Montreal Public Health had recently warned of a dangerous purple syrup being sold in fake Pharma bottles laced with benzodiazepine powder and the deadly opioid Protonitazene which is even stronger than fentanyl.The product, was labelled on the markets as a “promethazine with codeine oral solution” cough syrup.
“Over time, different mixtures have been identified in containers that appear identical,” said Public Health.
Officials said that some confiscated products that were tested have been shown to contain protonitazene, a toxic opioid, and bromazolam, a benzodiazepine that is not marketed in Canada.
“Anyone who consumes this product could be exposed to an unpredictable and toxic mixture,” the warning states, adding that consuming the liquid could result in overdose or death.
Previously there was a Laval Public Health issued a notice in November 2023 about a suspected overdose death linked to a similar product.
The Montreal-based narco network was described as “elite” by Law Enforcement and allegedly exported carfentanil and other next-generation synthetic opioids 100 times deadlier than fentanyl to American consumers via the dark web, leading to the arrest of four in late February, after 13 months of joint surveillance by U.S. federal agencies and Quebec police, and a seizure of more than 600,000 tablets of various synthetic drugs earlier in December.
The four suspects charged are reportedly connected, through their alleged street gang affiliate, to the Wolfpack Alliance —a network tied by DEA sources to a British Columbia fentanyl superlab, and by Canadian law enforcement and expert sources to Canadian outlaw motorcycle gangs, Iranian organized crime, and the Sinaloa Cartel.
The four suspects are: Darren McAlpine, of Delson; Geneva Fournier, of Châteauguay; and Wanya Nathan Ellis and Cheyanne Buchanan-Dennis, both of Sainte-Catherine. All four municipalities sit in the region directly south of the Montreal Island. They appeared by videoconference before a judge at the Longueuil courthouse and face charges of possession for the purpose of trafficking, drug trafficking, and possession of a prohibited weapon.
The arrests followed searches executed on December 17, 2025, at addresses in Châteauguay and Sainte-Catherine. No U.S. federal charges have been publicly announced.
The December searches produced a seizure that reads like an inventory of the post-fentanyl synthetic opioid market.
Quebec police pointed to more than 600,000 tablets — comprising 288,000 metonitazene tablets, 128,000 methamphetamine tablets, 180,000 benzodiazepine tablets, and 10,000 MDMA tablets — alongside 81 litres of protonitazene in liquid form, cannabis, cocaine, dark web trafficking equipment, a loaded 9mm firearm, and 9mm ammunition.
The 81 litres of liquid protonitazene is an industrial-scale volume of a still-emerging synthetic opioid. The DEA permanently placed protonitazene in Schedule I in 2024; on February 11, 2026, it separately finalized Schedule I status for variants of metonitazene and protonitazene.
“Metonitazene and Protonitazene are substances not widely known to the public at present, but they are considered more potent than fentanyl,” Quebec police said yesterday.
Evidence from the Canada Border Services Agency has identified China and Hong Kong as import sources for earlier nitazene variants. The seizure in this case — 288,000 metonitazene tablets and 81 litres of liquid protonitazene — represents the largest documented seizure of these substances in Canada on the public record.
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