The Oklahoma college students who were supposedly drugged with fentanyl at a Mexican resort may have been targeted for trafficking or even to have their organs stolen, according to one of their loved ones.
Stephanie Snider — whose son, Jake, is dating one of the students, Zara Hull — spoke out about the theory after photos emerged of Hull and friend, Kaylie Pitzer, slumped over after ordering water from their Cancun resort’s pool bar on Aug. 2.
“We believe they were planning to take her away to be trafficked or perhaps even to take her organs (which is what we were later told is a common thing that is done),” Snider wrote on Facebook this week.
“They most likely would have done something to my son as well, possibly even death,” Snider added.
She did not specify who exactly warned them about the possibility of Hull and Pitzer being targeted for trafficking or organ harvesting.
Hull, 20, was later hospitalized with what doctors suspected were life-threatening side effects of synthetic fentanyl.
She finally returned to Oklahoma on Monday, nearly two weeks after her traumatic ordeal, Snider added in another Facebook update.
The college student was pictured smiling in the passenger seat next to her boyfriend, who drove her home from Dallas, Texas, where she was hospitalized after being treated in Cancun.
“Zara is feeling better physically each day-just still a little wobbly and dizzy at times,” Snider said of her condition.
“It seems like when we close our eyes at night many things hit at once of what she’s been through. Kaylie is still struggling with these things as well so prayers are still needed for these girls,” she added.
Hull’s boyfriend, Jake, was separated from her when she was first hospitalized, his mom wrote online.
When he finally got to see her, he found her intubated and under heavy sedation.
He even prevented the hospital staff from taking her to another location for an MRI, which he suspected was a front for trafficking, his mom said.
The hospital admission also ran up a hefty bill.
“The baseline was $10,000 for them to even look at me,” Hull recalled in an interview with CBS News.
Hull and Pitzer were on their dream Mexican vacation with their boyfriends when disaster struck – and Snider warned other parents to be on the lookout for similar symptoms.
“I want everyone to know this is REAL,” she implored.
“As parents of Jake, and Zara’s and Kaylie’s parents, we still can’t close our eyes at night because these things are still haunting us.”
As of Tuesday afternoon, a GoFundMe for Hull’s hospital bills and related travel costs had raised nearly $25,000 of its $40,000 goal.
