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New York police criticized for 'weaponized marijuana' videos

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The New York Police Department faced criticism on Thursday after it emerged that video clips it used to show the crazed affects of smoking synthetic marijuana were of men high on other drugs.

The controversy emerged two days after NYPD Police Commissioner Bill Bratton outlined his department's growing concern over synthetic marijuana, which he said is spreading across New York and is sold illegally for as little as $2 a packet in city corner stores.

It gives users super human strength, makes them impervious to pain and can cause violent behavior, Bratton said at a press conference on Tuesday, dubbing the substance "weaponized marijuana".

To illustrate the threat to police officers and civilians, Bratton played two videos that showed delirious, ranting men, naked in public. In one clip, a bloodied man smashes a hole through a wooden fence with his bare fist before being pepper sprayed and dragged to the ground by a group of officers.

The NYPD confirmed on Thursday that the men in the videos, which were previously used in police training, were in fact high on other narcotics.

New York Police Chief of Patrol Carlos Gomez, at a press conference on Thursday, said the videos were meant to show drug users in an "excited delirium syndrome state."

"That is caused by illicit drug use such as cocaine, PCP, LSD," he said. "Synthetic marijuana can also cause that, so that video was to demonstrate what our officers may encounter."

The clarification came after reports this week that one of the clips was taken from an old episode of the television show COPS and that the man had taken PCP, the chemical also known as Angel Dust, and not synthetic marijuana.

The NYPD declined to say where the videos originated and Reuters could not independently confirm that one of the clips came from the television program.

"There was understandable confusion," NYPD spokesman Stephen Davis said on Thursday. "We could have been more clear."

The discrepancy was reported by several blogs, including Gothamist and Gawker, which called the video "deceitful."

Synthetic marijuana refers to herbal mixtures sold in small packets that often contain shredded plants and chemicals that when smoked can cause hallucinations, paranoia and even cardiac arrest, according to the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.

(Reporting By Edward McAllister; Editing by Andrew Hay)