[2][3] Sand was part of the League for Spiritual Discovery at the Millbrook estate in New York, has been credited as the "first underground chemist on record to have synthesized DMT" and is known for manufacturing large amounts of LSD.

[6] His father, Clarence Hiskey, was a researcher in the Manhattan Project's Metallurgical Laboratory who attempted to spy for the Soviet Union.

[6] Sand graduated from Erasmus Hall High School in 1959 and then spent a year working on a kibbutz in Israel.

[9][7] Sand and David L. Mantell were arrested on April 1, 1967 when their truck failed to stop at the Dinosaur, Colorado Port of Entry.

[11] In December 1968 Sand purchased a secluded farmhouse in Windsor, California, a small town in rural Sonoma County.

[14] On January 19, 1973 "Leland H. Jordan" (later identified as Sand) and Judy Neal Shaughnessy were arrested on drug charges by Kirkwood, Missouri, police, shortly after they arrived from San Francisco.

[15][16][17] On April 25, 1973, Sand, Tim Scully, Michael Randall, and four other major figures in the LSD operation were indicted by a Federal grand jury in San Francisco.

[6] LSD historian Mark McCloud reports that Sand then traveled to the ashram of so-called "sex guru" Rajneesh in west India.