Pubdate: Fri, 10 Jul 2015
Source: Washington Post (DC)
Copyright: 2015 The Washington Post Company
Contact:  http://www.washingtonpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/491
Author: Peter Hermann

DIFFICULTIES TESTING SYNTHETIC DRUGS ARE SLOWING CRIMINAL PROSECUTIONS

The difficulty in testing synthetic drugs is slowing the prosecution
of suspects accused of possessing or selling the chemically engineered
substances, even as authorities blame them for a spike in violence and
overdoses, according to District officials.

Prosecutors with the U.S. attorney's office have been unable to charge
a number of people recently arrested, and many of them have had to be
released while officials await test results, city and federal
officials said. Police said they hope to charge them once testing is
completed.

"It is a little bit of a delay process," D.C. Police Chief Cathy L.
Lanier said at a news conference Friday after Mayor Muriel E. Bowser
(D) signed legislation allowing officials to close and fine stores
selling synthetic drugs. Assistant Police Chief Peter Newsham said
that suspected synthetic drugs that were seized are being sent to a
lab with the federal Drug Enforcement Administration, although he
added that testing "doesn't happen as quickly as we would like."

Traditional drugs, such as cocaine and heroin, can quickly be
detected, so they do not present such testing problems. Suspects are
almost always immediately charged with possession or
distribution.

But that is not the case with the synthetic variety, which because of
their complicated compounds must be sent to a lab after a drug arrest.

The charging delays are yet another example of police struggling to
keep pace with designer drugs, with such names as Scooby Snax, Bizzaro
and Spice that officials say are made to intentionally bypass drug
laws and whose manufacturers change formulas as quickly as new rules
banning them are put on the books.

"The formulas of the synthetic drugs are constantly being changed to
stay a step ahead of law enforcement," the U.S. attorney's office said
in a statement. "Because the chemicals used in these drugs are
constantly changing, and because there is no reliable means of testing
those drugs in the field, we cannot sustain charges in these cases
until laboratory testing of the compounds is completed."

The D.C. government and law enforcement agencies have made fighting
the problem of synthetic drugs a priority. Nearly a dozen people
overdosed last month on suspected synthetic drugs outside a homeless
shelter near Judiciary Square. Lanier said that on a recent tour of
the city, she encountered three people overdosing -- "completely
disoriented, disconnected, sometimes in the middle of the street."

Police have also said they suspect that synthetic drugs were behind
two high-profile criminal cases this month -- the July 4 killing of a
passenger aboard a Metro train in which the victim was stabbed 30 to
40 times during a robbery and the abandonment of a baby near downtown.

But according to D.C. Superior Court documents, the suspect arrested
in the Metro attack tested negative for drugs. He was not, however,
tested for K2, one of the more popular synthetic drugs linked to
psychotic behavior, because it is not part of standard procedure. One
law enforcement official said the suspect will be tested for synthetic
drugs.

At Friday's news conference, Newsham said that information about
suspected synthetic drug use, such as K2, comes from witnesses
describing erratic actions "that would suggest folks are using this
substance before they are involved in violent criminal behavior." He
added that "there is a strong indication that synthetic cannabinoids
are responsible for a lot of the violence we are encountering."

The legislation that Bowser signed Friday gives Lanier and other
regulatory officials emergency powers to close stores and other
businesses for 96 hours if authorities determine that they are selling
synthetic drugs. Bowser noted the dangers of some of the synthetic
drugs, such as K2, billed as designer marijuana. But instead of
offering users a mellow high, they often act more like PCP: They can
lead to pyschotic behavior, uncontrolled violent outbursts, seizures
and suicidal acts.

"Many of these overdoses have gone unreported and untreated," Bowser
said. "The District will not tolerate the sale of these drugs and will
punish any business selling them."

A first violation carries a $10,000 fine in addition to the 96-hour
business closure. A second violation can lead to a 30-day closure, a
$20,000 fine and the possibility of a permanent license revocation.

"Make no mistake about it," Lanier told reporters after the bill was
signed. "This drug is not only dangerous to those who use it, it is
dangerous to anyone else around them."

The police chief said the drug is disproportionately affecting
impoverished neighborhoods and also is a problem for cities across the
country. Lanier pushed for a national strategy "to stop this madness.
We don't want to go back to the crack-cocaine days." That drug ravaged
Washington in the late 1980s and early 1990s and was blamed for the
District's high number of homicide, which turned the nation's capital
into the murder capital.

The chief recently revamped her drug squads to target synthetic drugs
that were largely available over the Internet. But, Lanier said, those
drugs are "now becoming a street-level drug." And recent street-level
arrests are getting caught up in the complex testing process.

In a letter to Bowser and other officials, U.S. Attorney Vincent H.
Cohen Jr. listed five synthetic-drug cases against store owners or
employees that are currently being prosecuted. Those include one
charged with selling $20,000 of synthetic drugs from a store in
Northeast and another who police say had $37,000 of such drugs at a
separate shop in Northeast.

Cohen noted in the letter that the DEA has recently identified several
new substances as illegal narcotics, and he said officials "will be
working collaboratively with the District to get those substances
banned ASAP." In a separate statement,the prosecutor's office said
that police "very recently made a number of arrests following
undercover buys, and we are ordering testing in the hopes that we will
be able to bring charges in those cases as well."

- -Keith L. Alexander and Aaron C. Davis contributed to this report.
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