Anti-Drug Message Sent After Laughing Gas Deaths

The organizers of popular underground parties in Los Angeles sent a recorded message this weekend to their fans: “You don’t need drugs to be inspired by the music.”

The message, relayed to anyone who called R.E.A.L. Events for information on a show featuring the Italian rap group Digital Boy, was issued after police and others familiar with the scene said the use of recreational drugs such as nitrous oxide is common at such late-night gatherings.

On Friday, three young men were found in a truck, apparently asphyxiated after inhaling nitrous oxide--commonly called laughing gas--emitted from an 80-pound canister they held across their laps in the truck’s sealed cab. They had attended an underground party and were intending to go to a Digital Boy show this weekend, according to friends. Digital Boy flyers were found in the truck that was parked on Topanga Canyon Boulevard in Chatsworth.

The recorded message also expressed sympathy for the families of the three men--”We call out to the family members with our deepest sympathies.” An organizer said security guards outside his shows clamp down on drug use when they find it.

The bodies of Richard Dellavechia, 20, of Sepulveda, Matthew Champy, 21, of Woodland Hills, and Michael Cook, 23, of Sherman Oaks were found early Friday.

Underground parties are dance shows featuring musicians and deejays who play records, sometimes until dawn, at warehouses and other private venues. Local entertainers at Saturday’s show included Doc Martin, Mat C. Steve Loria and others.

Los Angeles police called the deaths accidental and said the victims died after the canister’s valve was left open. An autopsy will be held today, a Los Angeles County coroner’s spokesman said.

Police were seeking information on how the three men obtained two tanks of the mild anesthetic, used legally in food preparation and at automotive speed shops but illegal for recreational drug use.

The two tanks of nitrous oxide in the truck bore the label of Liquid Air Corp. Northridge Hospital Medical Center reported two such tanks stolen in January, hospital officials said. Spokeswoman Leslie Wither said she is uncertain whether the tanks found in the truck are the ones that were taken.

Liquid Air Corp. spokesman Bill Schlinkert in Walnut Creek said the firm will try to determine Monday whether the tanks came from his company. Schlinkert said the company is concerned about liability but believes that the responsibility of protecting the gas from theft falls upon customers.

Several companies who produce the gas say efforts to protect supplies of nitrous oxide have increased over the last decade as thefts have increased. John Tyminski of Inglewood said his company has stopped selling nitrous oxide.

“We don’t mess with that trade at all,” he said. “We stopped it 10 years ago when we found out what was going on,” he said, referring to illegal use.

Nitrous oxide is legally available at speed shops as part of a high-performance kit attached to the carburetor.

Small amounts of nitrous oxide can be obtained from what once were called head shops, said some people familiar with its use.

The person said nitrous oxide is sometimes available outside clubs where underground parties are held. But she said most organizers are careful not to let it into the clubs, something that the Digital Boy show organizer confirmed.

He expressed anger that these deaths may be held up as proof that the underground club scene is a drug haven.

“These kids were playing around and it was fatal,” he said. “But now the press is coming on saying this is a part of the underground culture. That’s not true.”

That same resentment was expressed at Street Sounds on Melrose Avenue, a record store where tickets for the Digital Boy show in Los Angeles were on sale.

“I don’t see what the big deal is,” said Greg Cantu, 20, who works at the store. “Kids die all the time. They die from all kinds of things. A whole lot more die from alcohol and a whole lot more from violence.”

Times staff writers Anne C. Roark and Jim Herron Zamora contributed to this story.