was "like drinking seven or eight cups of strong coffee."[8]

Nicholas Saunders, author of the book E for Ecstasy, claimed that he was misquoted in the marketing materials of herbal ecstacy. According to him, the marketing materials did not include his entire statement, "People reported all kinds of effects. Some even saying it was the best ecstacy experience they had ever had, whether they had taken the herbal ecstasy or the vitamin pill." Saunders explained that his own conclusion regarding the product is that its effect is not greater than placebos.[14]