Man who drugged daughter and friends at sleepover sentenced

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — An Oregon man who drugged his daughter and her friends with fruit smoothies laced with a sleeping pill after they didn't go to bed during a sleepover has been sentenced to two years in prison. prison.

Michael Meyden, a 57-year-old man from Lake Oswego, a Portland suburb, apologized during his sentencing Monday after pleading guilty to three counts of causing another person to ingest a controlled substance, a reported The Oregonian.

“My whole life is destroyed,” he told the court. “Everything that was important to me until then has disappeared. »

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He said he planned a fun sleepover last summer for his daughter and three of her friends, all then 12, but they didn't go to bed at 11 p.m. like he wanted. Meyden said he wanted them to be well rested for the next day, but he also wanted them to go to bed so he could sleep.

Meyden mixed fruit smoothies with a sleeping pill, authorities said. Two of the friends drank the smoothies and ended up passing out. A third girl didn't want to drink and alerted a family friend via text after seeing Meyden come back to make sure the girls were asleep. He moved one girl's arm and another's body and put his finger under one girl's nose to see if she was sleeping.

The family friend came to pick up the girl and woke her parents, who then contacted the other girls' families.

The girls tested positive at a local hospital for benzodiazepines, used to treat insomnia and anxiety. Prosecutors said Meyden's daughter also tested positive.

“No decent parent feels the need to drug their own child and their friends,” one of the girl’s mothers told Meyden during sentencing. “No decent parent feels the need to confirm that their children are unconscious. No honest parent lays hands on drugged and unconscious young girls without nefarious intent.