3 Sickened Pacoima Students Ingested LSD

Three of the 14 fourth-graders hospitalized for drug use symptoms Wednesday actually did take LSD--without meaning to--but the other 11 had no drugs in their systems and may have invented their involvement in a case of mass hysteria, police said Thursday.

More than 200 parents of Haddon Avenue Elementary School students showed up Thursday at morning and evening meetings at the school to discuss their shock and alarm over the previous report--that all the children had knowingly sampled drugs brought to school by a classmate, causing reactions ranging from violent behavior to hallucinations.

First reports of the incident caused alarm among parents, school administrators and police, when it appeared that despite years of anti-drug messages in schools, the children had rushed en masse to try the drugs found by a 10-year-old girl on her way to class.

The picture painted Thursday was far different.

Lab tests showed that a clear liquid in a vial that the girl found was LSD, perhaps thrown away by a suspect in a police chase the night before, said Lt. Rick Papke of the LAPD’s Foothill Division.

Three of the children took the liquid, but did not know it was LSD, apparently trusting a label which identified it as breath mint, he said. Hospital tests turned up the drug in their blood and urine and they suffered hallucinations, dizziness and nausea.

Eleven other children, who police and school authorities said earlier had sampled a white powder found with the vial, had no drugs in their systems, Papke said, calling it a possible “Crucible situation.”

Arthur Miller’s classic play “The Crucible” was based on the Salem, Mass., witchhunt, brought on by young girls sharing a mass delusion.

The 11 were released from hospitals Wednesday and the other three, who had taken LSD, were released Thursday.

Papke said the 11 gave conflicting stories and, most suspiciously, said they had gotten the “white powder” from the 10-year-old at recess. But that girl wasn’t with them at recess. She showed up at the school nurse’s office at 8:45 a.m., suffering from the effects of the LSD, and remained there through the recess period while school officials notified her parents to take her to a hospital, Papke said.

Principal Loraine Mason said teachers were mot at fault.

“We believe it is an isolated incident, something that was brought to school and that happened before school,” she said.

“I’ve been with the district 34 years and I’ve been at a lot of different schools in a lot of other parts of the city,” Mason said. “I’ve never experienced anything like this.”

In coming weeks, she said, the school would debrief children and offer them counseling. The school also planned to provide parenting classes on character education and drug awareness.

Still, those reassurances did not sit well with some parents.

Outside the school auditorium parent Pablo Cruz, whose 8-year-old son Javier is a third-grader at Haddon, complained that Mason and other school officials should have given more information at the briefings.

“I asked a simple question. We’ve been getting a lot of different stories,” Cruz said. “We want to know what happened.” The incident occurred a week before the beginning of a DARE anti-drug program for Haddon students in kindergarten through fourth grade. Two DARE officers spoke to Haddon students Thursday morning about avoiding drugs and handling peer pressure.

DARE, the Drug Abuse Resistance Education program, originated in Los Angeles in 1983 and now sends police officers in 10,000 communities into schools to teach children how to say no to drugs, gangs and violence. The curriculum normally begins in fifth grade.

Glen Levant, president of DARE America, said the new program aimed at younger children includes a lesson on “how can you tell what is safe to touch, taste and smell.”

A spate of recent studies shows drug use among children 12 through 17 has surged since the early 1990s, led by rising use of marijuana. While data on younger children is more difficult to find, one study of 8- and 9-year-olds said parents underestimate the presence of drugs in their children’s lives.

The study by the Partnership for a Drug-Free America found 28% of 9- to 12-year-olds surveyed were offered drugs in 1997. In addition, almost half the children said they were unlikely to tell their parents about the offer.

Moreover, the study found a communication gap between parents and students. While 94% of parents said they spoke to their children about drugs, only 67% of the children recalled those discussions.

Times staff writers Andrew Blankstein and Boris Yaro contributed to this story.