Flakka, synthetic drug behind increasingly bizarre crimes
by Curt Anderson
One man ran naked through a Florida neighborhood, tried to have
sex with a tree and told police he was the mythical god Thor. Another
ran nude down a busy city street in broad daylight, convinced a pack of
German shepherds was pursuing him.
Two others tried separately to break into the Fort
Lauderdale Police Department. They said they thought people were chasing
them; one wound up impaled on a fence.
The common element to
these and other bizarre incidents in Florida in the last few months is
flakka, an increasingly popular synthetic designer drug. Also known as
gravel and readily available for $5 or less a vial, it's a growing
problem for police after bursting on the scene in 2013.
It
is the latest in a series of synthetic drugs that include Ecstasy and
bath salts, but officials say flakka is even easier to obtain in small
quantities through the mail. Flakka's active ingredient is a chemical
compound called alpha-PVP, which is on the U.S. Drug Enforcement
Administration's list of the controlled substances most likely to be
abused. It is usually made overseas in countries such as China and
Pakistan.
Flakka, a derivative
of the Spanish word for a thin, pretty woman, is usually sold in a
crystal form and is often smoked using electronic cigarettes, which are
popular with young people and give off no odor. It can also be snorted,
injected or swallowed.
"I've had one addict describe it as $5
insanity," said Don Maines, a drug treatment counselor with the Broward
Sheriff's Office in Fort Lauderdale. "They still want to try it because
it's so cheap. It gives them heightened awareness. They feel stronger
and more sensitive to touch. But then the paranoia sets in."
Judging
from the evidence being seized by police around Florida, flakka use is
up sharply. Submissions for testing to the Florida Department of Law
Enforcement's crime labs have grown from 38 in 2013 to 228 in 2014. At
the Broward Sheriff's Office laboratory, flakka submissions grew from
fewer than 200 in 2014 to 275 already, in just the first three months of
this year, according to spokeswoman Keyla Concepcion.
"It's definitely something we are watching. It's an emerging drug," said Chad Brown, an FDLE supervisory special agent.
According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, Florida
appears to be the nation's hot spot for reports of flakka, also known as
gravel. News reports have also cited flakka or gravel appearing in
Ohio, Texas and Tennessee.
In one recent case, 22-year-old Jaime
Nicole Lewis was charged in a DEA complaint with conspiracy to
distribute flakka after DEA agents based in London intercepted
U.S.-bound packages of the drug that were made in Hong Kong. An
undercover DEA agent posing as a delivery company employee then brought
the packages to Lewis' home in Palm Beach County, according to a court
affidavit.
"Synthetic drugs are illegal and present a grave danger
to our community, particularly our children," said Miami U.S. Attorney
Wifredo Ferrer.
Lewis is being
held without bail and is due to enter a plea next week. Her attorney,
Paul Lazarus, said prosecutors will have to prove she knew the packages
contained illegal drugs. A man believed to be the flakka ringleader in
this case also is charged, but has not been arrested.
New
cases keep coming: On Thursday, police in Boynton Beach arrested
20-year-old Qushanna Doby on child neglect charges after officers found
her 1-year-old daughter, crying and shivering in a soiled diaper,
outside an office building along a busy road. Doby told officers she had
had smoked flakka, and suffered hallucinations from the drug in the
past. It wasn't clear if she had an attorney.
James
West, a 50-year-old homeless man, was caught on surveillance video in
February trying to kick in the heavy glass front door of the Fort
Lauderdale Police Department, finally cracking it with large rocks.
Bleeding above one eye, West told officers that he was desperate for
help from police because "he was being chased by 20-25 individuals and
he didn't know why." He later told police he had smoked flakka.
In
March, Shanard Neely got impaled through the buttocks on the
department's 10-foot-high security fence while trying to climb over,
convinced he was being pursued and that "he needed to go to jail or they
would kill him," police said. Neely, 37, also told officers he had
smoked flakka. It took hours for rescuers to cut him down.
And
in Palm Beach County, a SWAT team had to talk Leroy Strothers, 33, off a
rooftop in January. He had fired a shot from up there, claiming he was
being followed by a Haitian gang that had threatened his family.
Strothers, who was charged with being a convicted felon in possession of
a firearm, told officers he had smoked flakka and could not remember
how he got on the roof.
"I'm feeling delusional and hallucinating," Strothers said, according to a sheriff's report.
The FDLE's Brown said his agency is training police to better recognize flakka and the symptoms it can cause.
One
challenge is that flakka manufacturers make subtle changes to its
chemical makeup, foiling efforts to test for the drug, and it is
frequently mixed with other substances, such as crack cocaine or heroin,
with unknown effects, said Maines, of the Broward Sheriff's Office.
With prolonged use over as little as three days, behavioral changes can be severe.
"It
actually starts to rewire the brain chemistry. They have no control
over their thoughts. They can't control their actions," Maines said. "It
seems to be universal that they think someone is chasing them. It's
just a dangerous, dangerous drug."
