/ 11 December 2001

DRUG SUSPECT HAS HEART ATTACK IN CUSTODY

A 19-year-old alleged drug dealer from Cameroon was in critical condition after German police forced him to take an emetic to make him vomit up narcotics he had swallowed. Authorities said the man, who was not identified, had had a heart attack Sunday after being given the herbal emetic Ipecacuanha while in custody. Police later found 41 vials of narcotics in his stomach and intestine that he had swallowed in an effort to hide evidence against him. The suspect had resisted taking the substance and screamed “I will die” when several officers held him down so a doctor could administer the substance, according to Klaus Pueschel, the director of the pathology institute where the suspect was taken. – AFP