More Kick Than Grass And Legal

College crowd smokes 'Spice' that imitates pot

K2 is a legal, though possibly dangerous, synthetic cousin to marijuana.

By Thomasi McDonald
thomasi.mcdonald@newsobserver.com

Posted: Sunday, Aug. 29, 2010

K2 or "Spice, " a lab-made leafy green drug, is sold under various brand names. HARRY LYNCH - hlynch@newsobserver.com


Hazmat head shop employee R.J. Crumpler, left, takes cash from customer Charles Wallace for some rolling papers and a 1-gram packet of "Spice" or K2 herbal incense. HARRY LYNCH - hlynch@newsobserver.com


As college students return to school in Charlotte and the Triangle, some are cracking open lip balm-size jars and plastic bags of a legal herb product that mimics the effects of marijuana.

K2, or "Spice," is a lab-made leafy green drug that looks and smells like oregano, with hints of blueberry, citrus and other flavors. The designer drug is showing up at tobacco and head shops, misleadingly labeled as "incense." The labels also inform buyers that the contents are not fit for human consumption, but behind closed doors the "incense" is being puffed as a legal alternative to marijuana.

K2 and similar products have been outlawed in six states this year, including Tennessee, and six other states are considering banning the products. The Marine Corps has asked shops near its N.C. bases not to sell the product to their troops, and the man who created the drug in a research lab warns of such side effects as increased heart rate and blood pressure and unpredictable effects on mood.

The synthetic drug was created in the early 1990s, but started showing up in tobacco and convenience stores in the U.S. late last year. Bert Wood, chief executive officer of the N.C. Partnership for a Drug Free North Carolina, had to Google "K2" when he was asked about his organization's stand on the product.

"I have never heard of it," Wood said. "But here's the big picture: Since cave people hit two sticks together to get sparks, we have looked at ways to feel different. If K2 mimics the effects of getting stoned, then we are not encouraging young people to use it."

At least one N.C. legislator says he intends to introduce a measure early next year to ban the product.

Sen. William Purcell of Laurinburg sponsored a bill in 2009 that outlawed salvia, another herbal product, with hallucinogenic effects comparable to those of LSD and psilocybin.

Purcell said he heard about K2 a couple of months ago. He says if he's re-elected this fall, he will take a look at K2.

"I'll probably take a look at it and get more information," he said from his Scotland County home. "Then we will see if something needs to be done about it."

In the meantime, the drug is flying off the shelves of stores that carry it.
'Selling like crazy'

"It's selling like crazy," said R.J. Crumpler, an employee at the Hazmat shop near the UNC Chapel Hill campus. "More than cigarettes, more than pipe tobacco, posters or T-shirts."

The prices vary, depending on the potency of the product. At Infinity's End in south Charlotte, where several brands of K2 are sold as incense and "not for human consumption," it sells for $3 to $20 a gram.

Crumpler figures his Chapel Hill store sells at least 20 grams a day. "It's more than that on some days," he said.

It relieves back pain

Blake Tippett, 26, is one of Hazmat's regular K2 customers. Tippett is back in school at UNC Chapel Hill this semester after leaving in 2007 when he hurt his back and underwent two surgeries.

Tippett said he finds it "rather interesting" that K2 is legal but thinks that will change quickly. Last week, he purchased about 6 grams of "Black Mamba," another powerful herb product. Tippett, who wants to work as a journalist when he graduates, said he's not happy about the prospect of K2 being outlawed.

Tippett said he smokes synthetic marijuana because it helps relieve the pain from back injuries that ruptured one disc and herniated another.

"I'm in the category of those people who smoke because it has helped to make me a healthy, 200-pound person able to walk around without wearing a back brace," he said.

Tippett said K2 and synthetic marijuana products like Black Mamba have helped his back pain "more than any other opiate under the sun."

A potent, brief high

N.C. State University sophomores Ethan Haynes and Kevin Catts haven't given much thought to the potential medical benefits of synthetic marijuana. They say they puff on K2 because it's fun.

Haynes and Catts strolled into the Kitsch smoke shop in Raleigh last week and went straight to the front counter where the shop features a full line of the herbal incense products. They pored over the K2 offerings: Standard, Spice, Blueberry, Blonde and Funky Monkey, before choosing the Summit brand, which sells for $30 a gram.

Haynes says that students allover NCSU's campus are puffing on K2 and that he smokes it about once a week. He said the high kicks in about a minute after a couple of puffs. The high, although more potent than marijuana's, is short-lived - about 30 minutes to an hour.

Developed in a lab

The substance in K2 that mimics the effects of marijuana is known as JWH-018. It was first developed in the summer of 1993 by John Huffman, an organic chemist at Clemson University.

Huffman developed the substance while looking for new pharmaceutical products similar to tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, the active ingredient in marijuana. The J, W and H in the substance's name are Huffman's initials. The "018" acknowledges that the compound was the 18th cannabinoid that the lab developed. (Cannabinoid refers to the organic chemical substances in cannabis, or marijuana.)

Last week, Huffman said his work did not lead to the development of any new legal medications. He did not receive a patent for his invention, and he did not sell the formula, which creates "a pale amber goo."

From JWH-018 to K2

So how did the compound wind up being sprayed as a light mist on dried leaves and sold as synthetic weed on the Internet and in head shops and tobacco stores countrywide?

"I assume that someone with some scientific knowledge found it in a publication in a scientific journal," Huffman said in an e-mail last week. "It is inevitable that psychotropic compounds will find their way into commerce. There are greedy and irresponsible individuals worldwide. This is just another example."

Huffman added that he receives no royalties from the sales of K2 or any other product that uses his formula.

Terrie Sonya of Granite City, Ill., offers K2 for sale at her website, K24Sale.com. Sonya, who also sells the product out of a liquor store she owns, claims that she did not know people were smoking it as an alternative to marijuana.

"I really don't know what people are doing with it when they take it out of the door," Sonya said. "We market it as incense and sell it as incense."

More kick than grass

Huffman described the effects of the substance he developed as "considerably more potent" than marijuana. He warned that the product increases users' heart rate and blood pressure and has unpredictable effects on one's mood.

So far, there has been no research to determine the long-term effects of smoking K2.
However, a New York Times blog last month fielded comments from readers who reported experiencing seizures, paranoia and heart problems after smoking the drug.

The blog writer, Malcolm Gay, stated that the comments "are likely representative of the over 500 reports made to poison control centers across the country this year."

After Catts and Haynes, the NCSU students, bought that bag of K2 last week, they mulled the possibilities of their next purchase.

"Funky Monkey," Haynes suggested to Catts. "We should try that the next time."