The scariest thing about synthetic drugs is everything that's unknown - Washington Post
A third, whom police found prancing through Capitol Hill, started kicking and screaming when eight police and fire officials tried to restrain him. Paramedics rushed all three men to hospitals in separate incidents Thursday night, and all three said they had taken synthetic drugs — a set of substances so alarming to District authorities that Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier recently likened them... [ Synthetic drugs pose challenges for prosecutors ]. Authorities say the problem spiked in June, with a sudden rash of 911 calls. Officials have linked the drugs to two homicides, including a grisly Fourth of July killing in which an allegedly high man stabbed a Metro rider nearly 40 times on a train. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) said last week that the drugs constituted a “serious threat to our public health and public safety. Because the mixtures change by the batch in part to skirt drug laws, the drugs are difficult to test — and overdoses are difficult to treat. Authorities said they’re still testing the Metro stabbing suspect for signs that he was using synthetic drugs, which they say they suspect from his. Source: www.washingtonpost.com
