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Mike Tyson dons DEA jacket, teams up with Alina Habba to take bite out of fentanyl smuggling: ‘One pill can kill'
Lend Mike Tyson your ear.
Iron Mike rang the bell Monday against the dangers of fentanyl during a tour of a US Drug Enforcement Agency laboratory in New York City.
The boxing great donned a blue DEA lab coat as he visited the Chelsea facility with Alina Habba, the acting US Attorney for New Jersey — who recently launched a 'strike force' against manufacturers and smugglers who peddle the precursors of fentanyl and similar deadly opioids.
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'One pill can kill,' the soft-spoken, yet hulking Tyson told The Post.
3 Mike Tyson visited a DEA drug lab Monday.
Matthew McDermott
'I just found out that a pin of fentanyl can kill somebody. I was never educated on fentanyl and this is new to me. I'm just here to be educated on the laws.'
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Drug safety has become a concern for Tyson, 58, as his legal cannabis company TYSON 2.0 grows.
He contrasted the safety of his products with the potentially deadly narcotics that can lace street drugs.
Nearly 70% of recent US overdose deaths have been attributed to illegally manufactured fentanyls. New York City saw nearly 2,200 fatal overdoses last year, according to the Office of the Special Narcotics Prosecutor.
3 Alina Habba arranged the tour with Tyson.
Matthew McDermott
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Habba, who became a good friend of Tyson and his wife Kiki after meeting them at a UFC fight, said they all agree on safety — even if they don't see eye to eye on marijuana use.
'There is a real toxic problem, and that's the truth of it,' she said.
'They are such proponents, the Tysons, of safe use. And making sure it's not from China or a pesticide.'
The tour featured lab workers showing off massive bags of marijuana, psychedelic mushrooms, fentanyl bricks and vapes collected from recent DEA seizures, including many at JFK Airport.
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Tyson shook his head as a scientist showed him a bag filled with orange-colored fake Adderall.
A scientist showed off a fentanyl brick and told Tyson it also contained carfentanil, 'which is more potent than fentanyl.'
'We have kids where they take a pill from God knows where or smoke a vape or take a gummy and they don't know where it came from and next thing you know you are on the floor because of that little piece of fentanyl,' Habba told Tyson.
3 Tyson, a successful cannabis entrepreneur, said he'll 'never' return to the boxing ring.
Matthew McDermott
Tyson acknowledged he's no stranger to illicit drugs, in part because of his troubled past.
'It's mostly because I was in a lot of insane asylums, believe it or not,' he said. 'Then I did a lot of drugs, a lot of cocaine and a lot of drinking and then I started smoking and it changed my whole life.
'I haven't been smoking, I haven't been drinking, I haven't done cocaine in nine years,' he said. 'Now, I'm trying to make the whole cannabis universe safe.'
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Tyson's cannabis products include 'Mike Bites,' which are THC-infused gummies in the shape of an ear — a cheeky nod to his notorious 1997 rematch with Evander Holyfield, during which he bit part of his opponent's ear off.
Boxing fans should also get used to Tyson as a cannabis entrepreneur.
He said he'll 'never' return to the ring after his high-profile recent bout with influencer Jake Paul, who won the match.
'That's why I did the last fight, so I never have to do it again,' he said.
