DALLAS -- Men and women, hooked on K2, are walking around in trances. K2 is a synthetic drug with ingredients that constantly change and can have a harmful effect on users.
And when that happens the Dallas Police Department has to respond. Dr. Alex Eastman is a trauma doctor at Parkland Memorial Hospital, but he is also on the Dallas SWAT Team and a sworn officer.
"It's very difficult for us to predict what those effects will be because we don't know what the next batch will contain," Eastman said.
It is draining on a department that has a shortage of hundreds of officers who are dealing with the users and arresting the dealers. Some of the dealers are usually right back on the streets.
When a person is in distress and unpredictable, the department has to send four officers and a supervisor.
"What we have seen in these K2 calls is that patients seem like they are in crisis, so we send enough people to safely deal with that to keep both patients safe and officers safe," Eastman said.
"They walk around aimlessly. It doesn't matter if they are in middle of the road or on a sidewalk," said Mark Galvin, owns a storage facility on Canton Street in downtown Dallas.
He says he sees them every day.
"They are probably here twice an hour on average,” said Galvin.
An officer provided a picture to WFAA that shows just how horrible the drug can be. It's a man who passed out on K2 naked in the middle of Ledbetter Road for everyone to see. There is a Facebook video of a man on a DART train, his eyes wide open as he drools on the steps.
“They will be walking, and sometimes they will stop and just melt down to the ground. We don't know if they are dead or what," Galvin said.