Free Republic

The teenager who arrived at Jose de Jesus Lopez's drug rehab clinic in the industrial Mexican city of Monterrey in December had unusual symptoms. The 17-year-old's family had taken the boy to hospital a few days earlier when he'd had trouble breathing and then passed out after supposedly consuming cocaine, the director said. Now he was sweaty and nauseous. He'd been vomiting and couldn't sleep. "Something doesn't add up," thought Lopez, who is also the head of an addiction center network in Nuevo Leon state, where Monterrey is located.

The Austin Police Association is pointing the finger at Travis County District Attorney Jose Garza after a homeless man – who was let back out on the street, despite violent assault charges – was arrested once again for allegedly stabbing another homeless man to death. The case concerns Hilario Adrian, a 56-year-old homeless man who was arrested in April after he was involved in a violent altercation with another homeless man. Court documents say Adrian attacked the other homeless man with a golf club, and threatened him with a hatchet. He was arrested for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon...

When Oregon voters approved a ballot measure in 2020 to decriminalize hard drugs, they were promised the lives of everyone would be improved and funds would be diverted to addiction recovery centers for which $300 million was allotted. But after more than one year, the rate of overdoses has spiked, and few offenders have used the treatment centers, DailyMail.com reported. At a legislative hearing Thursday, Steve Allen, Oregon's behavioral health director, acknowledged a "dramatic" increase in overdoses and overdose deaths statewide. One Republican state lawmaker said that her Southern Oregon community of Grants Pass has suffered a 700% increase in...

A women’s shelter in Arkansas will host a “family-friendly” drag show featuring drag queen headliner “Crystal Methyd” and at least 16 other drag queens as part of an LGBT event open to all ages on the afternoon of June 5. The Northwest Arkansas Women’s Shelter will host “You Belong,” a community resource fair at The Momentary, a satellite to Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art and contemporary art space at a decommissioned cheese factory in downtown Bentonville, Arkansas. The event will feature multiple pop-up performances from at least five local drag queens and will welcome “all to gather in support...

The FBI is investigating anti-fascist activists for an alleged plot to buy guns from a Mexican cartel in order to “stage an armed rebellion” at the southern border, according to an unclassified document obtained by The Chicago Tribune. The FBI document, from December of 2018, warns of militant antifa activists planning to “disrupt security operations” at the U.S.-Mexico border. The group allegedly planned to buy guns from a Mexican cartel associate known as Cobra Commander, in order to “stage an armed rebellion at the border.” The source who provided it to the San Diego Tribune asked the outlet not to...

Lawmakers on the House Energy and Commerce Committee held a hearing Wednesday on the dangers of drug-impaired driving. There is growing concern in Congress over the issue as data from the Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA) and the Foundation for Advancing Alcohol Responsibility finds that accidents from drugged driving have been on the rise over the last 10 years.A recent report showed that 44 percent of fatally injured drivers tested positive for drugs in 2016. That number is up from 2006, when just 28-percent of fatally injured drivers were drug-positive. But lawmakers also pressed for more information about the problem....

NEW MEXICO — A federal appeals court has ruled that driving with one’s hands at the “ten-and-two position” is reason enough to pull someone over for further investigation. No traffic laws have to actually be broken. Additionally, the court ruled that facial acne is reason enough to suspect a driver is a drug smuggler. The ruling stems from an incident that took place on April 18, 2012, at roughly 7:45 p.m. A border patrol agent driving down Highway 80 saw a white Ford F-150 heading the opposite direction. This took place roughly 40 miles north of the U.S./Mexico border —...

Beslan militants were drug-dependent, forensic study shows By C.J. Chivers Monday, October 18, 2004 MOSCOW Forensic analysis of the remains of 31 militants who seized the public school in Beslan last month has determined that all of them were dependent on drugs, a senior law enforcement official said in a statement reported by Russian news agencies Sunday. Nikolai Shepel, the deputy prosecutor general of Russia's southern federal district, also said that blood tests had found very high levels of heroin and morphine among a majority of the attackers who died at the siege, "which indicates that they were long-term drug...