Cannabis cookies are what possibly sent three people to the hospital Tuesday, the Richmond News has learned.

An office building at Richport Town Centre, located at Ackroyd and No. 3 roads, was evacuated in the early afternoon on Aug. 13 after Richmond Fire-Rescue, B.C. Ambulance and Richmond RCMP responded to reports of people falling ill in the area. The PriceSmart on Ackroyd Road was also evacuated.

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A customer or guest at a business on the second floor of the office building may have dropped off the cookies, which contained cannabis, according to personnel involved with the building. No one knew that the cookies contained cannabis when they ate them.

And one individual, who works in the building but didn’t want to be identified, told the News that some employees ate cookies containing cannabis, and later felt ill. The source of the cookies isn’t known.

Richmond Fire-Rescue was able to confirm that they handed a container of cookies off to RCMP at the scene, but couldn't comment on the cookies’ ingredients. Fire-Rescue also confirmed that the office was located on the building’s second floor.

On the day of the incident, B.C. Emergency Health Services told the News that there was “an inadvertent ingestion of (a) chemical substance,” which resulted in three people being taken to the hospital in stable condition.

Richmond RCMP said they had no further comment.