Police warning public about potentially deadly batch of fentanyl

By Joey Vacca

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    EUGENE, Oregan (KEZI) — The Eugene Police Department is warning the public about a potentially deadly batch of fentanyl out on the streets after seeing multiple overdoses over the weekend.

EPD said they were called out to the area of Fourth Avenue and Washington Street in Eugene on June 22 for a reported fentanyl overdose. When they arrived, they found one man already dead and another woman who was down, but she was given multiple doses of Narcan and was revived. While medics were helping the woman, they saw a third person go down in the early stages of an overdose.

“In the investigation, in talking with the other people in the area, those three people were doing drugs together within minutes before we arrived,” Lieutenant Sam Stotts with EPD said. “So all three of those people were doing the same drugs. The gentleman that was deceased walked away, went down on the sidewalk, and succumbed and overdosed there on the sidewalk very quickly.”

Police concluded that if all three were using the same drugs, there was likely something deadly about the batch they were using. And even if it was just something those three people used separately, they felt it best to warn the public. Stotts said even if they cannot pinpoint a cause, certain batches of fentanyl can have qualities that make them more dangerous than others.

“These drugs that are on the street that are not made by pharmaceutical companies with regulations,” he said. “They’re made in the back of a car, in a house, who knows where, in a foreign country, and then smuggled up and then sold on the streets. You don’t know what’s in them. There could be — maybe the fentanyl isn’t as good, maybe one pill has more in it than the other pill.”

Stotts said some people on the streets do manage to get pharmaceutical grade drugs, but those are not always the most dangerous or concerning.

“But the majority we see on the streets, yes, is the illegally made, made from some batch from, again, cartels, and trafficked into the country, or made in somebody’s local lab which they might have,” he said. “Which again, those are very rare.”

If it were not for the help of another agency, EPD may not have been able to help the two other people they found overdosing.

“We also have a little bit of a conundrum right now where our Narcan supplier has been difficult getting us the Narcan we need,” Stotts said. “And in fact over the weekend, we were very thankful, the Springfield Police Department loaned us a large amount of Narcan that we were able to keep on our streets to help us. And then we’re going to reimburse them when our batch comes in.”

Katrina Cantwell lives in the area and read about the overdoses and the warning from police on Facebook. She said unfortunately, she was not surprised

“You know, it still affects you in an emotional, emotional way, you know? We have people and loss of life, it shouldn’t be taken lightly,” she said.

But she said she thinks members of the community can do their part by staying informed.

“I think it’s super duper important that people know what’s going on, know that there’s more deadly drugs out there than, you know, there already is,” Cantwell said. “Because that might encourage someone to test their drugs that maybe otherwise would not if they are choosing to use them.”

June Schwartz also lives in Eugene, and agrees it is important to know what is going on. But she wants to help keep people like her grandchildren informed, and also highlight drug treatment programs in the community.

The Eugene Police Department is actively working to identify the source of this particular batch of fentanyl. But like always they’re encouraging everyone to avoid unknown substances and keep their guard up.

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