Chicago - It'll get you high quickly, you can smoke it like regular pot, it doesn't show up on drug tests, and it's legal! But here's the catch: it's also potentially dangerous, even deadly.

It's called synthetic marijuana, and in various states across the country, legislators are trying to make it illegal.

Fox Chicago News caught up with an 18-year-old as he left a Lakeview smoke shop and asked him about his latest purchase. It was a product called K2, and it's marketed as being a potpourri of sorts--though it's being smoked like weed.

"Some of my friends had tried it so I figured if they're having a good time with it, why not try it once," the teen said. "It seemed pretty similar to pot. It hits a little stronger. There's just little differences."

When asked if he was aware of the negative effects of the substance, he replied, "I heard some negative things about it, but you hear negative things about alcohol, pot, everything else."

Yet last month, on June 6, after trying K2 for the very first time with several friends, something went terribly wrong for David Rozga of Indianola, Iowa, a town near Des Moines

"David was a very normal 18-year-old kid that just graduated from high school the week before, and he was on cloud nine," said his father Michael Rozga. "He was going to University of Northern Iowa next fall to study business. He was excited, he wanted to start right now."

But after David smoked K2 that day. he had a panic attack.

"He smoked it and was having delusions, paranoia, :his father said. "His friends walked him around the park for a little bit try to calm him down."

But according to investigators, Davis would not or could not calm down. While his friends reported no ill effects from the K2, David kept repeating "I'm going to hell." He then returned home and shot himself in the head.

Jan Rozga, David's mother, is overwrought with grief. "We have never been as broken as we are right now," she said.

David's parents say their son's suicide can only be tied to one thing-- synthetic marijuana.

"Were there signs (of suicide)? I just shook my head," his father said.

"We know without a shadow of a doubt that if he would not have done K2 he would still be here today. Period. No debate. This is far worse than marijuana," his mother said.

Dr. Michael Wahl of the Illinois Poison Center says no deaths have been reported either in the Chicago-area or Northwest Indiana in connection with synthetic marijuana. But that does not make the substance any less dangerous, he explains. Based on call volume so far, he believes that hundreds of people have probably had adverse reactions in the last half year or so--most of them unreported.

Because synthetic marijuana is unregulated, one batch might end up with a small dose, another with a massive amount-- just like street drugs. And because it is so new, in terms of people using it, there is no way of telling what kind of effect repeated, long-term smoking of the compound will have on people.

"We would put this under the realm of an emerging public health threat," Wahl said. "You have to realize there is no test for this." And he says few medical personnel know what to do when confronted with it.

"ER docs and ER nurses call saying, you know, this patient took the substance. What is it? What's going on? How do we treat it?"

Dr. Wahl says much like the case of David Rozga, some users seem to become psychotically agitated and paranoid, their heart rate and blood pressure rise dramatically and they often need to be sedated. "It attaches to certain receptors more than others and it causes different effects than you would expect with natural native marijuana."

Synthetic marijuana was created two decades ago by a researcher who wanted to study the effects of the real thing. Yet only now has it somehow emerged in the marketplace where it's usually sprayed on leaves and sold legally as potpourri or incense.

Fox Chicago staffers found the substance under various names at four North Side stores, all within a quarter mile radius of one another. One of the brands, called Posh, sold for $18. Not a single store employee would comment, despite our repeated attempts.

We also found the substance for sale online at various web sites. A $42 order arrived in a plastic bag with absolutely no paperwork, no receipt, and no directions for usage.

State Representative Ken Dunkin of the 5th district says usage of the substance has spread so rapidly it prompted him to look further into it. "We had no idea that it is going to take off in such a way," he explained. But now that it has, Dunkin is trying to ban it. A bill he sponsored is sitting on Governor Quinn's desk after sailing through the state House and Senate. Illinois would become the ninth state to pass such legislation.