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Dangers of ‘drink spiking’ outlined

The following story by journalist Caroline Whelan was published recently in The Galway Advertiser newspaper and appears below with kind permission of the title. The story appeared under the heading “Shocked mother tells story of city man’s drink spiking”. It details how a young man had his drink spiked in Galway city with near devastating consequences. The man’s mother has quite rightly labelled the spiking of drink as akin to attempted murder. While there is no Boyle connection to the story, it is a must read for every young person to highlight the danger of pills being put in their drink as they socialise.

A city-based mother has spoken out after her son’s drink was apparently spiked in a city pub last weekend. The mother, who does not wish to be identified, says she is going public as she wants parents and young people to be more aware while out socialising.

The alleged spiking left the man in an agitated and violent state which led him to being handcuffed and brought away for his own safety by Gardai.

The woman outlined what happened her son the night after he got married in a city hotel a fortnight ago. The couple were staying in the hotel again the following night and they met some friends and relations to continue the wedding party. “When they were out in the pub my son mislaid his wedding band and in the confusion of searching for that, we think that is when his drink may have been spiked.”

The man suddenly started acting very strangely. “My son told my nephew that he had to go. Thankfully my nephew followed him and he went down to the river in Spanish Arch. He was sitting by the river saying how peaceful the water looked. My nephew was starting to get very worried about him at this stage but persuaded him to come away from the water.”

Shortly after the pair returned to the pub, the young man started to get agitated and again said urgently that he had to get out of there.

He again started walking in the direction of the river and his cousin had to talk him away from the water. The pair returned to the pub for the second time and the other man informed his wife about her husband’s behaviour. She started to get concerned at this stage and persuaded him to return to the hotel. While they walked up the street together, he was acting out of character, but she put this down to stress and tiredness due to planning the wedding and the fact it had been a long weekend.

The next day the man’s behaviour seemed to have returned to normal and the couple checked out of the hotel and went shopping. After a while the man suggested going for a drink as he wanted to watch a match on television. He went into the pub before his wife to order drinks. When the woman entered the pub, she found her husband with his eyes rolling around in his head, and again acting very agitated. He picked up their shopping bags and raced out the door of the pub.

While his memory of what happened is sketchy he remembers running towards his house, which is not far from the city centre, and rolling around on the green outside the house. He did not have a key so he threw the shopping bags over the wall and took off his T-shirt. He then went missing for over an hour and has no recollection of what he was doing. At this stage his mother had been contacted about his behaviour. “We were ringing him constantly, in a state of total panic at this stage. His phone was in the pocket of his trousers and thankfully he answered eventually and said he was at Cookes Corner.”

Pandemonium

When his mother and wife arrived at Cookes Corner they were met with a very distressing scene. “He was hanging over the bonnet of a car, acting completely demented. He was trying to hit, kick, and spit at anyone that came near him. He even managed to land a kick at his wife – this is completely out of character for my son, he would never lay a hand on anyone. I had to try and hold him down forcefully to calm him down. We called an ambulance and he spat at the ambulance driver. He was completely mortified when I told him that. We then called the guards, who had to handcuff him and it took five guards to get him into the Garda car.”

The woman says the experience was very traumatic as it was such a shock to see her son acting in this way. “We had no idea what was going on. He was held in Mill Street for a few hours until he calmed down and it began to dawn on us at that stage that his drink must have been spiked. He had a nosebleed as well and apparently that it a common symptom of spiking.”

After the man was released from Mill Street he was taken to WestDoc where a doctor took a sample of his urine. “The doctor said it was a classic case of drink spiking. He found rat poison and seven other types of drugs in the sample. He said it would take between 48 and 72 hours for the effects to wear off, and gave him something to counteract the poison. We brought him home and he slept it off, but still looked unwell the next day. We were watching him constantly.”

Thankfully the man has made a full recovery but he is very shaken by what happened. His mother knows that as bad and as the story is, that very scarily the situation could have been a whole lot worse. “I am very shaken by it, but as well as being angry about what happened, I am relieved as I feel he had a lucky escape. Only for my nephew stayed with him the whole time there could have been a very different outcome. I suppose having the drink the next day set it off in his system again and it was very distressing to see my son acting like that.”

The woman wants to warn others not to leave their drink out of their sight on a night out. “As a parent I am concerned for other children. We have thousands of students in the city, they need to be aware of the dangers out there. Something has to be done to stop this happening. It needs to be highlighted – as far as I am concerned spiking a person’s drink is attempted murder.”

 

(image: drinkstuff.com)

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