Police: TeWinkle students hospitalized for drugs

Four students at TeWinkle Middle School in Costa Mesa have been hospitalized after taking Ecstasy and inhaling from an aerosol can Friday morning, police said. The students, all in the eighth-grade, were girls between 12 and 14 years old, said Lt. Bob Ciszek.

School district officials said the girls took the pills and used the inhalant either on the bus on the way to school or on the campus early that morning.

About 9:30 a.m., one of the girls went to the school nurse and said she felt ill, said district spokeswoman Laura Boss. She was going in and out of consciousness and the nurse called the paramedics, Boss said.

School officials rounded up the three other girls involved and took them to the Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian as well as a precautionary measure, Boss said. A vice principal from the school is at the hospital with the students, she said.

One of the girls admitted to police that she gave the other girls Ecstasy then all four inhaled from a Dust-Off can, an aerosol cleaner used to clean computers and TV screens, Cizsek said.

Police and school officials are continuing to investigate and no disciplinary actions have been determined, Boss said.