Posted by
June 28, 2014
Date Submitted
breakerbreaker
Description
WARNING: THIS PILL CONTAINS PMMA
This report is being made as part of a pill testing service. All pill samples are tested across 4 different reagents (Marquis/Mecke/Mandelin/Simons). Solubility extractions and further tests are done on any results which are mixed or ambiguous, to determine the components of the pill.
This pill has surfaced in the MONTREAL, QUEBEC, CANADA region as of JUNE 2014.
It is a square pill, quite large and very badly made - crumbles easily and is off-white. It's inscribed with "Die Hard" as seen in the logo of the film of the same name.
It is an apt name for this pill as it is TOXIC.
REAGENT TEST RESULTS:
Reagent tests reveal:
MARQUIS: Red/rusty orange, fast/strong reaction
MECKE: Red/rusty orange, slow/faint reaction
MANDELIN: Red/rusty orange, strong/slow reaction.
SIMONS: Blue/violet/purple, strong/fast reaction.
SOLUBILITY TESTS:
- active component(s) are SOLUBLE in ethanol
- active component(s) are SOLUBLE in water
- active component(s) are SOLUBLE in acetone
Active components are all at least partially soluble using the above organic solvents at STP.
No method was found which could completely extract each component. This again proves that amphetamines/methamphetamine was not a component in this pill.
Fillers and binders were almost entirely insoluble in either water, acetone or ethanol and thus could be extracted from the active components.
The amount of active components appears high; much higher than a standard dose would be for speed.
ANALYSIS/CONCLUSIONS:
1. The pill contains zero amphetamine or methamphetamine (absence of green/blue Mandelin reaction).
2. DANGER: The pill tests positive for likely PMMA (green-to-red Mandelin reaction + positive Simons result on extracts where the other contaminates should not be present).
3. The pill tests positive for methylphenidate, also known as the ADHD drug "Concerta". Evidenced by red Marquis + Mandelin + Simons reaction.
4. The pill tests positive for a subsituted cathinone; possibly MDPV ("bath salts"), butylone or methylone, as evidenced by positive Mecke reaction.
All in all this is THE most dirty pill we have ever seen in 3 years of running a testing service. There is a complete absence of "speed" in this pill. It's a fake mixed from several stimulants including the EXTREMELY dangerous PMMA.
This is even more worrying given that the above stimulants are neurotoxic when mixed. Further, the fact that this is being sold in summer is of extreme concern (PMMA causes body temperature to rise out of control, leading to death - this is much more likely to occur in hot weather, outdoors, and when dancing).
We are therefore publishing an alert.
WARNING - RISK OF SERIOUS INJURY AND/OR DEATH. DO NOT TAKE IT. REPORT ANY DEALER THAT SELLS IT.
This report is being made as part of a pill testing service. All pill samples are tested across 4 different reagents (Marquis/Mecke/Mandelin/Simons). Solubility extractions and further tests are done on any results which are mixed or ambiguous, to determine the components of the pill.
This pill has surfaced in the MONTREAL, QUEBEC, CANADA region as of JUNE 2014.
It is a square pill, quite large and very badly made - crumbles easily and is off-white. It's inscribed with "Die Hard" as seen in the logo of the film of the same name.
It is an apt name for this pill as it is TOXIC.
REAGENT TEST RESULTS:
Reagent tests reveal:
MARQUIS: Red/rusty orange, fast/strong reaction
MECKE: Red/rusty orange, slow/faint reaction
MANDELIN: Red/rusty orange, strong/slow reaction.
SIMONS: Blue/violet/purple, strong/fast reaction.
SOLUBILITY TESTS:
- active component(s) are SOLUBLE in ethanol
- active component(s) are SOLUBLE in water
- active component(s) are SOLUBLE in acetone
Active components are all at least partially soluble using the above organic solvents at STP.
No method was found which could completely extract each component. This again proves that amphetamines/methamphetamine was not a component in this pill.
Fillers and binders were almost entirely insoluble in either water, acetone or ethanol and thus could be extracted from the active components.
The amount of active components appears high; much higher than a standard dose would be for speed.
ANALYSIS/CONCLUSIONS:
1. The pill contains zero amphetamine or methamphetamine (absence of green/blue Mandelin reaction).
2. DANGER: The pill tests positive for likely PMMA (green-to-red Mandelin reaction + positive Simons result on extracts where the other contaminates should not be present).
