[chris]

Two young adults died and six others were hospitalized after a group at a house party near Konawa, Oklahoma, took a synthetic hallucinogen that had been bought as the drug 2C-E but was later identified as a more toxic compound, authorities said.

The Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation said it received an emergency call around 1:30 a.m. on May 7, 2011, from a rural residence in Seminole County. A partygoer who had not taken the drug called 911 to report that a friend was having a seizure and spitting up blood, according to an officer who responded. Responders found eight people, ranging in age from 19 to their early 20s, in severe distress at the house.

Anastasia "Stacy" Jewell, 22, of Ada, died at a hospital, and Andrew Akerman, 22, of Konawa, died days later, investigators said. The group had dissolved a powder in water and drunk it, believing it was 2C-E, a drug chemically related to ecstasy. Laboratory analysis later determined the substance was Bromo-DragonFLY, a synthetic hallucinogen with effects that can last for days and a narrow gap between an active dose and a lethal one.

The six survivors were taken to hospitals in Ada and Norman, two of them in critical condition, the OSBI said. One of them was the 20-year-old son of a Konawa police officer who had responded to the scene. The state medical examiner ruled Jewell's death an accidental overdose.

Prosecutors said Cody Weddle, 21, of Ada, had ordered one gram of what he believed was 2C-E from a website for $120 in late April 2011 and shared it at the party. Investigators said he was arrested while visiting one of the victims in the hospital. He was charged in Pontotoc County with two counts of second-degree murder, conspiracy to distribute a synthetic drug and distribution of a synthetic drug.

Weddle waived his right to a jury trial and entered a blind plea of no contest. In October 2014, a Pontotoc County judge sentenced him to 10 years in prison followed by probation, court records show.

The deaths were among several across the country in 2011 tied to designer drugs ordered over the internet, and they were cited by Oklahoma lawmakers who moved to ban a range of synthetic compounds, according to news accounts at the time.