Austin police have identified more than 30 individuals they say have been involved in the distribution of the synthetic drug K2 in the Austin downtown area. Police officials said they arrested 10 suspects Monday. Five others were already in custody, police said.

Austin police have charged 36 as part of a three-month investigation targeting the sale and distribution of the synthetic drug K2 to the homeless population downtown.

Ten people were arrested Monday in connection with the operation, according to Austin police Lt. Oliver Tate with the narcotics unit. Five other suspects were already in custody for other charges and 21 were on the loose, Tate said.



All were charged with felonies, police said.

The charges come after Austin police began an investigation in December in which they deployed undercover cops near the Austin Resource Center for the Homeless to spot dealers and make controlled purchases of the unpredictable narcotic.

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Austin-Travis County EMS Cmdr. Mike Benavides said the roundup came just as EMS has seen a recent spike in medical calls related to use of the drug, which is thought of as a low-cost synthetic marijuana. In December and January, EMS saw an amount of K2-related calls that were the second and fourth most ever in Austin, respectively.

Austin police Cmdr. Troy Officer, who leads the Organized Crime Division, said it is dangerous to refer to K2 as “synthetic marijuana.”

“This is no more marijuana than if I put bleach in a martini glass and called it a cocktail,” Officer said.

What spurred the operation was learning that about 50 K2 over doses occurred on Thanksgiving, Officer said. The timing of South by Southwest also played a part in making arrests on Monday, since police downtown will be dominated by crowd control once the festival begins on Friday.