Local police warn of fentanyl-laced gummy bears

Jennie Taer, DCNF

A local police department in Georgia is warning residents about fentanyl-laced hard candies resembling gummy bears.

The Athens-Clarke County Police Department posted on social media Wednesday about the fentanyl-laced candies. The perpetrators “infused” melted Jolly Ranchers with fentanyl, then molded them to look like gummy bears and rewrapped them in the Jolly Rancher wrappers, Lieutenant Shaun Barnett of the Athens-Clarke County Police Department told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

“The purpose of the social media posts was to caution the public of this substance being recovered locally,” Barnett said.

The Northeast Georgia Drug Task Force seized the drug-laced hard candies on July 30 while executing a search warrant, and there is an ongoing investigation into the matter, according to Barnett. The candies were found in an Athens home, the Athens-Banner Herald reported.

It remains unclear if any overdoses or overdose deaths were linked to the fentanyl-laced candies or if there are any suspects in custody, as Barnett couldn’t provide further details due to the ongoing investigation.

Fentanyl is a highly-potent synthetic opioid that is responsible for the majority of synthetic drug overdose deaths in the U.S. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported 92,183 drug overdose deaths in 2020, 1,848 of which were in Georgia, according to local reports.

Houston DEA Special Agent in Charge Daniel Comeaux told the DCNF last month that “nearly all illicit synthetic drugs smuggled into the U.S. are manufactured in Mexico” and linked the surge in overdose deaths to the Mexican cartels.

The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) considers 2 milligrams of fentanyl to be a lethal dose.

A number of former top U.S. officials penned a letter to President Joe Biden last month urging him to declare fentanyl and its analogues Weapons of Mass Destruction, according to Families Against Fentanyl.

The Atlanta DEA declined to comment.

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to reflect that the Atlanta DEA office declined to comment.

For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

DONATE TO BIZPAC REVIEW

Please help us! If you are fed up with letting radical big tech execs, phony fact-checkers, tyrannical liberals and a lying mainstream media have unprecedented power over your news please consider making a donation to BPR to help us fight them. Now is the time. Truth has never been more critical!

Success! Thank you for donating. Please share BPR content to help combat the lies.

Comment

We have no tolerance for comments containing violence, racism, profanity, vulgarity, doxing, or discourteous behavior. If a comment is spam, instead of replying to it please click the ∨ icon below and to the right of that comment. Thank you for partnering with us to maintain fruitful conversation.

PLEASE JOIN OUR NEW COMMENT SYSTEM! We love hearing from our readers and invite you to join us for feedback and great conversation. If you've commented with us before, we'll need you to re-input your email address for this. The public will not see it and we do not share it.

Latest Articles