At first glance, they look like ordinary scraps of litter. Small white squares, less than an inch across, with a raised silver button in the center.<\/p>\n
There are dozens of them scattered around the Allentown Parking Authority\u2019s North Lot on Seventh Street, a block from PPL Center. The squares are electrodes, sometimes called leads, small stickers used for attaching an EKG to a patient\u2019s chest in a hospital emergency room.<\/p>\n
How so many of them got there, in this parking lot a half mile from the closest hospital, is the story of a largely ignored drug overdose problem that is costing Allentown hundreds of thousands of dollars.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a problem Lehigh County District Attorney Gavin Holihan says he\u2019s trying to solve by treating the behavior associated with K2 use as a more serious crime when it happens repeatedly, then offering drug treatment to users when they are incarcerated.<\/p>\n
Not everyone agrees with this approach. Chief Public Defender Kimberly Makoul says the DA is using criminal charges to coerce drug users into treatment, raising serious due process and constitutional concerns.<\/p>\n
\u2018Frequent fliers\u2019<\/p>\n
K2 is a designer drug made with an ever-changing mix of chemicals meant to mimic THC, the main psychoactive ingredient of marijuana. It\u2019s technically illegal, but the varied ingredients and underground manufacturing process make prosecution challenging.<\/p>\n
K2 has been around for years, but rarely grabs headlines like fentanyl and ketamine. It used to be called synthetic marijuana, but law enforcement officers reject that name since the drug\u2019s effects are unpredictable, and do not mimic cannabis.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s sold in smoke shops and bodegas all over Allentown, and is cheap, addictive and difficult to address, since it doesn\u2019t show up on many law enforcement drug tests.<\/p>\n
Chronic K2 users flock to the North Lot and the streets around it to use the drug. Despite being so close to the hockey arena and Hamilton Street\u2019s bustling restaurant scene, the lot is fairly secluded.<\/p>\n
About 30 people, called \u201cfrequent fliers\u201d by police, repeatedly overdose on the drug, sometimes multiple times a day, straining the resources of the city\u2019s ambulance corps.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are people who overdosed four times within a 24-hour period. There\u2019s one person who overdosed 29 times within a 30-day stretch,\u201d Holihan said. \u201cWe have people who overdose 12, 15 times in a week. We have people who take an ambulance ride, are released from the hospital and overdose within an hour, and take another EMS ride back to the hospital.\u201d<\/p>\n
Police surmise that it\u2019s these K2 users, freshly released from a hospital, who are ripping off the electrodes and discarding them in the parking lot. According to one court case, K2 overdoses resulted in $380,000 worth of unpaid ambulance rides in 2025.<\/p>\n
When police officers encounter K2 addicts, they are frequently passed out on the sidewalk or sleeping in a doorway. The crime that prosecutors say addresses that behavior is called disorderly conduct. In most cases it\u2019s a summary offense, akin to a traffic ticket, that doesn\u2019t result in any jail time.<\/p>\n
In November, Holihan started an initiative to address the number of K2 overdoses happening in Center City. Disorderly conduct citations now come with a written warning, and repeat offenders are charged with persistent disorderly conduct, a misdemeanor punishable by jail time.<\/p>\n
But that stick also comes with a carrot.<\/p>\n
K2 users who get arrested and take advantage of drug treatment offered at the jail can have their charges dismissed. As part of the initiative, the DA\u2019s office spent approximately $190,000 of opioid forfeiture settlement funds this year to pay the salaries of four addiction specialists at the Lehigh County Jail.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s the goal of this effort, to get people who can\u2019t control themselves and can\u2019t control their addiction a chance to detox, an opportunity to get sober, an opportunity to get a drug and alcohol assessment and an opportunity to get to treatment. All of that costs less than the medical treatment that they\u2019re getting now,\u201d Holihan added.<\/p>\n
Fewer ambulance calls<\/p>\n
Though statistics on how many K2 users have gotten treatment this way are difficult to find, one year into the initiative, there has been a decline in K2-related 911 calls from the area around the North Lot.<\/p>\n
In August and September 2025, city ambulances transported 115 patients for suspected K2 overdoses. In those same months this year, only 51 calls came in.<\/p>\n
Mehmet Barzev, the city\u2019s EMS chief of operations, could not say what was behind the decline. He didn\u2019t know about Holihan\u2019s initiative until asked about it for this story, but said he believes it\u2019s a good idea.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt sounds like the right step,\u201d Barzev said. \u201cI think we\u2019re all just waiting for that pivotal point when something happens that\u2019s going to help the problem, and I think that\u2019s going to have to come from the law enforcement side.\u201d<\/p>\n
Allentown EMS has four ambulances, and there have been days when all of them were tied up with calls from the 100 and 200 blocks of Seventh Street, Barzev said. Medics are on a first-name basis with some of the people who repeatedly overdose.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re not frustrated with the people. They clearly need help,\u201d he said. \u201cThere\u2019s no clear cure for this problem, and we have to do what\u2019s right by the patient. There is a sense of frustration when we take somebody, and hours later we take them again, for the same exact thing. Obviously, leaving them in a vulnerable situation is not the answer.\u201d<\/p>\n
A toll on emergency room staff<\/p>\n
Barzev said the majority of K2 overdose patients who end up in city ambulances are transported to St. Luke\u2019s Hospital-Sacred Heart on Chew Street.<\/p>\n
