Chuck Schumer wants DEA to launch special unit to crack down on sale of synthetic drugs like K2, Scooby Snax
The federal Drug Enforcement Agency needs to launch a special investigative unit to crack down on the sale of synthetic drugs following a major bust and a startling spike in emergency room visits, Sen. Chuck Schumer said Sunday.
The distinct division should focus on websites that peddle the powerful illegal drugs online and notify credit card companies and other payment processors like PayPal and Venmo of the high tech hawkers, Schumer told reporters.
“Unless we find a way to chock off their supply, synthetic drugs are going to keep delivering very real and very painful consequences,” Schumer said. “Toxic chemicals, cooked mainly in China, are available to dealers or bodegas at the drop of a hat.”
The sale of potent drugs like “K2” and “Scooby Snax” appears to be increasing.
The use of synthetic marijuana has resulted in 2,300 emergency room visits in New York State over a recent two-month period, according to the Manhattan federal prosecutor’s office.
Authorities have struggled to keep pace.
A 10-man drug ring that allegedly distributed over a ton of synthetic marijuana to city bodegas was busted last Wednesday. The drug crew used chemicals shipped from China to at least one processing facility in the Bronx where they would be mixed and sprayed onto leafy materials like tea leaves, according to an indictment.
Officers seized $30 million worth of drugs, including 275,000 flashy packets distributed in bodegas for around $5 each, authorities said.
“The chemicals were likely purchased via the Internet and likely with a credit card,” Schumer said. “The high is cheap, the cost is low, and the consequences are deadly.”
Synthetic drugs are frequently a dangerous combination of chemicals made to copy 9-tetrahydrocannabinol, the primary psychoactive ingredient in marijuana.
Many of the websites selling the drugs are operated in China, Schumer said.
“It’s hard to shut them down because the Chinese government doesn’t cooperate,” he said. “But if we eliminate the ability to process credit cards we can strangle their operation, we can choke off their oxygen.”
Filed under: General Problems
I have a neighbor dealing drugs and I have called the sheriff three times over the last year. Still nothing has been done about. Even the high schoolers know it is the town drug house. This type of thing goes on every where and yet DEA. Main focus in pain meds.
Doctors normally are not armed and keep good records .. although often illegible… and have more assets to seize and liquidate… which the DEA can spend on “new toys” When they bust a “drug dealer” .. all they get are various “drugs and guns” which has no value to the DEA… they can be heavily armed and shoot at the DEA and the only value they can get out of the BUST is whatever cash they can seize…