'Needle spiking' in UK nightclubs wtf?

[beesonthewhatnow]

There's no doubt at all that drink spiking happens.

Yep, it’s happened to me, but I’m fairly sure I wasn’t the intended recipient.

Was a few years back when I was DJing. Lots of drinks around the booth, I assume I picked up one that wasn’t mine. I suddenly and very quickly felt very strange, as if I was massively drunk, but with none of the fun part. Last thing I really remember is going to the loo as I felt sick, then waking up at home the next day. Friends said I was basically passed out in the gents all night. They’d kept an eye on me and got me home in a cab.

 

[8ball]

No, its possible but I don't believe it. Subcutaneous midazolam would be very fast to administer and comes in 5mg/1ml so a reasonably small volume to inject into the fat. Quicker and easier to just put it in a drink though, as others have said.

Though at this place in Nottingham the drinks are very well guarded, as discussed.
Midazolam does seem like the best amnestic candidate. Would be a comparatively slow onset, so a case of "surreptitiously inject, then watch...".

Would lower inhibitions/judgment esp. when combined with some alcohol, then next day you have the memory blackout...

Like you, I'm also a little sceptical, but rushing to a "social contagion" explanation has echoes of "look at these silly women getting hysterical over a rumour".

edit: I should be clear that it wasn't kropotkin that raised the sociogenic angle - that was meant more generally

 

[MickiQ]

Am getting a vibe that Mum maybe doesn't like Paddy that much.
You can meet nice people in shitty clubs tbf.

That place is something else, though - never seen anything like it.

Mrs Q loves Paddy she thinks he's great, (must admit I've grown fond of the boy myself) she was more pleased than anyone when he proposed. She does drop the odd hint how she would like an half-Irish grandkid but Middle has become adept at dodging that subject.
Veering slightly back to the subject Middle Q was a regular on the Nottingham nightclub scene when she was a student and told us that she was always aware of the risk of her drink being spiked. If a guy wouldn't take no for an answer when he asked for her phone number she would give him the number of our local Crime & Community PCSO. Guys she was interested in including the aforementioned Irishman she would ask them to meet her for coffee in the Starbucks next to the theatre.
She also told her mother last night to tell me not to worry because Youngest is smart and clever knows to be careful but that isn't going to stop me getting twitchy every time a story like this comes up for the next few years.

 

[not-bono-ever]

I have as one attacked by a bloke wielding a bloody needle in a club. I barstooled him. How we laughed.

But this does sound a bit odd. Unfortunately The fear is already out there from the previous roofie stuff of z few years ago. Even though it’s massively massively unlikely, that people have to watch their drinks is shite

 

[maomao]

No, its possible but I don't believe it. Subcutaneous midazolam would be very fast to administer and comes in 5mg/1ml so a reasonably small volume to inject into the fat. Quicker and easier to just put it in a drink though, as others have said.

The advantage with midazolam would be thirty seconds later the victim is not going to give a fuck.

 

[bellaozzydog]

I’m calling bollocks

 

[Magnus McGinty]

I imagine the getting caught vs getting away with it ratio swings heavily toward the former yet the reports are suggesting the latter. The mind boggles.

 

[LDC]

Yeah, the risk to reward ratio is pretty fucked up, but then loads of crime is like that. And there was that bloke who did door-to-door fake vaccines to old people for a few hundred quid or something, so who knows.

 

[bellaozzydog]

I’m calling bollocks

To clarify I’m not denying women have been pricked with needles

Piquerism is a thing and just straightforward assault with a needle is well known (the threat of HIV etc ask any copper)

But find me an anaesthesiologist who would agree that it’s feasible for pin prick delivery of a drug to a human that can cause the required symptoms to be effective as a date rape drug, delivered fleetingly in a nightclub

I’m not saying it is impossible I’m suggesting it’s so far beyond what is accessible and feasible for a perpetrator to achieve that it’s nonsensical

This is a project fear story, urban myth stuff

 

[8ball]

The advantage with midazolam would be thirty seconds later the victim is not going to give a fuck.

I think more like 5 minutes if done subcutaneously. With the right dose a person would appear (and feel) very calm and still look pretty lucid, adding some plausible deniability compared to getting a semi-comatose person out of a club. It feels quite a lot like alcohol IME and works on some of the same receptors (the ones that cause the calm sleepiness of alcohol).

Sounds like you've had some experience with it too (goes very nicely with morphine - the staff at my local hospital call it an "M&M cocktail").

bellaozzydog - this is the first time I've heard of piquerism.

 

[maomao]

Sounds like you've had some experience with it too (goes very nicely with morphine - the staff at my local hospital call it an "M&M cocktail").

I had it with pethedine during a very painful endoscopy. I remember the effect as pretty much instantaneous.

 

[Sue]

Being cynical, much easier to focus* on this than address the underlying misogynistic and sexist shit many women experience regularly.

*For the police, politicians, the media etc.

 

[kropotkin]

I had it with pethedine during a very painful endoscopy. I remember the effect as pretty much instantaneous.

That was IV, therefore was indeed instantaneous. Subcutaneous absorption is slower-more like 20mins

 

[8ball]

I had it with pethedine during a very painful endoscopy. I remember the effect as pretty much instantaneous.

