Substance found in motor home was bath salts
MDEA busy with investigations
By Kathy McCarty
Staff Writer
FORT FAIRFIELD — Law enforcement officials have determined a substance found in an abandoned camper in a Fort Fairfield parking lot in November was bath salts.
Late last week Darrell Crandall, Maine Drug Enforcement Agency division commander, indicated test results confirmed the motor home was not being used as a drug lab but that “elaborate devices and other materials that were being used to smoke synthetic cathinones, commonly referred to as bath salts, were found in the camper.”
Initially, Fort Fairfield police had checked out the motor home, entering to see if anyone was in it, as they tried to discern who the owner might be. No one was in the structure but evidence was found leading police to believe illegal drugs had been manufactured there. MDEA agents were called, a search warrant obtained and the investigation got under way.
According to Crandall, a number of items were seized by agents and chemists. Evidence from the motor home was collected and subsequently sent to the Health and Environmental Testing Laboratory in Augusta to be analyzed, including a substance believed to be bath salts — a synthetic compound which can cause paranoia, psychotic behavior and has resulted in at least one documented death in the state in the past year. The owner was not immediately identified, pending completion of MDEA’s investigation, but has since been named.
“The owner of the motor home, Ryan Ellis, 32, of Bangor, was in jail at the time agents searched the motor home and remains there on charges of possession of synthetic hallucinogenic drugs. No charging decisions have been made regarding the evidence found in the motor home,” said Crandall.
