California bars and clubs must offer drug testing kits for common date-rape drugs starting July 1 

Bars and clubs across California will soon offer a new safety precaution for customers to help protect them from getting roofied.

Beginning July 1, Assembly Bill 1013 will require establishments with a Type 48 license from the California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC) to have drug-testing kits available for common date-rape drugs and signs noting their availability displayed in a visible location.

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• File Photo By Steve E. Miller
• SPIKED DRINKS Starting in July, bars and clubs across California will start offering drug-testing kits to check for common date-rape drugs.

"Once somebody's drink has been spiked, it's too late. So how do we prevent that from happening," state Assemblymember Josh Lowenthal (D-Los Angeles) told New Times. "If you put a test coaster out on display, if you have your strips out on display, maybe a perpetrator is going to think twice about doing it because they don't want to be caught."

Businesses will be allowed to order whichever testing kit they prefer—the test strips or coasters—and can choose whether they will be offered for free or for purchase, Lowenthal said.

"I'm not only a legislator, but I'm also a restaurant and bar owner and I'm a father," he said. "It's deeply disconcerting that we allow sexual assault to take place by not cracking down on roofying. This is a solvable problem, and we let it reach crisis proportions."

Lowenthal said he learned of this crisis' magnitude after touring the state, talking to young people, and learning that a majority of them have had some sort of experience with either getting roofied or knowing someone who has been drugged.

"The main drugs that are being used for roofying people now are GHB or Ketamine, and they leave your body within 24 hours, so you can't test for it," he said. "By your first urine in the morning, it's out of your system—so you black out, then you wake up and recover and it's already out. There's no scent, no taste, and there's no color, so the only way we can stop this is actually to prevent it."

Gamma-hydroxybutyrate (GHB) is a drug that produces feelings of euphoria, confidence, relaxation, and sociability with side effects including drowsiness, vomiting, mood swings, dependence, as well as more serious symptoms of unconsciousness and respiratory collapse leading to coma, or in extreme cases, death, especially when mixed with alcohol, benzodiazepines, and opioids, according to Better Health Channel.

AB 1013's requirements are aimed at bars and clubs, but Lowenthal said he's aiming to extend those requirements to restaurants and sporting events, as he's working on proposing two other bills that will help increase safety for those in California.

"One of the bills requires that if you ask for a drink with a lid on it, that the bar has to provide you a drink with a lid, so you feel more safe about it," he said. "The second is if you notify anybody in a bar that you believe that your drink has been drugged, that they're required to contact law enforcement and try and monitor you until first responders arrive."

Lowenthal said this bill will offer an extra layer of security, as it's common for perpetrators to pretend like they're helping the victim by taking them home, when oftentimes they're potentially trying to commit sexual assault.

"We're going to keep going at this, and we're really going to be doing public awareness campaigns until we really cut down on this," he said. "It's reached epidemic levels."

Fast facts

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Reach Staff Writer Samantha Herrera at [email protected].