Fighting against the free flow of illicit substances can be an uphill battle, and local law enforcement has reason to be concerned that the terms of engagement in their ongoing battle have changed, again.

Recent investigations and incidents have seen an increased presence of Ecstasy in Jasper, and while the more of this dangerous club drug is troubling in its own right, the detail that has RCMP Sergeant Dave Maludzinski most preturbed is the link to an even more devastating and addictive drug.

A recent trafficking investigation conducted in Jasper invovled several tablets being sold as Ecstasy. When these items were sent to Health Canada for analysis, it was revealed that the tablets contained a certain percentage of crystal methamphetamine, a drug that, while easy to produce, is highly addictive and increasingly prevalent in nearby communities, particularly to the east.

While Maludzinski could not say 

definitively if meth was first introduced into places like Hinton and Edson through similar means, it wouldn’t come as a surprise.

“I would say that’s a pretty good guess,” he said. “Crystal meth is becoming more and more prominent and popular in all 

communities.”

There are clear benefits for drug traffickers that combine meth and Ecstasy in single tablets. Beyond cutting costs, lacing other tablets with meth will increase the chance of addiction and dependency while giving the drug users the sense that they are using a very potent variety of the original drug they believe themselves to be consuming.

“The benefits behind it for the trafficker are huge,” Maludzinski said, adding that commonly held beliefs about what Ecstasy tablets look like mean very little.

“We’ve had people say that it’s only safe to eat the green tablets, but the tablets we sent into Health Canada were green too!”

Another related issue is the sale of aspirin tablets as Ecstasy, something that is problematic for people with allergies to aspirin. That’s a surprisingly high percentage of the population, Maludzinski reports.

“People are selling anything. Heart tablets for dogs, too,” he said.

For older generations, Maludzinski wants to emphasize that the drugs currently available are nothing like the speed of the 1970s. The RCMP claim that meth and Ecstasy now available on the street is at least five times more potent, twice as pure and much easier to produce and obtain.

With the summer season upon us, the local RCMP detachment will be hard pressed to handle the myriad of drug issues that are likely to come up.

“When you’re just trying to keep your head above water, it’s almost impossible to get time to do drug work,” said Maludzinski. “We have a community of 5,000 that we’re supposed to police with the force we have, but in the summer there are so many more people on the street.”