3. The pill tests positive for methylphenidate, also known as the ADHD drug "Concerta". Evidenced by red Marquis + Mandelin + Simons reaction.
4. The pill tests positive for a subsituted cathinone; possibly MDPV ("bath salts"), butylone or methylone, as evidenced by positive Mecke reaction.
All in all this is THE most dirty pill we have ever seen in 3 years of running a testing service. There is a complete absence of "speed" in this pill. It's a fake mixed from several stimulants including the EXTREMELY dangerous PMMA.
This is even more worrying given that the above stimulants are neurotoxic when mixed. Further, the fact that this is being sold in summer is of extreme concern (PMMA causes body temperature to rise out of control, leading to death - this is much more likely to occur in hot weather, outdoors, and when dancing).
We are therefore publishing an alert.
WARNING - RISK OF SERIOUS INJURY AND/OR DEATH. DO NOT TAKE IT. REPORT ANY DEALER THAT SELLS IT.
Last Update
June 28, 2014
Logo
Die Hard
Colour
White
Shape
Square
Height
3.0 mm
Width
13.0 mm
Texture
Crumbles easily
Edges
Flat
Suspected Contents
PMA / PMMA
Rating
Adulterated
Warning
Yes
Tested
Yes
Mandelin Reagent
Orange
Marquis Reagent
Red
Mecke Reagent
Other - Please see description
Simons Reagent
Other - Please see description
Consumed
No
ABOUT PILLREPORTS
Pillreports is a global database of Ecstasy" pills based on both subjective user reports and scientific analysis. "Ecstasy" is traditionally the name for MDMA based pills, however here we also include closely related substances such as MDA, MDEA, MBDB. Pills sold as "Ecstasy" often include other, potentially more dangerous, substances such as methamphetamine, ketamine and PMA.
5 Comments
drumcode (member since January 21, 2014)
I really can't imagine how bizzarely fucked up you must be to:
June 28, 2014, 3:52 pm GMT1) make this pill, putting all these nasty ingriedents at once, which makes it even more toxic when mixed;
2) sell this shit, lying about it's content, instead of pure MDMA bliss, you are giving someone a fucking poison, putting him/her (mostly young party people who don't harm anyone) in a very very bad condition, if not dead;
3) give this product a "Die hard" name, making fun of the people you are going to kill.
It's not about the money, they could make a fake pill using some other inactive shit. It would be cheeper and easier. I swear these are made by some psychopath.
I wish a was a writter or a movie maker, I would totally write a book or make a movie about this sick, evil, mad chemist psychopath. I guess it would be a very good psycho-drama-horror-thriller.
Sorry about the long comment, but sometimes I'm really amazed how dark minded can someone be. Fuck...
stayhealthy970 (member since September 1, 2012)
Thanks 4 the warning
June 29, 2014, 7:21 pm GMTIs it possible for u to get a pic?
bearlove (member since August 25, 2008)
I don't get these chemists :/ - it's not as if nobody knows how dangerous PMA/PMMA is now.
June 30, 2014, 8:59 am GMTThanks for the warning
breakerbreaker (member since June 28, 2014)
Sorry about the delay.
August 10, 2014, 3:04 am GMTFirst: I'm really sorry to NOT get a picture of this. The pill was really crumbly and I basically destroyed it doing rounds of tests. I asked the person who brought it to me to source another, but this didn't end up happening. It's a real shame :/
Regarding the more general issue of PMA: As I feared, PMA/PMMA has claimed a number of lives in Canada this summer. The deaths last week of 2 young people in Toronto's VELD festival, and the hospitalization of 15 more, are almost certainly due to PMA/PMMA - as is the case in Pemberton, BC, and a few others which were less reported.
While there are some nasty, nasty substances used to "fake" MDMA and speed, most of these will result in transient psychosis, seizures or other non-lethal (but pretty serious) effects. Cathinones, MDPV etc. are really nasty but unless you have a pre-existing medical condition, you're quite unlikely to actually die on the spot. As soon as you hear of MULTIPLE deaths and/or hospitalizations, you know you're almost certainly dealing with PMA/PMMA.
