Canada - Teen's Death Blamed On Overdose of "Ecstasy"

[chillinwill]

Mother Thinks Daughter's Drink Was Spiked; Police Believe She Took Drug Knowingly

Seventeen-year-old Jenni Bond left her Surrey home on Friday evening telling her mom, Renatta, that she was going to the movies.

Within a matter of hours Jenni was dead, apparently the victim of an overdose of drugs, possibly ecstasy.

She collapsed and died at the entrance to the Edmonds SkyTrain station about 11 p.m.

Jenni was the second teenager to die suddenly in the past month in circumstances that suggest illegal drugs might have been involved.

West Vancouver police are still awaiting a toxicology report on Carla Benavides, 16, who was unresponsive when her mother tried to wake her up after she had been out with friends the night before.

Jenni was Renatta's only child and the mother's loss lies beyond the reach of language. Words can only hint at it.

"I wake up and realize she's not there. Then I think, 'Oh my God, she'll be coming home soon.' And then I remember, 'No, she's never coming back.' "

It's the cruelty of how the mind works and the awful loss itself that makes those three short sentences such an effort for her mother to deliver.

Her mom and Jenni's friends from Newton Learning Centre and Richmond's Fraserview Church gathered at the Edmonds SkyTrain station in remembrance on Monday afternoon.

There are two versions of what happened.

Her mom believes that instead of going to the movies, Jenni went to a friend's house in Burnaby, where her drink was spiked with ecstasy.

She said her daughter had used the drug a couple of times three years ago but had stopped because two of her friends had died from overdoses.

However, Burnaby RCMP don't believe the death was suspicious, and they think that Jenni knowingly took a drug.

Cpl. Alexandra Mulvihill said police are investigating the death.

"So far there's nothing to indicate there was anything suspicious," Mulvihill said.

"Everything leads us to believe she knowingly consumed it,"

It will take a toxicology test to determine what the drug was, she said.

Mulvihill said it appears that Jenni met a male friend and purchased drugs at a location outside Burnaby.

She took the drugs and then came back into Burnaby on a bus that was taking the pair to the Edmonds SkyTrain station, where she collapsed.

"She was attended by the SkyTrain security. Our members came as did the paramedics," Mulvihill said.

The overarching message from the police is that another young person has died as the result of ingesting an illegal drug.

"It doesn't matter what the drug was. The use of an illegal drug, be it ecstasy, heroin, cocaine, GHB or others can have devastating consequences," Mulvihill said.

"This incident is a tragic event and highlights the dangerous activity of illegal drug use.

"It isn't the first time it's happened recently. There's the young girl in West Vancouver. It only shows how dangerous these drugs are."

Pubdate: Tue, 28 Oct 2008
Source: Vancouver Sun (CN BC)
Copyright: 2008 The Vancouver Sun
Author: Gerry Bellett
Source: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v08/n976/a09.html?1042