A Vicksburg man caught in Brandon on Thursday with a whopping amount of synthetic LSD faces felony charges under a new state law, according to the Mississippi Bureau of Narcotics.
Michael Anthony Montgomery, 28, was arrested near Rouse Elementary School in Brandon and charged with one count of sale of a controlled substance, MBN interim director Sam Owens said in a release Friday.
Agents seized about 6,000 dosage units of 25-B-NBOME on paper about 114 grams of the hallucinogen in powdered form, Owens said. The bust was valued at $600,00 to $1 million. A law enacted by the Legislature last spring made the sale or possession of synthetic LSD a felony.
The chemical is sold on the street as a drug that mimics LSD and became a Schedule I substance in November, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration. Unlike LSD, which has a handful of reported cases of overdose death, 25-NBOME is linked to at least 19 deaths in the U.S. of people aged 15 to 29 between March 2012 and August 2013, the DEA has said.

MBN said Montgomery sold and distributed the drug to undercover agents within 1,500 feet of a school. Thus, the charge could be upgraded to aggravated trafficking of a controlled substance. If convicted, he faces 25 years to life in prison, MBN enforcement commander Lt. Col. Mike Perkins said.
Montgomery’s arrest wrapped up a 15-month investigation by MBN and law enforcement officials in Rankin County. He was held in the Rankin County Detention Center.