Funcaps

History

2025:49 people died from drugs bought from an online store

On November 17, 2025, the Dutch prosecutor's office announced the death of at least 49 people due to the use of drugs purchased through an illegal pharmaceutical online store. We are talking about the online platform Funcaps, which was closed in August 2025.

According to Reuters, the owners of the named site are suspected of selling drugs without a license and selling drugs without the necessary prescriptions. In particular, it was established that the so-called designer drugs were distributed through Funcaps. These are new psychoactive substances that are created in order to bypass the current legislation. Designer drugs are synthetic analogues of any natural drugs, but differ from the latter in their composition. Due to the constant change in components, there is a difficulty in identifying and classifying such substances, and therefore they remain legal until a certain point.

𝓲

Фото: Freepik

According to the case file, the police saw a close connection between the deaths of 27 people and drugs purchased on Funcaps. During the investigation, records of 22 more deaths were found in law enforcement databases, which may be related to the use of drugs purchased on the specified site. Thus, a total of 49 people could die from drugs purchased from this online store.

Among the dead were young people and minors who had their whole lives still ahead of them, the prosecutor said.

In the summer of 2025, police arrested three men from the province of Limburg linked to the work of Funcaps. According to the Dutch Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority (NVWA), the suspects sold unlicensed drugs prescribed for anxiety and serious sleep disorders to customers. Funcaps turnover over five years of activity is estimated at €42 million.^[1]

Notes