WTOP: Spike in D.C. killings parallels synthetic drug use
Posted on July 2, 2015
Through the first half of the year, killings in D.C. jumped about 20 percent from the same period in 2014. Mayor Muriel Bowser said flatly that she believes the synthetic drugs — which go by names such as K-2 and Spice — are responsible for an uptick in homicides.
New York, Chicago and Milwaukee are among other large cities that have also experienced an increase in violence this year after a long trend in the opposite direction.
“It’s bad enough that we’ve got a drug that’s having this impact on our community, but to have businesses selling it, that’s unacceptable,” Lanier says.