Driving Under the Influence of Synthetic Cannabinoid Receptor Agonist XLR‐11 |
| |
Authors: | Nikolas P Lemos PhD FRSC D‐ABFT |
| |
Institution: | 1. Forensic Laboratory Division, Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, , San Francisco, CA, 94103;2. Department of Laboratory Medicine, School of Medicine, The University of California, , San Francisco, CA, 94143 |
| |
Abstract: | The case of a 22‐year‐old male Caucasian driver is presented. He was involved in a traffic collision. At the roadside, he displayed blank stare and mellow speech with a barely audible voice. A DRE found low body temperature, rigid muscle tone, normal pulse, lack of horizontal and vertical gaze nystagmus, nonconvergence of the eyes, dilated pupil size, and normal Pupillary reaction to light. A standard toxicology DUID protocol was performed on the driver's whole blood including ELISA and GC‐MS drug screens with negative results. Additional drug screening was undertaken for bath salts and synthetic cannabinoid receptor agonists by LC‐MS/MS by a commercial laboratory and identified the synthetic cannabinoid receptor agonist XLR‐11 in the driver's blood. XLR‐11 was subsequently quantified at 1.34 ng/mL. This is the first documented case involving a driver operating a motor vehicle under the influence of the synthetic cannabinoid receptor agonist XLR‐11. |
| |
Keywords: | forensic science forensic toxicology human performance forensic toxicology driving under the influence of drugs drug recognition expert synthetic cannabinoid receptor agonist spice blueberry spice XLR‐11 San Francisco |
|
|