Trump-themed 'mega dose' ecstasy pills found on Florida drug dealer arrested in connection with overdose death
A Florida man who allegedly possessed ecstasy pills in the shape of President Donald Trump's face has been arrested.
23-year-old Brendan Dolan-King had five orange tablets resembling the US leader's head, The Smoking Gun reported. The back of the tablets were emblazoned with the letters 'Trump NL' along with six stars.
According to a police report, officers responded to Dolan-King's Clearwater apartment on Friday following reports of "an overdose".
Authorities subsequently searched the residence and eventually found fentanyl and five ecstasy tablets of the said variety in an air vent.
Later on, police determined that Dolan-King "was possibly the person to provide the victim of the overdose with the heroin that he overdosed on."
He was subsequently charged with drug possession.
According to the outlet, Dolan-King has a Long Island tattoo on his arm and was currently serving an 18-month probation sentence after he was convicted last year for possessing cocaine and marijuana.
The repeat offender also had ecstasy pills, also known as MDMA, during his previous arrest in February 2018. At the time, those pills were in the shape of Star Wars' Darth Vader.
Dolan-King is now being held on a $2,000 bond.
Having said that, this is not the first time the Trump-themed ecstasy pills have made headlines.
According to reports, the pills are believed to be a new breed of "mega-dose" ecstasy tablets which also come in 'Putin' and 'Donkey Kong' variants.
New Zealand grabbed global attention last week after it became the latest country to face an influx of pills with a "double dose" of ecstasy after similar cases in Britain and Australia.
Authorities seized at least 400 kilograms of the drug at the country's border in 2019.
The Loop, a community group that provides drug safety testing, found the "double dose" pills contained around 330mg of MDMA—more than five times the regular dose.
Jamie Bamford, the New Zealand customs group manager for intelligence and enforcement, said an elaborate international operation was responsible for the spike in availability of the drug.
"What we are seeing here in the past few years is a huge spike in MDMA coming over the border," he said. "There is an effort to create and meet a market here."
President Trump has heavily pushed for pharmaceutical companies to be transparent in their pricing in order to roll back prescription drug prices. However, that would obviously not affect the sale of illegal narcotics like ecstasy, despite being packaged to resemble the president.