In Quebec the situation is so bad this year that 10x as many people have died as in 2013 (the worst year on record), and the Government has resorted to posting notices in the bathrooms of bars, clubs and clinics to warn people.
Unfortunately they choose to term it "overdose" and call the drugs "too concentrated" rather than confuse people with the inconvenient fact: that it's Government crackdowns on drugs that caused this market of fakes in the first place.
The public here are unprepared, too - this is the first year we've had PMA/PMMA in the east, so the huge majority of consumers are in the habit of just popping anything they're given without question. Combined with a hot summer and outdoor festivals, it's shaping up to be a bloodbath.
All this goes to show, again, the problem with an illegal market: organized crime runs the show, and they don't give a flying f*** who they kill - they'll happily feed you rat poison as long as it's cheaper than MDMA, and as long as people keep lining up with their money.
I support organizations like Toronto's TRIP, who try to distribute educational materials and test kits. I also manufacture and distribute test kits locally (Marquis/Mandelin/Mecke/Froedhe/Liebermann), often for free.
Some claim test kits are "unreliable" for detecting PMA. This is true ONLY if PMA has been mixed with MDMA (because the black color of the MDMA reaction obscures the PMA reaction color). At least in Quebec, the situation seems to be "you've either got MDMA or you've got a complete fake"... in hundreds of tests, I've never once seen a pill sample which contained BOTH a desired drug AND a fake. This is probably because the people who make fakes are concerned with profit - it's more expensive to make a "mixed" pill than just a pure fake. So it seems that at least in the Northeast of the Americas, PMA will be detectable using test kits in almost all cases.
breakerbreaker (member since June 28, 2014)
Oh, and to answer the question about why people sell this...
August 10, 2014, 3:13 am GMTI've had the opportunity to ask quite a few dealers how a business model of selling crappy pills works. After all, anyone who's had a piperazine "pipe bomb", or cathinones etc., should know this is definitely not MDMA! So why are these customers coming back, week after week, for more abuse?
The answer is kind of sad, and comes in two parts:
1. Since the fakes are now 90+% of the market, most young people DON'T KNOW THE DIFFERENCE. They think this is what "Molly" IS. They think it's normal to have a nasty sketchy trip and feel like utter crap for the next few days.
2. People who buy drugs for a night out almost ALWAYS take more than just that drug. They'll usually get completely hammered on alcohol first. So when they get in a club fight, vomit in the taxi, and wake up the next day feeling like death... they think it's the ALCOHOL that did it, and not the pill. And so they believe implicitly in the dealer's sales pitch about how their pill is "a really good batch, like totally awesome"... and they line up the very next week to pay for more poison...
...I told you it was sad....
And concerning the PSYCHOLOGY of people who do this... well, this is actually pretty common in other things too.
Example: People who don't get a 'flu vaccine and then go to work or in public hacking and coughing... these people are murderers too! Hundreds of old people and small children die of influenza each year. All of them caught it from someone. Often, that someone was symptomatic, didn't have their 'flu shot... and didn't bother taking basic precautions about getting their virus everywhere. These people are murderers, but it's socially acceptable because (unlike stabbing that old person or little kid with a knife) it happens later on, out of sight.
Another example: people who drink and drive (or drug and drive). That's reckless disregard for the lives of others.
A third example: 30% of HIV infections are from someone who was fully aware of their status and didn't take precautions. (this statistic is not shown in public much, but it IS true... I also work in sexual health).
Why does this happen? Because of a psychological effect called "cognitive dissonance". You can reproduce this easily in experiments: when the brain has to hold two conflicting ideas, it will automatically create a self-justification to resolve it.
People will quite literally delude themselves into feeling OK about the most monstrous things: "it's not my fault I killed an old lady with the 'flu... it's nature, it happens". Or: "the other person should have used protection, it's not my fault I gave them HIV". Or "I didn't make them take the pill, they bought it and took it, it's their fault".
Or: "I'm OK to drive, I'll just be a bit more careful". I bet you or your friends have said these EXACT words... so don't think you're an exception to cognitive dissonance!
Whole companies do this, when we talk about ignorance of global warming. The police force and the Government do this, when they continue using failed drug policies that just make the problem worse. The list goes on.
Every single one of these people justifies their actions causing misery and death. Dealers aren't an exception; they're just doing what humans do.
Got cold shivers yet?