NEED TO KNOW
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Jewel recounted her wild experience when she was caught in the middle of a drug bust in Mexico in 1994 during the Not Alone summit in Las Vegas, held from November 10 to 13.
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This story inspired her hit “You Were Meant for Me”, released the following year.
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Last month, the #NotAlone Awards celebrated innovators who are changing the global conversation about mental health.
When Jewel came on stage during it Not Alone Summit at Wynn Las Vegas On November 10, she discussed mental health, creativity and resilience. However, viewers did not expect to hear from her the solution to one of the most bizarre, dangerous and frankly cinematic stories in her life. It's a story she first told nearly two decades ago at a concert and returned to it last month with the clarity of hindsight and the humor of someone who lived it.
It all started in the summer of 1994, when 20-year-old Jewel, then an aspiring songwriter, and fellow singer-songwriter-guitarist Steve Poltz took a week off to write music in Mexico. She worked as a barista at Java Joe's near San Diego. He was a singer, playing gigs at The Rugburns, and he had a sore throat, and Jewel made him tea late one night. They became friends, sang together and found themselves in synchronized downtime.
Jewel didn't want to drive because touring meant endless highways, but Poltz talked her into it. What should have been a three-hour drive turned into 15 hours lost on dusty back roads until they came across the nearly abandoned Rosarito site in Baja, Mexico, with three plywood shacks on the shores of the Sea of Cortez. They broke in (Polz insisted that “it wasn't really an invasion”), watched the sun fall on paradise, and noticed – without suspicion – that the city seemed completely deserted.
“It was dangerous, it was a little foggy,” Polz added. “And I remember the moon came up and we just kept walking and there was no one around. It was very dark.”
The next day, while they were writing songs on the sand of the beach, four armed men in uniform appeared. Their shirts had “Federales” written on them.
– What are you guys doing here? – asked the police. Jewel, full of innocence and frankness, replied: “Watching the empty city.” Then she and Polz asked the most unintentionally life-changing question: “Do you know where we can get a boat to go whale watching?”
“We have a boat,” they said. “Come with us.”
“So we’re really smart,” Jewel recalled with a laugh in Las Vegas. “And we did it. We get on the boat. Nothing special, just a small boat with two wooden benches. They give me binoculars and we look for whales, and I think the police are looking for whales.”
She turned to one of the officers and asked what brought them here. “We are in the business of arresting drug traffickers,” he told her.
She looked at him, stunned. “'Now?'”
“Yes,” he replied.
“Is it dangerous?” she asked, her voice tense with fear.
“Sí,” the officer repeated.
Without hesitation, the officer lifted his shirt, revealing healed scars from bullet holes on his stomach. Jewel realized that while she was looking for whales, the police were looking for smugglers so they could immediately arrest them.
Jewel soon discovered that the wooden bench she was sitting on served as storage for automatic weapons on the boat.
“When I realized we were on this boat with these cops, that’s when I first felt fear because I was looking at their guns and I was like, man…they could kill us,” Holtz exclusively told PEOPLE, laughing. “That's when the cops said, 'Do you want any weapons, like an AK-47, and body armor?' It was like Miami Vice or something like that. But Jewel wasn't interested. “No, thank you,” she told them.
Each boat passing by had to radio and identify itself. One did not do this and instead of slowing down, he started the engine. “Pretty soon we’ll be on a high-speed chase through the water—on my day off,” Jewel deadpanned.
When the smugglers' boat finally hit the sand, four men jumped out and ran for the trees. The feds jumped out and grabbed them. Sitting on the boat, Jewel prayed as officers handcuffed the men, allegedly beat one and eventually forced him to reveal where the cache was.
Underneath the large rock were thousands of pounds of marijuana wrapped in Saran Wrap in potato sacks. Jewel was reluctant to follow him—the situation was already surreal and increasingly frightening—but Polz insisted; she didn't want to sit in the boat alone. They followed the officers across the sand. The Federals, who evacuated the village because of the danger of the operation, were delighted; they were observed for several weeks.
The officers loaded the confiscated cargo with the help of the temporarily uncuffed smugglers and Poltz, who was directly overhead.
“We're loading up on all the drugs, and the feds are thrilled,” Jewel told the Vegas summit audience. “They high five. “Jewel, you're like a good luck charm! There will be a party tonight. Do you want to go?” they asked. “I thought, 'Oh, I bet there is.' Just throw some in the fire and stand downwind.”
Despite all this, she was afraid that they would be framed. “I was really paranoid that we would end up in Tijuana jail. I would spend the rest of my life defending Steve's honor because he was very handsome,” she giggled.
Returning to shore, Poltz insisted that they help unload. When they did, the fed approached him with gratitude and temptation. “Steve, you've helped me so much. Do you want some?” “Okay,” Steve said, despite Jewel's desperate pleas, “Don't.”
The officer cut the block of marijuana with a hunting knife and held it out as if it were communion. Polz later described it as “the clouds parting and the angels singing.” The law enforcement officer practically begged him to take drugs. He took some. Then again. Jewel panicked, convinced that this was the moment they would be thrown into prison forever. They eventually gave the marijuana to Rosa, a 60-year-old cook who was making spaghetti on the beach for a Mormon youth group and said she needed it for her arthritis.
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Then came the moment that would later appear on the Internet. Out of nowhere, a commuter car called by the police arrived and the officers began loading the seized drugs into it. Someone took what would become the infamous drug dealer photo.: Jewel holding an AR-15, Poltz grinning next to her with a kilo of marijuana, both of them smiling next to the officers. They stayed a few more days, making music together. One song, “Food Stamp Love,” was impossible to forget. The other was “You Were Meant for Me”, released on her 1995 debut album. Pieces of you which she sang to an enthusiastic audience.
At the summit, Jewel reimagined the story exclusively for PEOPLE as not just an absurd '90s misadventure, but a reminder of how unprepared she once felt while navigating fame, responsibility and her own well-being. “It was such a crazy, weird random adventure, I feel like I was in the '90s,” Jewel said, chuckling.
“But being a musician is really hard on your mental health,” she continued. “That's why so many musicians were drug addicts, and we kind of glorified them as drug addicts, but it's not sustainable. And so for me, when I took a step back after my second album, mental health breaks didn't matter. You know, they laughed at me, they told me, that's all, and I knew that it was a powerful decision, and it was a decision for my happiness.”
“And that’s why I see so many musicians here who are really honest about their mental health and want their careers to benefit them,” Jewel said. “I’m just really proud of all the musicians that came out here today. Music has been my medicine and I love seeing that it is medicine for other people. If my song can help someone, that's a really wonderful thing.”
This story still sounds crazy. But now Jewel is a grounded and thoughtful artist, striving to help other creatives survive in the very machine she once walked away from. Maybe that's the point: not the feds, not a thousand pounds of marijuana or an AR-15, but the fact that she lived through it all – long enough to understand it, laugh about it, and use her experience to help others heal.
If you or someone you know needs mental health help, text “STRENGTH” to the Crisis text line at 741-741 to be connected to a certified crisis counselor.
Read the original article at People
