Four Who Drank Jimson Weed Brew Released From Hospital

At 17, Travis Burke says he has experimented with drugs, but his nearly fatal encounter Thursday with the common roadside plant jimson weed has made him swear off drugs for life.

“It shows what drugs can do to you,” he said from his parents’ house Friday afternoon after he was discharged from the hospital. “That’s enough for me. It can mess you up real bad.”

Around midnight Thursday, Travis said, he and three of his friends cut open 20 of the prickly seedpods from the jimson weed plant, brewed themselves about eight cups of tea and drank all of it. The four suffered muscle spasms and hallucinations before lapsing into comas.

Helen and Harold Burke, Travis’ mother and stepfather, found the boys about 5 a.m. when they heard Travis having spasms in the hallway and he collapsed into their bedroom. All of the boys were hospitalized Thursday and released Friday.

Police and poison center officials said they see similar cases each spring, when the weed blooms throughout the West and Mexico. The weed can cause extreme agitation, high fever and severe muscle and nerve damage. Experts said teen-agers experiment with the plant not knowing how toxic it can be.

Officials in Orange County said they have no record of deaths from jimson weed.

Travis, appearing pale Friday, said he heard about the weed from one of his friends, who also drank the tea. He and his friends, whom authorities have not identified, picked the seedpods from a hillside in Orange and brought them back to his house.

He said he tried the weed because he wanted to experiment.

Unlike other drugs he has tried, jimson weed was “way more intense,” he said. “I ain’t gonna do any more drugs.”

He said doctors told him he has damaged his muscles and kidneys, although with care his health should return.