The group holds many beliefs in common with the Rastafari, including the use of marijuana as a sacrament, but differ on many points, most significantly the matter of Haile Selassie's divinity.
[4] The group expanded rapidly in the 1970s, under the leadership of 'Niah' Keith Gordon, attracting a new generation of white American followers to their "Gospel camp" in Jamaica.
[5] The Coptic's pro-marijuana beliefs went as far as to consider it their duty to distribute it widely,[6]: 125 and the new converts helped move ever larger consignments of "herb" from Jamaica to the United States.
[7] The group attracted widespread publicity in the early 1980s, when they were the subject of investigative TV reports, and several of its members were prosecuted for importing marijuana to the United States.
After Louva Williams passed in 1969 the group splintered for a short time, until George Baker Ivy brought several of the original followers together[17] at a new camp in Hall's Delight above Papine in St.
It was at this stage Keith Gordon, another elder from Louva William’s time, set up a new camp in Trelawney, and invited the white members to regroup with him there.
[6]: 123 The new Cockpit Country camp was in the heart of the Jamaica's inaccessible, mountainous interior, which had for centuries served as refuge for Maroons escaping slavery.
[6]: 127 Under his guidance the ganja-smuggling enterprise intensified, the stated goal being to raise funds to increase the movement's physical presence in Jamaica, or "build a kingdom".
The main method in the early days was to empty cartons of cigarettes and replace the contents with compressed bricks of ganja, but they would also fill cigar boxes or tape it to their bodies to evade customs.
The airport smuggling continued and got more frequent, with cash pumped back into developing the camp, purchasing more land for cultivation, housing, electrification, plumbing, irrigation and other improvements.
[22] Much of the money being made was put into the purchase of a 34-foot long wooden boat, with the intention to use it for smuggling hundreds of kilos at a time from Jamaica to Florida.
They began to work the land vigorously, planting multiple acres of coconuts, bananas, yams, tobacco, timber, sugarcane, ginger, carrots and other crops.
'[28] In 1979 the group was accused, tried, and convicted of smuggling massive amounts of potent cannabis from Jamaica to Miami in actions that kept the Jamaican economy afloat that decade.
During the same year, The Supreme Court of Florida found: "(1) the Ethiopian Zion Coptic Church represents a religion within the first amendment to the Constitution of the United States, and (2) the "use of cannabis is an essential portion of the religious practice.
On January 19, 2017[30] James Tranmer, a member of the group, was pardoned and released from prison by Barack Obama before he left the office of the President of the United States.
Today many are grateful for his sacrifice and his release is an acknowledgement in the paradigm change that has taken place since the majority of the population now see that to fight against a medicinal plant is a detrimental social policy.
[28] The Zion Coptic Church appeared in the 2011 Billy Corben documentary Square Grouper: The Godfathers of Ganja, whose first section concerns the group and features interviews with former members.