CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- A woman’s horror story at a popular uptown bar is shedding light on a bigger problem.
Leah McGuirk said her drink was drugged at the Epicentre earlier this month. On Friday, Charlotte Mecklenburg Police held a news conference about the incident, saying the case wasn’t handled properly.
McGuirk told NBC Charlotte what happened on May 12.
“It was one of the first warm nights of summer, so I wanted to go out to do something with my friends,” she recalled.
McGuirk believed her drink was drugged at Rooftop 210.
“Apparently, my eyes rolled to the back of my head,” she said. “My vision started to go out and started to hear this weird hissing or crackling sound.”
McGuirk wasn’t sexually assaulted, but police said that may have been the suspect’s intent. She went to CMPD headquarters to file a report two weeks later, but an officer told her she needed to go back to the scene to do that.
That's when McGuirk took her case to social media -- posting about it on Facebook and Twitter. CMPD Lieutenant Peacock got involved and assigned a detective to investigate.
“There is no requirement for someone who may have been victimized in this kind of nature to go back to scene, so there was some misinformation there,” CMPD spokesman Rob Tufano said. “It’s certainly regrettable this young lady didn’t receive the immediate customer service; we are certainly handling that internally to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
NBC Charlotte has learned of eight other reports at the Epicentre this year involving drugging or sex offenses or both. Lt. Peacock said they’re trying to improve how they keep track of those cases.
“Simply the assertion, we want to start tracking these things better,” said Lt. Peacock.
CMPD said the case involving the officer who gave misinformation was being handled internally, and police were following leads in McGuirk’s case.
“If I can prevent one person from being roofied or having this experience then I’ll do it,” she said.