A teenage girl has died in Greater Manchester after taking ecstasy at a sold-out clubbing event attended by up to 5,000 people, prompting police to warn others who may have taken the drug to urgently seek medical attention.

The girl, aged 17, had an adverse reaction to a form of ecstasy known as “MasterCard” in the early hours of Monday at Victoria Warehouse in Trafford, Greater Manchester police said. She died in hospital a short time later.

She is believed to have taken the small pink pill at an event called Don’t Let Daddy Know (DLDK).

Victoria Warehouse, where the Don’t Let Daddy Know party was held. Photograph: Alamy

DI Helen Bell from the police force’s Trafford division said: “We are appealing to anyone who may have taken this form of ecstasy, known as ‘MasterCard’, to get checked out urgently. Even if you took it some hours ago, this pill will still be in your system and could be seriously harming your health.”

She added: “This is a tragic situation – the death of a young person is always devastating – but in these circumstances, it is all the more heartbreaking. My thoughts are with her family and friends at this time.

“Sadly we know it is very unlikely that the girl was the only person to have taken this drug last night.”

DLDK kicked off at 9pm on Sunday and ran until 6am on Monday. Police officers were called to the venue at 5am following reports the teenage girl had fallen ill.

According to the Victoria Warehouse website, DLDK featured “world entertainment, cutting-edge production and mind-blowing special effects”. The DJ lineup included Showtek, Blasterjaxx, Don Diablo, Laidback Luke, Ummet Ozcan, Florian Picasso, Sem Vox, and Third Party.

Anyone with information about what happened or where the drug came from is urged to call police on 0161 8567662 or 101, or the independent charity Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.

The teenager’s death comes just over a month after that of a 16-year-old, Sky Nicol, who died in Darwen, Lancashire, after she was suspected of taking ecstasy.

Lancashire Police said that they believed she had taken “a quantity of drugs” before she died after suffering a “suspected cardiac arrest”. A 16-year-old girl was later arrested on suspicion of supplying ecstasy.

The deaths of three men in Suffolk and a fourth in Telford, Shropshire, were blamed last year on a batch carrying the Superman motif.



Suffolk police offered a temporary drug amnesty to anyone who surrendered the red or pink tablets of ecstasy, inscribed with a Superman-style “S” in their centre.

Investigators believe that the pills involved were made with a high concentration of the chemical PMMA instead of MDMA, usually the main component of ecstasy.

Three of the deaths included those of John Hocking, 20, from Rendlesham, Justas Ropas, 22, who was living in Ipswich and Gediminas Kulokas, 24, who was also living in the town. They all died over the Christmas and New Year period last year.

A verdict of accidental drug related deaths in the cases of all three men was recorded last September by a coroner in Suffolk, Peter Dean, who said that the they showed the extreme hazards of drug use.

“Even if other people you know have taken (drugs) without adverse effects you do not know you will not succumb,” he added.

“People consuming them do not know the effects of that individual tablet on them.”



The use of ecstasy, as well as LSD, among young adults spiked in the two years up to a survey which was published last July. Its results indicated the numbers taking the drugs in the previous 12 months were up 84% and 175% respectively.



Compared to the two years before, an estimated 157,000 more people aged 16-24 took ecstasy over the year leading up to the publication of the statistics from the Crime Survey of England and Wales.