It’s a sunny day at Wesleyan University. The picnic blankets are out, which means the weed and cigarettes are too. The night brings beers in hand and Naloxone in pant pockets. Someone spilled poppers on a dorm floor.
I didn’t know much about Wesleyan before my acceptance beyond its prestigious academic reputation and connection to Lin-Manuel Miranda. For that reason, I wanted to delve deeply into the university that I would be attending for the next 4 years: achievements, notable alumni, and of course, controversies. Out of everything I found in the public domain—from “Bring Back Fr. Bill” to the threat of defunding The Argus—the most notorious event seemed to be the 2015 “Wesleyan Molly Bust.”
My exploration of the Wesleyan Molly Bust didn’t really begin until my matriculation and introduction to the campus’s drug culture. Needless to say, Wesleyan students are experimenters in all regards: academically, socially, and recreationally. Openness to new experiences is encouraged heavily many and in many ways underpins what it means to attend a liberal arts college. The freedom that college brings fosters abundant opportunities to explore drugs at Wesleyan. After all, stonerthings.com ranked us number two on the Top Ten Universities for Stoners.
From an outsider’s perspective, Wesleyan’s drug culture may not appear to be that bad or particularly different from any other liberal arts college within a 100-mile radius. However, once I came to campus I became truly aware of just how present drugs are across campus, often witnessing drug use that teetered dangerously towards substance abuse. Initially, I felt like I was overreacting and that this was a part of the college experience. Several thoughts lingered in my head: what makes this student body particularly tolerant of drug use? What resources exist within our community to guide our understanding of whether some of this behavior is legitimately dangerous? Of course, we have CAPS, WesWell, and other groups on campus that promote overall well-being. But how much of an impact do these resources really make? Nothing taught me more about this and Wesleyan’s drug culture than my research into the molly debacle.
On February 22, 2015, eleven students were hospitalized for apparent MDMA overdoses. A few days later, five students were arrested in connection to the incident. In a A Rolling Stone Article, alum Emily Greenhouse ‘08 details the events of two weekends during which these students purchased contaminated molly. Her article delves deep into the profiles of those arrested and the broader reaction of the administration and students. Of the five students involved, four of them were neuroscience majors. One of the dealers who also took the molly ended up in a medically induced coma.
Eric Lonergan, a student convicted and expelled for distributing the molly, was described as “a sage of drugs” on campus, known as the person to turn to for “advice on using street drugs to chemically treat [mental illness].” He adamantly denied any responsibility in the overdoses, arguing that he sent students video links in which he appeared to test the substance and show the camera a positive MDMA result. A student and friend of Lonergan, Rama Agha Al Nakib, worked with him to manufacture and sell the Molly. Following a dorm search, a medley of drugs were found in their rooms: 500 pills, a variety of powders and liquids, tryptamine, and 610 Xanax pills. Nakib explained to a detective that she turned to home remedies because she did “not believe in the American Medical System.” The substance found in the molly was the synthetic cannabinoid AB Fubinaca, which is typically linked to rapid heartbeat, lethargy, and intense paranoia. With their background in neuroscience and interest in pharmacology, it appears as if the students suspected of causing the overdoses viewed themselves as knowledgeable caretakers as opposed to harmful drug dealers. Lonergan’s goal, according to his LinkedIn profile, was to “integrate neuroscience and Philosophy of Mind to create a consistent image of the universe along with revised methods for dealing with mental disorders through pharmacotherapy and psychotherapy.” For him, an illicit drug business at Wesleyan allowed him to work towards this objective. However, regardless of the convicted students’ intentions, their actions were incredibly reckless and demonstrated a glaring disregard for their classmates’ safety.
About a year later, a separate incident occurred at the University with a Wesleyan football player pleading guilty to one count of possession with the intent to distribute a synthetic hallucinogen among his teammates. Reportedly, some of the deals occurred in the locker room, and the student-turned-dealer purchased the drug on the dark web using bitcoin.
I write this article not to condemn those who experiment, but to ask you to reflect on Wesleyan’s drug culture and whether you truly understood what you were getting into when you decided to study at Wesleyan. I believe that these scandals illustrate the immense dangers of drug use. I do not intend to reopen old wounds with this article, but rather hope to bring awareness to the history of drug use at this University and challenge those who believe that the culture is without problems. None of my friends knew anything about these incidents, but there is no question that they should. With the abundance of cheap fentanyl, the adulterated drugs available today are far more lethal than those of 2015 and 2016. In Connecticut alone, there was a 418% increase in fentanyl-involved deaths in 2019, compared to 2015.
We are college students. We are going to experiment. We are going to find confident guides who claim that they can cure our ailments and provide us with products of the highest quality. However, our proclivity towards experimentation on campus should be equally matched with an awareness of the harm that can arise from experimenting with new drugs.
Nia Chetkovich can be reached at nchetkovich@wesleyan.edu.