Guard your drinks, awareness drive urges

The first time Lauren Tuck had her drink drugged, she didn't know what had happened to her.

The first time Lauren Tuck had her drink drugged, she didn’t know what had happened to her.

She was too embarrassed to talk about it except with her close friends, and then only to mention that something strange had happened that New Year’s Eve.

The evening was just beginning, and Tuck left her first drink unattended for a moment. After she returned to it and took a few sips, she began to feel tired and ill.

“For the rest of the night, I spent my time sleeping and throwing up,” she recalls. “I remember basically nothing from the entire night and woke up with a shiner on my temple and no memory of how it happened.”

Because she was with friends, Tuck says she is confident no one took advantage of her, but she also knows many others in the same condition would not have been so lucky.

The second time she was drugged, and Tuck pledges it will be the last, was at a music festival last summer.

She says she had a few drinks over a few hours, not an amount that would normally incapacitate her, and never left her cup unattended. She left the festival grounds with her friends and returned to a friend’s apartment.

“I remember walking into the house when I started feeling really strange - weak and sick. I then proceeded to throw up and lose control of my body.

“I could hear everything but I couldn’t lift my arms, I couldn’t sit up. I was basically conscious in a vegetable body.”

Once again, she was surrounded by trusted friends, and although shaken up by the experience, she was not hurt.

When she recovered, Tuck says she tried to justify her “weird behaviour.” She didn’t go to the hospital and she didn’t report what she now felt sure was a drugging to the RCMP.

It wasn’t until another woman who had heard of Tuck’s experience approached her and told of a similar one.

“It was then that I felt completely validated and decided that something needed to be done.”

Tuck is the impetus behind the new Protect Yourself, Protect Your Drink awareness drive, launched this week by the Yukon government.

There are no Canadian statistics available on how many people are unknowingly drugged in a year, but the anecdotal evidence speaks of an under-reported and misunderstood crime.

“It’s not just women who get drugged,” according to Jonas Smith, a long-time Whitehorse bartender and manager.

“I do believe it’s usually done to facilitate sexual assault, but it is sometimes done in order to rob a person or even as a prank - someone who thinks he’s been snubbed or insulted might do it just to see the guy stumble around the bar.”

Tuck agrees and says that of the 10 or so drugging victims she has met, two are men. One was robbed, the other was raped.

“Anyone can be a target,” she warned.

Like Tuck, none of the other victims she has spoken to went to the hospital nor the police with his or her story, even though some were sexually assaulted.

One of the drugs most commonly used in this sort of crime is the prescription drug Rohypnol, colloquially known as Ruffies. GHB, an illicit chemical concoction is also popular.

Both leave users incapacitated and can do permanent damage to their systems, but in the case of Rohypnol, they may still be aware of what is going on around them, but unable to move or call out.

“It’s a myriad of drugs,” says RCMP Sgt. Blake Wawrk, the officer in charge of the Yukon’s drug section when asked how perpetrators are getting the drug.

‘It includes things that are available by prescription and things that are made illicitly.”

He warned that the drug can come in many forms and likely would not change the colour nor taste of a drink.

One of the many difficulties associated with identifying and charging people who use these “Date Rape Drugs” on their victims, is the speed at which they leave the system.

A urine test will only show the presence of the drug immediately after it has passed through the body.

“It’s gone after your first pee,” says Tuck.

Because people don’t usually realize what has happened to them, they rarely get that first sample tested.

Furthermore, says Smith, when a drunk person complains they’ve been drugged, often times, no one buys their story.

“I’ve heard of situations where the hospital staff or RCMP don’t believe (the victims) because they think they’re just intoxicated,” he says, adding that he hears of “reports of this happening several times a year.” 

Leah White, who works in the territorial victim services unit, agrees.

“We have women coming forward who say, ‘I think this happened but no one believes me because I was drunk,’” she says.

Blake says police are aware that druggings are happening and will take any reports seriously.

“It can be difficult to collect the evidence,” he concedes, but notes there is one case currently being investigated wherein police could act quickly enough to find drug residue in a wine glass.

The shame of a sexual assault or even just the embarrassment of losing control is another barrier to stopping the people who commit this kind of crime.

Tuck says she hopes more awareness about the issue will give people the confidence to come forward if they have been targeted. But even more so, she hopes people will see the potential for danger and protect themselves

“It is my hope that this campaign inspires people to watch their drink, hold their drink in a protective manner and watch out for friends at all social functions, not just in bars.”