Crimecall returns for a brand-new series

Crimecall, presented by Carla O'Brien, returns tonight for a brand new series at 9.35pm on RT One and RT Player.

In tonight's episode, alongside appeals from live investigations and CCTV cases from around the country, Garda explain the issues surrounding illegal vapes', a growing concern not only for law makers but medical professionals across Ireland.

Detective Superintendent S McCormack is a member of the Garda National Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau and has seen first-hand the problems associated with vaping illegal drugs.

He says They're not an innocent little toy. They're a serious product. They have serious outcomes for people who are using them.

Vapes have become a common sight in Ireland over recent years with the vast majority of people using them to smoke traditional tobacco or tobacco substitutes. However, some people now use them to smoke illegal drugs such as tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the main psychoactive chemical found in the cannabis plant.

While THC, or the similar chemical HHC, are banned, producers are constantly creating new variants of these drugs, in a hope to circumvent the law. Dr Sarah Killoran from Forensic Science Ireland (FSI) tests vapes that have been seized by Garda . She says It's a cat and mouse game [producers are] modifying it just slightly chemically to produce an almost identical compound that behaves psychoactively similar to THC, but it has enough structural changes for it now to be no longer considered a controlled substance.

Not only have FSI found several of these new chemicals being used in vapes, they also have found impurities. These are crude, often unintended, chemicals or contaminants that there is little to no scientific or medical research around.

Doctors like Professor Eamon Keenan, the HSE National Clinical Lead of Addiction Services, are already seeing the negative consequences associated with the contents of these illegal vapes, particularly when it comes to mental health.

He says, We see people presenting with anxiety, with paranoia, with depression and in some cases, with psychosis. As he points out, These synthetic cannabinoids and semi-synthetic cannabinoids are much more potent (and) more likely to cause mental health and physical problems.

Detective Superintendent McCormack joins Carla in studio to discuss what An Garda S och na are doing to combat the sale and production of illegal vapes.

ENDS

Fergus McCormack, Communications Lead

LINK:	https://about.rte.ie/2026/09/28/crimecall-returns-for-a-brand-new-seri...
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