From April to September, the hospital\u2019s emergency department counted 649 encounters with people needing treatment for drug-related emergencies, including overdoses. Hospital officials were not able to say how many of the patients were using K2.<\/p>\n
But of the 649 drug-related emergency department visits, 234 were repeat encounters involving patients who were brought in more than once for the same problem. These repeat visits involved 62 patients, according to a statement from St. Luke\u2019s spokesperson Sam Kennedy, with the top five patients accounting for 26.5% of all repeat visits.<\/p>\n
Thirteen patients had five or more emergency department encounters for substance abuse-related concerns over a six-month span. One patient alone accounted for 24 substance-specific visits over six months, according to the statement.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis pattern of recurrent emergency department utilization presents an ongoing operational challenge, consuming valuable treatment bed capacity and potentially limiting access for other patients,\u201d the statement read. \u201cMany of these encounters require limited acute medical intervention, and some occur multiple times within the same day for the same presenting concern. For example, in April, one isolated patient presented to the Sacred Heart emergency department four times for recurring overdose-related concerns. Some patients have been violent, requiring police intervention. For emergency department staff, all this can take a toll, emotionally and otherwise.\u201d<\/p>\n
Necessary step, or a step too far?<\/p>\n
Is incarcerating K2 users the answer? That was the question before Judge Robert L. Steinberg in June when lawyers for a 40-year-old Allentown man, Angel Luis Ramos-Rodriguez, challenged the persistent disorderly conduct charge after Ramos-Rodriguez was found slumped with his head between his knees on the front steps of a Seventh Street home, too intoxicated on K2 to stand.<\/p>\n
Prosecution witness Sgt. Jacqueline Murray, an Allentown bike cop who patrols the area around the North Lot as part of the Community Oriented Policing unit, testified that it was Ramos-Rodriguez\u2019s sixth offense. In one five-day period, Murray testified, Ramos-Rodriguez had six contacts with law enforcement that resulted in ambulances being called.<\/p>\n
Murray told the judge that Seventh Street residents are tired of people overdosing on their property.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey should be able to walk out of their residence freely and not have to step over somebody or be afraid of what kind of drug the person is on,\u201d Murray said.<\/p>\n
Prosecutors explained the enhanced charge to the judge.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are trying to keep these people out of body bags, essentially,\u201d Deputy District Attorney Isis Irizarry Negron said.<\/p>\n
Defense attorneys pushed back, and in the end Steinberg dismissed the charges. Makoul, the county\u2019s chief public defender, said that was the right call. Sleeping on someone\u2019s doorstep is not enough to be charged with disorderly conduct, Makoul said. In creating the policy targeting a specific set of K2 users, the DA overstepped, she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat approach may indicate that the prosecution targets individuals based on perceived substance use or addiction rather than specific criminal conduct,\u201d she said via email. \u201cThat suggests a policy directed not at specific unlawful acts, but at a class of people perceived to struggle with addiction.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sending people to jail, in an effort to force them to accept drug treatment, could cause more problems than it solves, Makoul added.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe do not object to individuals receiving treatment that they seek or need. But treatment obtained only after arrest and under threat of prosecution can deepen, rather than alleviate, the instability that often impedes recovery. Criminal charges and incarceration carry consequences that extend far beyond the courtroom,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u2018Trying to make the city better\u2019<\/p>\n
On a recent Tuesday afternoon, Holihan walked through the North Lot, pointing out drug paraphernalia and litter, including electrodes, blowing in the breeze while students from nearby Central Elementary STREAM Academy walked by. Across the street, people checked out the new Hive Residences apartment complex, where a studio apartment starts at $1,350 a month.<\/p>\n
Holihan said the smoke shop across the street from the Hive sells K2, but when this reporter tried to buy some, clerks claimed they didn\u2019t know what she was asking for.<\/p>\n
\u201cPart of what we\u2019re doing is trying to make the city better,\u201d Holihan said. \u201cNot just for the people in these new apartments, but for the people who have lived here their whole lives. They don\u2019t want to see people overdosing or have to step over puddles of urine right outside their door.\u201d<\/p>\n
From her side porch overlooking the North Lot, decorated with flower pots and a Puerto Rican flag, Turner Street resident Angela Jorge said she believed things are getting better in the neighborhood where she\u2019s lived for 10 years.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is still a lot that happens out here, but we\u2019re seeing more police officers. It feels safer,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At first glance, they look like ordinary scraps of litter. Small white squares, less than an inch across,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":307159,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[119,121,120,433,182,139,28,432],"class_list":["post-307158","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-allentown","tag-allentown","tag-allentown-headlines","tag-allentown-news","tag-lehigh-county","tag-local-news","tag-news","tag-pennsylvania","tag-top-stories-tmc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307158","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307158"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307158\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/307159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}