Seen this video of a guy ‘kena pukau’? There’s a logical explanation… and it’s worse

Two days ago, a video surfaced on social media sites of an old guy who got his bike stolen in a super weird way.

‼️KES CURI MOTOR‼️Menurut anak mangsa, ayahnya terpukau dan terpedaya dengan kata-kata suspek dipercayai lelaki berbangsa India. Motosikal yang dibawa lari jenis Honda Wave Alpha, warna hitam, no.plat BNS 1908. Di Jalan Sultan Abdul Samad bersebelahan Klinik pic.twitter.com/sDf1zbwK3Q

— nan manjoi8715 (@nanmanjoi8715) October 3, 2023

If you can’t or don’t want to watch the video, the 2 minute-ish CCTV clip shows a younger man who approaches an old guy who’s about to get on his bike. The former starts talking and gesturing to the latter, and the clip ends with the younger guy grabbing the old guy’s helmet and riding his bike away, leaving him looking around in confusion.

Now, the caption attached to the above video suggested that the younger man pukau or hypnotized the old man, which is probably the first response to many who’s watched the video. Someone else said in the comments that the victim is very old, insinuating that he has dementia or some other condition that made it easier for him to fall prey to unscrupulous scum.

And while that’s 100% plausible, what if we told you there might be a more horrifying explanation for what happened in the clip? What if we told you that…

Scopolamine is a drug from South America that hypnotizes people

You have without a doubt heard of heroin, meth, and ketamine, but you’ve most likely never heard of scopolamine. The drug, better known as burundanga or ‘Devil’s Breath’ in Colombia where its use seems to be the most widespread, and is extracted from certain plants of the nightshade family, like this unassuming yellow flower…

…and made into powder or liquid that can be added to drinks or inhaled. Once ingested, you can expect auditory and visual hallucinations to start kicking in, with a sprinkle of paranoia and a pinch of agitation added to the mix. Doesn’t sound very scary so far – other drugs like LSD, meth and cocaine do the same thing, right?

Allegedly, the reason why some call Devil’s Breath ‘one of the scariest drugs in the world’ is that it can turn you into a mindless zombie who will do anything you’re told. You’ll empty your bank account or sleep with someone if they asked you to, and you only have to catch a whiff of the drug for it to work. Someone could just blow it into your face, and you’re out like a light.

“It’s like you cannot control it at all. You don’t need it in a cup or a drink. Just to smell it. It’s very strong.” – An interviewee in a VICE documentary on Youtube

And according to this VICE documentary, you’ll look fairly normal on scopolamine, maybe a bit lost, but that’s it. No twitching, no mood swings, no red eyes unlike the effects of some other drugs, and you won’t remember anything from a Devil’s Breath binge.

It’s hard to imagine that something so Clockwork Orange-y exists, and some people say that the whole thing is exaggerated. Yet, it’s got history – during the Cold War, it is said that both the U.S. and the Soviet Union used the Devil’s Breath as a form of truth serum. Nowadays, it is inextricably linked to crime. In 2015, three members of an international triad were arrested in Paris for using the drug to steal millions of euros from unsuspecting, mostly elderly people, and in 2020, two men tried to abduct a female Lyft (a rideshare service) driver in Atlanta using the drug.

Alright, now that we’ve got y’all nice and spooked, is the drug already here in Malaysia?

Scopolamine is widely used in Malaysia, but…

…as a legit medicine for motion sickness. Yes, just like how morphine, a drug used in hospitals for pain management can be turned into heroin, scopolamine can heal or harm, depending on how it’s made.

As for Devil’s Breath, there hasn’t been any reports of it being used for criminal purposes in Malaysia as recently as 2022… but it’s not unthinkable that it’s made its way here. Certainly makes for a more… reasonable explanation behind all the local pukau cases.