Drug laced with chemicals that can cause delusion, delirium
A new variant of synthetic marijuana may be coming to St. Charles Parish that could put emergency responders, and the public, in danger.
East Baton Rouge paramedic Nicole Jagers responded to a call Jan. 18 from 21-year-old Artdric Conner, who was suffering from a drug overdose. Conner was initially “calm but anxious.”
Only hours later, hospital staff found themselves gang-tackling the young man after he had repeatedly punched Jagers and other medical workers.
“That was the first time I ever acquired injuries as a result of a patient,” Jagers, an 8-year-veteran of the East Baton Rouge EMS service, said. “Now we’re dealing with more and more [synthetic marijuana] cases.”
Jagers said that her patient-turned-assailant told her he had smoked synthetic marijuana many times in the past, but on the night of the assault he had tried a new kind called “Black Magic.”
Though Ken Rousseau, director of Emergency Medical Services for St. Charles Parish Hospital, said there has not been an increase in local calls for synthetic marijuana use, he said EMS units have responded to “several incidents related to this type of drug use.”
“This particular drug can sometimes lead to a fight or flight response, which can prompt aggression, paranoia, delusion and delirium,” Rousseau added.
St. Charles Parish Sheriff Greg Champagne noted that synthetic marijuana is not a single chemical, but a regularly changing formula of chemicals sprayed onto a smokeable substance. Sellers of synthetic marijuana, or “synthetic cannabinoids,” can make chemical tweaks to their formula to evade prosecution—leading users into dangerous territory.
“Calling this synthetic marijuana makes it sound like this is a safe alternative to marijuana—it’s not,” Champagne said. “The chemical in marijuana that is illegal is THC—these don’t have THC.”
Dr. Brent Giuffre, director of medicine at St. Charles Parish Hospital, said the chemicals used to manufacture synthetic marijuana could even lead to death.
“We’re talking about potentially life-threatening organ failure in some instances,” Giuffre said. “Not something you would see with simple marijuana abuse.”
The St. Charles Parish Sheriff’s Office has warned residents, through a PSA, that synthetic marijuana presents a unique legal challenge. In addition to not appearing on drug screenings, investigators often find that synthetic marijuana packets they’ve confiscated do not contain substances that are technically illegal.
“We’re talking about just synthetic chemicals that are being sold by people who construct the formula to avoid the law,” Champagne said.
Champagne applauded the state legislature for passing a law that allows the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals to quickly add new substances to the list of schedule I controlled substances, making them illegal. In this way, he said, law enforcement does not have to wait for a session of the legislature to arrest dealers for selling new, previously undetected variants of synthetic marijuana.
“In some cases we’ve had guys who had the lab reports in their store when we busted them, insisting that what they were selling was legal,” Lt. Marlon Shuff said. “And we’ve had to say, ‘no, you’re going to jail.’”
A brief search by the St. Charles Herald-Guide yielded the website legalbuds.com, selling a product called “Black Magic” with a warning that the product is “not for the weak” and that users should “not operate any machinery after using” the product.
Champagne said that the synthetic cannabinoid variants are popular for those between the ages of 16 to 20.
One Luling mother with a son in high school, Ginger Jackson, said she’s concerned about the growing use of the drug by high school students.
“[My son] and his buddies said they all know people at [Hahnville High School] who are smoking it,” Jackson said.
Though the Sheriff’s Office said it has partnered with many local businesses to stop the over-the-counter proliferation of synthetic marijuana, Champagne suspects that much of the purchases are occurring online. In November, a Destrehan woman was arrested after signing for a package from China that contained more than 1,000 grams of bath salts—a drug with mood-altering and stimulant properties that was officially labeled as a controlled substance by the DEA in 2011.
“I think we’ve convinced a lot of the store owners, at least locally, that it’s not a good thing for businesses to [sell synthetic drugs],” Champagne said. “We’re not violating anybody’s rights, but we asked them, ‘why do you want to do this?’”
Jackson said because most stores no longer sell synthetic marijuana, drug dealers are manufacturing their own product.
“Nobody knows what these dealers are spraying on this,” she said.
For now, St. Charles Parish EMS and the Sheriff’s Office continue to work together to prevent the kinds of issues that happened to Jagers. Rousseau said deputies are on hand for any patient presenting a problem.
“If an individual is a threat to the paramedics, the sheriff’s department will ride along with the patient inside of the EMS unit to ensure safety,” Rousseau said.
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