Butane Abuse in Guam

Via the Pacific Daily News in Guam:

Last Wednesday a 20 year-old man was arrested after breaking into an upholstery store twice in one night and attacking the owner so he could steal four cans of butane.

The owner lives in the building and heard the man in the store. When he confronted him, the man “fled the store empty-handed.” The owner was again woken soon after and again, confronted the same man and caught him opening the sink counter. The man “tackled the store owner, sitting on his chest and punching him in the face.” He fled and the police caught him at a nearby apartment building, huffing from one of the butane cans. He was charged with “burglary as a second-degree felony, attempted burglary as a second-degree felony and third-degree robbery as a third-degree felony.”

The article also notes that “a decade-long study by the Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse has determined that inhalant abuse by young people is more prevalent in Guam than in the rest of the United States.”