Two people have been arrested after seven Virginia elementary school students ate fentanyl-laced gummy bears from a bag one of them brought from home and shared with the others.
Clifford Dugan, 50, and Nicole Sanders, 26, were charged with contributing to the delinquency, abuse of a child after the group of fourth-graders needed medical attention Tuesday for something they ate at lunch at Central Elementary School, the Amherst County Sheriff’s Office said.
“During the course of the investigation, it was found that these students had ingested gummy bears. The SRO on scene observed residue in the baggie that contained the gummies,” police said in a statement.
One of the seven children brought the bag of gummies to the school and shared them with his classmates during lunch, WSLS reported.
Five students were taken to a hospital, including two via ambulance, sheriff’s spokesman Lt. Dallas Hill told CNN.
They all experienced symptoms including nausea, vomiting, headache and muscle spasms, he said.
A field test kit on the bag indicated a positive result for fentanyl, according to officials, who said the specimen would be sent to a Drug Enforcement Administration lab for additional testing.
As a result of the investigation, police executed a search warrant at a home on Pendleton Drive in Amherst County, where Dugan and Sanders were taken into custody.
Dugan also faces a count of being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm, while Sanders also was slapped with a charge of possessing Schedule I or Schedule II narcotics.
Schools Superintendent William Wells said the affected students were released from a hospital late Tuesday.
In a statement to families, the school district said it has “confirmed that the bag was brought from home by a student. We will work with the Sheriff’s Office as they continue their investigation.”
At the news conference, Wells said: “This is not a school issue … the fentanyl came from somebody’s house … I ask our parents to take charge. It’s here and it’s real.”
The district “will make it a point of emphasis to remind our students not to share food items. Drug awareness will continue to be a point of emphasis across the division at all schools,” he said.
Meanwhile, the mother of one of the affected students shared an update on Facebook about her son, Hayden Floyd.
“Hayden is home, the tests all came back normal with no traces of fentanyl thank God,” Kristina Wright wrote in the post, where she shared photos of her son being taken to the hospital and lying in a bed.
“I do want to say, ACPS did not do anything wrong, as soon as they were notified of the incident, I was called and made aware. They took the ultimate precaution and had EMT at the school soon as I arrived,” she wrote.
“I was notified when they let me know it was just gummies from Sam’s club. As well as notified soon as they tested the baggy and it contained fentanyl,” Wright wrote.
She said her son had eaten 10 gummy bears and pleaded for parents to not allow their children to “accept ANYTHING from anyone, it could be life threatening. THIS could have been so much worse.”
In an interview with WSET, 10-year-old Hayden said the gummy bears “tasted weird. Then it tasted good. The aftertaste, it tasted really good.”
But things took a turn for the worse after lunch.
“We felt nauseous, sick in our stomachs, hot,” Hayden told the outlet in an exchange on Facebook with his mom’s permission.
“When I was in the ambulance, I was really scared,” he said. “They could, like, barely put my things on because I was shaking so much.”
Hayden said he’s learned a valuable lesson from the incident.
“If people ever offer you things like food, do not take it from them,” he told WSET.
Both suspects were being held at the Amherst County Adult Detention Center — Sanders on $2,500 bond and Dugan with no bond.
