POLICE STOP PROVES A LIFESAVER

Times Colonist

Police officers believe they may have saved a man's life by stopping a
car that was being driven erratically.

The officers found a passenger in the vehicle in the throes of a drug
overdose.

Officers tried to pull over the car as it was being driven north at
high speed on Cook Street around 3 a.m. Monday, Victoria police
spokesman Sgt.

Grant Hamilton said.

The driver carried on but eventually stopped, Hamilton said. Officers
noticed the smell of marijuana and saw that one passenger was slipping
in and out of consciousness.

The two other people in the car insisted they had only had a joint,
Hamilton said. As the man's condition worsened, the officers called
B.C. Ambulance and found a one-litre bottle of gamma-hydroxybutyric
acid , commonly known as the date-rape drug.

The man, 35, had been drinking it from the bottle. He was taken to
Royal Jubilee Hospital, where he was in a coma-like state for four
hours. Hamilton said just eight millilitres of the clear liquid drug,
which is virtually tasteless and odourless, can kill a person. The man
has left hospital.

Police arrested the other passenger, a 29-year-old Saanich man, who
was wanted on an outstanding fraud charge. He also faces charges of
possession for the purpose of trafficking and violating court
conditions. He was released on a promise to appear in court on April
4.

The 32-year-old driver, a woman, was given a 24hour suspension for
driving while impaired and her vehicle was impounded.