Jim Carlson talks to a television reporter in front of his head shop, The Last Place on Earth, on Sept. 16, 2011. (Photo by Paul Lundgren)

A Duluth head shop owner convicted of federal drug trafficking charges more than a decade ago will have his sentence commuted in a sweeping clemency order issued by President Joe Biden Dec. 12.

According to the order, former Last Place on Earth owner James Robert Carlson, 67, will be officially released from the federal prison system Dec. 22. Carlson was convicted of conspiracy to distribute synthetic drugs in 2013. He was sentenced to 17.5 years in prison and three years of probation by United States District Court Judge David Doty in August 2014.

Carlson served time at a low-security federal correctional facility in Milan, Michigan. He was released from incarceration and is currently under the watch of the North Central Regional Office of the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

“Most of our inmates in the Federal Bureau of Prisons go to a pre-release halfway house for placement before their projected release date,” said Residential Reentry Specialist Shelly Dunkin. “So that means they are placed in a half-way house or in-home confinement.”

Dunkin would not provide details of Carlson’s current location.

Following release from the Federal Bureau of Prisons, the United States Probation Office will manage Carlson for the next three years. The clemency order did not commute the probation sentence.

Dunkin said most of the offenders granted clemency were already out of prison and participating in a reentry program through the First Step Act, a bipartisan criminal justice bill signed into law in 2018. Others were released into community supervision through the act to relieve prison capacity during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We do have offenders who have been in the community for years,” said Dunkin. “There’s a wide range of conditions.”

Biden granted 39 pardons and commuted the sentence of 1,499 non-violent offenders, many of them convicted of drug crimes.

“America was built on the promise of possibility and second chances,” said Biden. “As President, I have the great privilege of extending mercy to people who have demonstrated remorse and rehabilitation, restoring opportunity for Americans to participate in daily life and contribute to their communities.”

According to the United States Attorney’s Office, from at least 2010 through 2013, Carlson made millions of dollars by distributing synthetic drugs through the Last Place on Earth, which operated at 120 E. Superior St. in Downtown Duluth. Carlson used shop employees to test unregulated drugs so he could confirm that those drugs would “work” on customers. The attorney’s office said some Last Place on Earth customers became addicted to the synthetic drugs sold by Carlson and suffered dangerous side effects, including tachycardia, paranoia, agitation, seizures and blackouts.

According to documents filed in court, Duluth-area hospital emergency rooms treated a significant number of synthetic drug users while the Carlson store was in operation. By 2012, the emergency room at St. Luke’s Hospital was receiving nearly three synthetic-drug-abuse cases each day.

City officials and the downtown business community battled Carlson and his Last Place on Earth for years before federal authorities won conviction in 2013. An appeal to the United States Supreme Court was denied in 2015.

The Last Place on Earth building was purchased by Titanium Partners in 2015 and became home to the first downtown location for Blacklist Brewing Company. It is now home to Duluth’s Best Bread Company.