MONTGOMERY – The Alabama Law Enforcement Agency (ALEA) and the Attorney General's Office announced on Monday a recent statewide operation cracking down on illegal kratom products.
The Attorney General's Office issued a cease-and-desist order to businesses selling or possessing kratom in March.
According to Katherine Robertson, chief counsel for Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, 83 search warrants were executed statewide in Operation Southern Shield.
The joint effort between ALEA and the Attorney General's Office seized 64,000 bottles of products containing kratom and about 59,000 doses in two warehouses in Montgomery from wholesalers.
"This is a situation where these labels are not correct. Our first order of business was to send these letters out notifying the sellers of what they actually had. If they're improperly labeled, we weren't going to hold them responsible, but if they're still selling them, then they're in dangerous territory. This is also not the AGO or ALEA just being hall monitors for the fun of it," Robertson said at a press conference on Monday. "We've actually gotten numerous reports of adverse health impacts. This stuff is highly addictive, it has opioid-like effects. Despite the label, it is not made from natural Kratom, or what people think is natural kratom, this is mostly synthetic stuff, which means it's highly concentrated and highly addictive."
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