WORLD | NATION
THE SUMTER ITEM
FRIDAY, JULY 29, 2016
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A3
Elephant sedative emerges as threat in overdose battle BY KANTELE FRANKO The Associated Press
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
A French nun greets a resident during a gathering in a town park for a solemn homage to the Rev. Jacques Hamel in Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray, Normandy, France, on Thursday. Islamic State is taking responsibility for the fatal attack in which Hamel was killed.
French ID 2nd church attacker; police had warning about him BY LORI HINNANT AND ELAINE GANLEY The Associated Press PARIS — French officials on Thursday identified the second man responsible for attacking a Catholic church in Normandy as a 19-yearold who was spotted last month in Turkey as he supposedly headed to Syria — but returned to France instead. The prosecutor’s office identified him as Abdel-Malik Nabil Petitjean after DNA tests on his corpse. A security official confirmed that he was the unidentified man pictured in a photo distributed to French police July 22 with a warning that he could be planning an attack. Four days later, Petitjean and a 19-year-old local man, Adel Kermiche, stormed the church in Saint-Etienne-duRouvray during morning Mass. They held five people hostage — the priest, two nuns and an elderly couple — before fatally slashing the priest’s throat and seriously wounding the other man. Another nun at the Mass slipped
away and raised the alarm. Police shot to death both attackers as they left the church. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility and released a video Wednesday allegedly showing Kermiche and Petitjean clasping hands and pledging allegiance to IS. Prosecutors said Petitjean was born in Saint-Die-desVosges, eastern France, but most recently lived in the Alpine town of Aix-les-Bains where his mother lives. Kermiche was from Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray. A youth aged about 16 who was detained after the attack was still being questioned Thursday, the prosecutor’s office said. Thursday’s revelations showed that anti-terrorist authorities came close twice to identifying Petitjean as a threat but couldn’t put his name to his picture as part of two disconnected intelligence tipoffs. First, according to a French security official, France received a report from Turkish counterparts that Petitjean was seen passing through a
Turkish airport June 10 destined for Syria. France duly placed Petitjean’s name on a long list of names of French residents who travel to Syria and Iraq, either to fight with IS forces or simply to live among them. The database of citizens considered a potential danger is used to maintain a lookout for militants returning from the war zone. However, Petitjean never went to Syria but instead returned almost immediately to France, the security official said, and was back inside the country long before his name was added June 29 to France’s watch list. The official was not authorized to discuss the case publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
COLUMBUS, Ohio — A drug used to sedate elephants and other large animals, 100 times as potent as the fentanyl already escalating the country’s heroin troubles, is suspected in spates of overdoses in several states, where authorities say they’ve found it mixed ALEXANDER with or passed off as heroin. The appearance of carfentanil, one of the most potent opioids known to investigators, adds another twist to the fight against painkillers in a country already awash in heroin and fentanyl cases. “It certainly is a very disturbing trend,” Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine said. A man suspected of selling carfentanil as heroin was indicted this week in central Ohio on 20 counts, including murder, in connection with a July 10 death and nine other overdoses that happened within hours of one another. Some of the surviving users told investigators they thought they were buying heroin, but testing found none, Franklin County Prosecutor Ron O’Brien said. The suspect, 36-year-old Rayshon Alexander, pleaded not guilty. Investigators are still trying to track down the source of the carfentanil. DeWine said he wasn’t
aware of any thefts of the drug, which, he noted, could be shipped from abroad or produced here. Chinese companies sell carfentanil online, but it hasn’t shown up much in the U.S. drug supply, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. The drug has been suspected in overdoses or found in seized drugs in central Kentucky and in Florida’s Tampa Bay and Sarasota areas, as well as other Ohio cities. Akron authorities have seen more than 230 overdoses in July, 20 of them fatal, and police said evidence of carfentanil was found in some of those. Carfentanil is thought to be similar in strength to a painkiller known as W-18, which has shown up in heroin in Philadelphia, New England and Canada. Such drugs up the ante in a market where sellers already mix powerful painkillers with or disguise them as heroin to increase their products’ potency, which can increase overdose risks for users chasing more intense highs, especially when they’re not aware of what they’re actually using. Carfentanil is so powerful that zoo veterinarians typically wear a face shield, gloves and other protective gear — “just a little bit short of a hazmat suit” — when preparing the medicine to sedate animals because even one drop splattered into a person’s eye or nose could be fatal, said Dr. Rob Hilsenroth, executive director of the American Association of Zoo Veterinarians.
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