Australian Feds crackdown on the importing of 'date rape' drugs

 

Crackdown on dangerous ‘date rape’ drug

ByClare Sibthorpe

Updated May 30, 2024 — 10.26am

Australian authorities are cracking down on a dangerous “date rape drug” which has been linked to sexual assaults and overdoses and is being hidden in beauty and food products.

The drug, 1,4-Butanediol, commonly known as “bute”, reduces feelings of pain by interrupting the way nerves signal pain between the brain and the body and can cause breathing difficulty. It naturally converts into the illegal gamma-hydroxybutyrate GHB, or liquid ecstasy, once ingested.

New legislation introduced in March controlling its import has allowed the Australian Federal Police (AFP) to confiscate more than 4000 litres of the drug in Sydney since the changes.

The most common ways officers saw the drug hidden was inside body oils, face masks, and food products.

Bute can be legally imported into Australia for legitimate industrial use by importers registered with the Australian Industrial Chemicals Introduction Scheme and is used in the production of plastics and polymers.

But, under the new laws that define bute as a border-controlled drug, importers who do not have a legal purpose for them face a maximum penalty of life imprisonment.

The drug is illegal to possess in all states and territories.

AFP Eastern Commander Kate Ferry said bute is an industrial chemical used to produce plastics which can lead to “harrowing consequences”.

She said it is one of the main drivers of fatal and non-fatal GHB overdoses in Australia and is used in sexual assaults and the spiking of food and drink, particularly in nightclubs.

While she said this served as a reminder to people – especially young women – to watch their drinks while out at night, that shouldn’t have to be the case.

“Australian women are a little tired of being told of what to do to be safe for themselves,” Ferry said.

“What we’re saying is this is a whole of Australia problem, and we are targeting the people bringing it in before it even gets into Australia”.

Ferry said importers should be wary of on-selling large amounts of obscurely labelled goods and should report suspicious activity to Border Watch online.

ABF Acting Commander Asha Patwardhan said Border Force officers had seen individuals and criminal syndicates attempting to import bute in volumes of up to 40 litres per day.

“The misuse of this substance can prove fatal – and those in the community need to be aware of the dangers,” Patwardhan said.

“It is typically from the Asia market, with the majority from China. The substance is incredibly dangerous and may have deadly consequences for vulnerable teenagers and adults.”

ABF officers detected about 180 litres of bute imported to Australia from China, concealed in bottles labelled as body oil, on March 7.

Search warrants led by the AFP at businesses in the Sydney suburbs of Fairfield and Lidcombe led to the further seizure of more than 1000 litres of bute.

The ABF alerted the AFP to another detection of bute imported to Sydney from China on March 23, which was estimated to have 960 litres of the dangerous substance concealed in bottles of “essence oil”.

One importation of 660 litres of bute was seized in early May 2024, after the recipient alerted authorities they had become aware of the change in legislation and had received the drug late last year.

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NYPD Captain Under Fire for Saying Police ‘not too Worried’ About Date Rape Rise

© Reuters

A NYPD captain’s dismissive remarks about a 62.5 percent spike in reported rapes in 2016 has drawn a backlash. Peter Rose said the police were not worried about it because in most of the cases, the victims knew the perpetrators.

Rose commands the 94th Precinct, in the Greenpoint neighborhood in Brooklyn. In 2016, there were 13 rapes reports there, compared to eight in 2015, with three cases remaining unsolved. 

Rose described the situation to the news website DNAinfo ahead of a meeting with the community council as something the police are not concerned about.

“Some of them were Tinder, some of them were hookup sites, some of them were actually coworkers. It's not a trend that we're too worried about because out of 13, only two were true stranger rapes,” he said, adding that in many cases, victims would not cooperate with the investigation.

“Every rape should be investigated. I wish we could do more,” Rose added.

Later at the meeting on Wednesday, he reportedly made similar comments, implying that victims of rape by acquaintances are somehow less hurt than those targeted by strangers.

“They're not total abomination rapes where strangers are being dragged off the streets,” Rose said.

“If there's a true stranger rape, a random guy picks up a stranger off the street, those are the troubling ones. That person has, like, no moral standards,” he added.

Is he suggesting a date-rapist has moral standards? Seriously?

The apparent lack of compassion drew fire from public officials after the controversial comments went viral on Friday.

“The comments by the Captain do not represent the views of the mayor, our administration, or of an NYPD that is deeply committed to fighting for survivors of sexual assault,” New York Mayor Bill de Blasio's office said in a statement.

“Rape is rape, in New York City and everywhere else. The crime merits no moral qualification and does not involve shades of criminality or degrees of danger. In New York City, rape is aggressively investigated and prosecuted blind to the nature of the underlying relationship, and with an absolute focus on obtaining justice for the survivor and safety for our neighborhoods,” the mayor’s press secretary, Eric Phillps, said.

NYPD Deputy Commissioner Stephen Davis said Rose's comments “did not properly explain the complexity of issues involved with investigating rape complaints.”

“Every report of rape is thoroughly investigated by specially trained detectives in the NYPD's Special Victims Unit. All complaints of rape and other types of sexual crimes are taken seriously whether they are committed by domestic partners, acquaintances, or strangers,” Davis told the media.

Some women’s rights groups called for Rose to be dismissed for his inappropriate comments.

US statistics on perpetrators of rape are in line with what the NYPD precinct reported. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, only about 14 percent of such crimes are committed by strangers. The victim support group RAINN - Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network, on the other hand, says 28 percent of rapes are committed by total strangers.

So using the CDC's figures, that would mean the NYPD are not too concerned about 86% of all rapes in the city. Chief Rose's comments may not represent the official attitude of NY city or even the NYPD, but I fear it reflects the attitudes of far too many people in the NYPD. An anonymous survey might be very interesting.

Nail Varnish that Detects Date-rape Drugs Set for Release after Getting Millions in Investment

    © Eric Thayer / Reuters

A revolutionary drug-detecting nail varnish that began as a college project is expected to be launched in the near future after the invention, designed to prevent date rape, garnered an investment of $5.5 million from a multitude of backers.

Undercover Colors, the company behind the wearable nail tech, has reemerged on social media informing eager customers looking for a market release date that there was “much to come in 2017.”

The concept was first mooted in 2014 by four engineering students from North Carolina State University, who have since been extensively testing the product while investment has been pouring in.

The company say they want to hand back power to women and this product will allow women to determine if their drink has been spiked by simply dipping their finger into their drink.

If a common date rape drug such as rohypnol, Xanax or GHB is present the nail will change color, according to the creators.

Recent records show that the nail polish has attracted $5.5 million in research and development investment over the past two years from 49 investors, according to the Triangle Business Journal.

One of the backers, David Gardner, told the Triangle Business Journal the product would be a “game changer” once it hit stores.

“It’s shifting the fear back on the perpetrators and it’s too good of a thing not to deserve a backing and a chance,” he said.

I agree, although I'm not sure how much fear it will induce on the perverts. Maybe if girls who found their drinks to be spiked would take a photo of the pervert who spiked it and put it on the internet, then there might be something to fear. That's risky business though and could result in nasty court action. But, at least, it should save some girls from being raped, and that's the most important thing.