Cathinones: Isotopic profiling as an aid to linking seizures

The number of cathinone derivatives available to the street market has increased steadily since 2008. Many of these compounds have proven to be potent psychostimulants and fatalities have occurred through their recreational use. The method of manufacture is essentially the same for each cathinone, i.e., (i) selection of the appropriate β-ketoarylalkane, (ii) bromination alpha to the keto group, followed by (iii) amination using the desired amine. The cathinone derivatives are usually prepared at a very high purity and little information is available from an organic manufacturing by-products profile because the product is so pure. To provide law enforcement agencies with a tool that would enable links to be identified between samples from the same production batch, the carbon, hydrogen, and nitrogen stable isotope ratios in a number of cathinones were investigated. The aim was to determine if sufficient diversity existed in the light element stable isotope ratios of cathinones to allow the isotopic ratios to be used to discriminate between different seizures and to assist in linking samples from the same seizure. Careful measurement of the δ(13) C, δ(15) N, and δ(2) H values in each sample revealed that the stable isotope ratios for a particular cathinone analogue vary from one seizure to another. In the seizures studied, carbon, hydrogen, and nitrogen stable isotope ratios were found to vary from -32.8‰ to -26.1‰, -152‰ to +72‰, and -16.6‰ to -2.7‰, respectively. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.