Colorless, odorless with a slightly salty taste, as little as a few drops of GHB, or gamma hydroxybutyrate, can render a person unconscious for four hours or more, leaving them with little or no memory of events. It can also kill you. Authorities contend that it was GHB that Andrew Luster, the handsome heir to the Max Factor fortune, used to make his victims helpless in order to rape them.

Luster's in the pokey with bail set at $10 million awaiting a pretrial hearing next week. The Ventura County Sheriff's Department, which is investigating the case, says there are three confirmed victims. But there could be as many as 15 more. Sheriff's detectives seized videotapes and photographs of Luster having sex with numerous, apparently unconscious women, most of whom remain unidentified.

The case offers a stark illustration of why GHB may be the new weapon of choice for sexual predators. Easy to make and cheap to purchase (on the street, a "dose" of GHB can go for as little as $5 or $10), GHB makes rape much easier. Instead of all the effort involved in abducting someone at gun or knife point, less than a teaspoon of GHB can render the woman of your choice vulnerable to assault within 10 to 20 minutes. Not only won't she fight back, she won't even remember being attacked, and may not recall your face at all. Plus GHB exits the body within 12 hours of being taken. So by the time the victim realizes what has happened (if she realizes what's happened), there'll be no evidence that GHB was involved. Unless, of course, the rapist was unwise enough to videotape the event.

Luster, who by some accounts may be worth as much as $30 million, pleaded not guilty on Aug. 1 to 40 counts of kidnapping and rape. His lawyer has told the press that any sexual acts caught on video were 100 percent consensual. Sheriff's detectives have yet to identify the presence of GHB in any of the items obtained from the raid on Luster's home. They believe GHB was involved because Luster supposedly mentioned the drug to his victims and because of the modus operandi they say they've uncovered.

"The whole case started when one of the victims came forward and said she believed she'd been drugged and raped the weekend before," explains Eric Nishimoto, a spokesman for the sheriff's department. "She was actually accompanied by a male companion. It turned out that they were both drugged after meeting Luster in a bar in Santa Barbara. He was in [Luster's house] when the rape occurred, but he doesn't recall anything either."

After investigators raided Luster's beachfront home, another victim came forward. Detectives recognized her from one of the videotapes, showed the videotape to her and asked if she gave consent. She claims not to have been aware of the incident on tape. The Ventura County District Attorney also added a Jane Doe to the list of victims, based on videos seized.

Nishimoto says that this bizarre, high-profile case is Ventura County's first real dose of GHB-related crime. But Santa Barbara County, the home of the University of California at Santa Barbara and several smaller colleges, is more familiar with the advent of GHB as a party drug and as a date-rape drug.

Lt. Nick Katzenstein, spokesman for the Santa Barbara Police Department, says GHB complaints began to surface two years ago and have been increasing. In 1999, as many as 10 young women complained of spiked drinks and possible sexual assault. But no case was made since the victims could not identify the person responsible. Santa Barbara also had one case of GHB-related overdose when a young woman knowingly took GHB in combination with alcohol. And, according to Katzenstein, there was a suspected GHB-related rape of a young woman by two male students at a local photography college. The case has for the moment been dropped because, once again, the woman had no memory beyond being in a bar with friends at one moment and waking up in a strange home the next.