That would be IV. SC onset is 4 or 5 times slower.
Endoscopy sounds rough. Glad they were responsive with the drugs.

 

[quiet guy]

There was piece on this on East Midlands BBC news last night with a young lady showing a very bruised looking arm as her evidence of being needle pricked. She was saying that she wanted nursing staff at A&E's to report these cases to Police even if the person presenting with this type of symptom didn't want to.

 

[8ball]

There was piece on this on East Midlands BBC news last night with a young lady showing a very bruised looking arm as her evidence of being needle pricked. She was saying that she wanted nursing staff at A&E's to report these cases to Police even if the person presenting with this type of symptom didn't want to.

Very easily to cynically say she's hardly the first person to wake up in their own bed with memory holes and one or more mysterious injuries, obv.
I don't like the idea of nursing staff reporting cases against the patient's wishes - if this is a real phenomenon it could deter victims from going to the hospital.

 

[ouirdeaux]

if this is a real phenomenon it could deter victims from going to the hospital.

If this isn't a real phenomenon, it could deter people from going to hospital. People turn up at A&E with interesting stories. Many claim to have been injected with opiates by perfect strangers. One memorable chap insisted that the magic mushrooms he had consumed were on the pizza he had bought from Iceland. It may be necessary for their self-esteem to insist on this sort of thing, and it all contributes to the gaiety of life, but if they think that the police are going to get involved, they may not want to seek help at all.

 

[girasol]

DM is calling for people to be thoroughly searched because of this. It does seem odd that suddenly it's happening but maybe angry Incels have decided to attack simultaneously or something...

 

[sojourner]

DM is calling for people to be thoroughly searched because of this. It does seem odd that suddenly it's happening but maybe angry Incels have decided to attack simultaneously or something...

This was my first thought on hearing the stories.

Some of the dismissals on here have been quite sneery in tone too. Not a good look.

 

[8ball]

DM is calling for people to be thoroughly searched because of this. It does seem odd that suddenly it's happening but maybe angry Incels have decided to attack simultaneously or something...

That was my thought - perhaps a small number of them teaming up and testing out some 'ideas'. A few locations in Scotland plus Nottingham (with 12 reports very close together in time) gives it that feel for me.

edit: make that an extra 30 in Nottingham from 12th September - just announced by Notts police - the initial 12 reports were just from 4th til12th Sept - so 44 total.

 

[sojourner]

That was my thought - perhaps a small number of them teaming up and testing out some 'ideas'. A few locations in Scotland plus Nottingham (with 12 reports very close together in time) gives it that feel for me.

edit: make that an extra 30 in Nottingham from 12th September - just announced by Notts police - the initial 12 reports were just from 4th til12th Sept - so 44 total.

That's now a substantial number.
I wonder if anyone is checking the incel forums? Those fuckers are stupid enough to brag about it.

 

[RainbowTown]

He’d be spiking the men’s drinks

Fairly sure the 'gove is gay' thing isn't true, and has a stench of homophobia about it. I'd steer clear of it tbh

Yes, joking about Gove 'spiking men's drinks' is so funny. Not.

Reynhard Sinaga: 'Evil sexual predator' jailed for life for 136 rapes

A rapist who preyed on men outside clubs will "never be safe to be released" from jail, a judge says.

www.bbc.co.uk

Drink spiking: Do men know enough?

The vast majority of victims are women, but Reynhard Sinaga's case shows that men are at risk too.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[NoXion]

I wonder what the risks of the needle breaking off in the skin of the victims would be. People tend to move about a lot in a nightclub.

 

[sojourner]

I wonder what the risks of the needle breaking off in the skin of the victims would be. People tend to move about a lot in a nightclub.

Not if they're stood at the bar

 

[Magnus McGinty]

I’d definitely risk injecting someone in the arm in full view of a bar.

 

[8ball]

That's now a substantial number.
I wonder if anyone is checking the incel forums? Those fuckers are stupid enough to brag about it.

I'd expect it to be a dark web job, but that's a great idea.
I used to have a friend in the police analytics team I could have called about that...

 

[NoXion]

Not if they're stood at the bar

People fidget and gesticulate even if they're not moving from A to B. Seems very risky to me, but then I'm not the kind of shit who sticks needles in unaware strangers.

 

[8ball]

I’d definitely risk injecting someone in the arm in full view of a bar.

Though not that hard to make an Epipen or similar look like a vape, I suppose. Then you need people clustered fairly close to each other and a practised motion as you brush past...

I think bellaozzydog may well be right, though, and this is a case of someone with some kind of jabbing fetish in many cases.
Especially with 44 cases and so far, as much as we know, no resultant sexual assault afterwards. I wouldn't expect a random dose of an amnestic to be so reliable.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

Though not that hard to make an Epipen or similar look like a vape, I suppose. Then you need people clustered fairly close to each other and a practised motion as you brush past...

It could be done easier with two people, similar to how a distraction theft operates. But then someone might remember the distraction if not the injecting. Still very risky.

 

[planetgeli]

Surely this is pricking, not injecting or spiking. Not to play it down, it's massive arsehole behaviour, but the practicalities of spiking this way seem very slim.