Mystery drug sickens 2 Middle Georgia students

Officials haven’t confirmed if a drug that sickened two Middle Georgia students recently is LSD, the Jones County Sheriff’s Office said in a Facebook post.

However, sheriff’s officials and the Jones County School District determined a “synthetic hallucinogen” led to the illnesses.

The GBI is working to identify the substance, sheriff’s officials said.

Between Aug. 28 and 29, two Jones County students exhibited unusual behavior, one at home and the other at Jones County Achievement Academy, according to the post.

Both students acknowledged they had ingested an unknown substance, and one student said he had obtained it from another student, according to the sheriff’s post.

Jones County School Superintendent Chuck Gibson said the students consumed postage-stampsize pieces of some type of paper, the Macon Telegraph reported.

The paper features a graphic of a man riding a bicycle in front of a mountain, with the year 1943 inscribed, the Telegraph reported.

That artwork references April 19, 1943, also known as Bicycle Day, when Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann discovered the effects of LSD during a bicycle ride, according to research by the Telegraph.

Four adults and a 15-year-old juvenile were arrested on various drug charges in connection with the incidents, Sheriff Butch Reece said. The adults were Aaron Devin Kimbrough, 21, Laura Nicole Sellers, 21, Dylan Michael Thomas, 17, and Aaron Michael Gaultney, 23.

Also, about 2,600 “hits” of the synthetic hallucinogen were recovered.