Orlando police officers sickened after night out in Sanford, police investigating
After three off-duty Orlando police officers fell ill after a night out in downtown Sanford last week — two of them later hospitalized — the Sanford Police Department is investigating whether they were intentionally drugged or poisoned.
A doctor who treated one of them at a Seminole County hospital said the officer “might be experiencing the effect of being drugged or poisoned,” according a report by Sanford police released Tuesday.
The report did not identify the three as law enforcement officers or by name, due to Marsy’s Law, the recently enacted victims' rights amendment to Florida’s constitution.
Adam Krudo, the president of the Fraternal Order of Police lodge that represents Orlando officers, confirmed the three were OPD cops. All were off duty and not in uniform when they were out in Sanford, but have since recovered and are out of the hospital, Krudo said.
The officers visited four restaurants or bars in downtown Sanford Sept. 16, where they had dinner then drinks, the report said. At the last bar, one of them started to feel ill, “visibly sweating and vomited,” the report said. They called an ambulance, and that officer was treated with an IV.
When the two other officers later went home, each also fell sick.
One said symptoms began “all at once out of nowhere," including “vomiting, profuse sweating and muscle pain,” the report said. A first responder who treated one of them said the officer went in and out of consciousness and “appeared to be having the symptoms of someone who may be overdosing,” the report said.
Health care staff reportedly told Sanford police investigators that one officer “may have been drugged with a narcotic commonly known as Rohypnol (GHB)," which is commonly known as a “date rape” drug.
One of the officers was later placed on a ventilator at the hospital, the report said.
Sanford police spokeswoman Bianca Gillet said the FBI had assisted with the probe. She said investigators were waiting on toxicology results to confirm whether the officers were poisoned.
The Orlando Police Department declined to comment on the investigation.
gtoohey@orlandosentinel.com
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