By Eric Graves
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INDEPENDENCE, Mo. (KMBC) — Ashlyn Klesath is a mother of two young girls who both love Barbies. It was no surprise when one of her daughters picked out a new doll when they were in Cargo Largo last Wednesday.
“My daughter was digging through a box of all different types of Barbies and picked the one she liked,” Klesath said.
As soon as they bought the doll and were out of the store, Klesath said her daughter was already starting to tear into the packaging.
“She started opening it herself,” Klesath said. “Ripped the plastic piece off of the front, and I helped her finish it the rest of the way.”
The entire process was nothing out of the ordinary, but what Klesath didn’t know was that she had just avoided something that could have been terrible.
Fast forward to three days later, Independence police said Cargo Largo security called them because a substance had been found on the packaging of a Barbie doll in the store.
Officers determined that the substance was fentanyl, a deadly opioid drug stronger than heroin and a large part of the overdose crisis in the U.S. IPD said the drug had been hidden in the dolls’ packaging before arriving at Cargo Largo.
IPD officers then worked to track down everyone who might have bought one of the dolls.
Klesath said her sister told her about IPD’s social media post about the Barbies at the same time a detective called her family.
“They worked very quickly,” Klesath said. “Like, we saw the post, and they called me all within 15 minutes, and he was here within 20 [minutes].”
Klesath said the detective on her doorstep walked her through what they needed to do, then started searching her trash for the doll’s packaging.
“I originally told them that I would get it out of the trash for him, and he was like, ‘No, please don’t do that. I will do it,'” she said. “So, he put on gloves, dug through the trash, found it, and then showed us how it was hollowed out in the back.”
Sure enough, inside the doll’s packaging was a bag of deadly fentanyl. The officer showed her how it had been hidden.
“It has cardboard backing on it and then like a plastic piece of the front of the Barbie connected to the cardboard,” Klesath said. “Well, I guess the back cardboard piece was hollowed out, and the officer called it flat packing, so they flat packed the fentanyl into a tight, sealed bag and slipped it in between the cardboard.”
Klesath said the detective told her this could all be a part of a drug smuggling operation.
“He said it was more than enough to kill my whole house,” Klesath said.
Klesath said fentanyl is something they’re all too familiar with the dangers of.
“We actually lost my husband’s brother to a fentanyl overdose three years ago,” she said. “So that, like, really hits home. It keeps hitting home over and over again. Just shows you how big this epidemic is.”
Klesath is relieved her kids are safe, but frustrated that this even happened.
“The fact that my kids are in danger, I can’t even trust to let them open up a Barbie doll on their own,” she said.
Independence police said all of the contaminated Barbies have been collected. IPD did not have an update to share on Monday. A spokesperson said the investigation is ongoing.
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