The Drug That Never Lets Go
By Jenny Marder
Dickie Sanders was not naturally prone to depression. The 21-year-old BMX rider was known for being sweet spirited and warm -- a hugger not a hand-shaker. The kind of guy who called on holidays. Who helped his father on the family farm. Who spent countless hours perfecting complicated tricks on his bike.
Yet on Nov. 12, 2010, Sanders was found dead on the floor of his childhood bedroom. He had shot himself in the head with a .22 caliber rifle.
The suicide was the culmination of five days of strange behavior that began shortly after Sanders snorted a powdery substance he bought from a friend. Instead of the brief high he was seeking, he experienced days of insomnia, along with waves of terror and frightening delusions, including an incident where he “saw” 25 police cars outside his parents' kitchen window and then slit his own throat with a butcher knife. That incident landed Sanders in the hospital with stitches. For a few hours, the hallucinations subsided.
“I don't like the way this is making me feel," Sanders told his stepmother, Julie, as the two awaited his release from the hospital. "I promise I won't do anything again. I'm done.”
But the paranoia flared up with a vengeance that night, and back home, Dickie's father lay in bed with his son, arms wrapped around him, until he finally nodded off. It's unclear when Dickie woke up, made his way downstairs to his bedroom and found the rifle he had won in a shooting contest years before. No one heard the gunshot.
more (very good explanation of the biochemical effects of bath salts)
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/multimedia/bath-salts/
= new reply since forum marked as read
They released him too soon imo. 
He [obviously] was still a danger to himself and others around him.
There was so much at the link about the effects of this drug, and the who and why and how of its production. I can't imagine what it must be like to be in law enforcement or the the medical and have to investigate things like this.
Many refuse to listen to anyone telling them to not use things like this as if they are interfering with their pleasure. There is desperation and lack of purpose to give people the strength to manage the stress of life.
My generation mocked 'Reefer Madness' and made jokes about 'better living through chemistry' with LSD, etc. But this is nothing from nature and made of poisons. We are careless with the gift we have been given in this life, our body is a one time present. This is so sad.
Kids will find something else to do under those conditions. And so you end up with (legal) bath salts. Our drug policy is fucked up. 
Both non-pot-smoking sluts.
It amazes me when people tell me that pot relaxes them. It turns me into a paranoid squirrel-head. Seriously.
Now, a nice glass of merlot on the other hand...
