But what the public knows is far from the only consideration here, and that’s my point. If I’m an election worker, or my child is, or my mother, and the substance has an element of fentanyl in it, I would want to know that.
There are competing interests here. I would never put the public’s right to know ahead of the interests of any actual victim of this horrible act, irrespective of what the material turns out to be. I trust that the law enforcement agencies felt it was important to disclose to the election workers that fentanyl is a factor. And once that’s been disclosed to the victims, it will be in the news. May as well disclose it to the public via the media.
Does it have the specificity that pleases you? Probably not. But this is how these things go, in my experience. We’ll learn more as information is ready to be released.
I know the law enforcement agencies are not going to compromise their investigation to satisfy anyone’s curiosity.
Sorry about the popups. I use an ad blocker, so I never see them and don’t think about them when I post a link.
I’m not concerned about the public’s right to know. Sure, the victims and the investigation are far more important. But I’ve seen some very sloppy reporting. I think it’s possible that the police and investigators weren’t concerned that there was any risk from the positive fentanyl reading, because they see it all the time and ignore it, but some reporter saw it and ran with it anyway.
It’s also possible that the fentanyl was a real concern, of course.
I suppose we’ll find out eventually. But that’s the kind of detail that, in my experience, early news reports can be very unreliable.
They likely test them because they have an unidentified powder. This practice dates back to 20001, when some number of people were killed and otherwise harmed by anthrax-laced letters. I have no idea how any such tests are conducted.
(I found a copy of a press release in our break room this morning when I went to lunch)
If you’re talking about carfentanil, which is a large-animal tranquilizer and is dosed in MICROgram amounts, that is correct.
I “volunteered” to count ballots for my county, and in fact have done so twice. I put that word in quotes, because I was paid, and that included mileage to and from my house to the courthouse.