Spice dealers ‘target’ refuge for homeless
SPICE dealers are reportedly preying on homeless people seeking refuge from plunging temperatures.
Packets of the drug were seized, along with cash, from a man suspected of trying to deal to homeless people queuing for a bed at a cold weather refuge in Manchester.
GMP City Centre tweeted a picture of the money, drug and snap bags after officers made an arrest. They tweeted: “Male arrested in the NQ (Northern Quarter) for supplying Spice, after being pointed out dealing to people attending the cold weather provision. Struggled violently to escape but restrained and detained. Large quantity of cash though claims to be NFA (no fixed address) and has been using the service provided.”
Police fear that as expected freezing conditions arrive over the next few days in Manchester, homeless people will become an easy and potentially lucrative target for spice dealers, as dozens will gather at city centre buildings used for temporary accommodation in cold weather.
Manchester council provides shelter for homeless people when temperatures dip below zero.
Spice was designed as a legal cannabis alternative, but was banned in 2016.
By then it had become widely abused by rough sleepers, causing unpredictable effects including zombie-like states, fits and psychotic episodes.
In December ‘catatonic’ drug users were seen in the city centre as a new super-strong strain of Spice hit Manchester’s streets.
Along Market Street and around Piccadilly people were seen suffering from the effects of taking the drug.
It made users so ill that charity workers and police suspected there could be a new, stronger, strain possibly laced with heroin - dubbed ‘Annihilation’ because of its potent effects.
Julie Boyle, support worker for homeless youth charity Lifeshare, told the M.E.N. at the time: “We are seeing people collapsed, rigid. We had people who were catatonic earlier this year but it seems to be coming back again - people can’t talk, can’t move.
“I’m massively concerned, and this is just my clients, not to mention all the other people out on the streets.
“It’s awful.”