“Addiction is still running rampant”

http://www.sentinelandenterprise.com/news/ci_28805332/addiction-is-still-running-rampant

Politicians, parents, teachers, medical professionals, police, fire and many others are rightly concerned about the opiate epidemic.

But so are the drug dealers.

After all, it’s bad for business.

In a 93-page affidavit submitted by Drug Enforcement Administration special agents that contained transcripts of recorded conversations among five high-level dealers, two spoke about why business has been “slow.”

“What happened is that over, up here, 180 people died of overdoses in three months, so people are scared,” Felix Melendez, one dealer, was recorded saying on May 7.

But there were others who, despite all that, wanted to start dealing again, he said.

“They’re the ones I have hope for,” Melendez said.

According to a press release from U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz, Jose Lugo, 53, of Providence, R.I.; Hugo Santana-Dones, 41, and Felix Melendez, 39, both of Leominster; Osvaldo Vasquez, 47, of Worcester; and Elvis Genao, 26, of Fitchburg, were charged in a complaint with conspiring to distribute in excess of 100 grams of heroin and cocaine and distribution in excess of 100 grams of heroin. Vasquez, Santana-Dones, Lugo and Melendez were also charged with using a “telecommunication facility in furtherance of a narcotics trafficking offense.”

They received these charges Aug. 7 in U.S. District Court in Worcester, after having been monitored for a year by special agents with the Drug Enforcement Administration.

Investigations of what the DEA affidavit calls “the target subjects” began in August 2014, with physical surveillance, controlled purchases made by cooperating sources and interceptions of wire communications, which were authorized by U.S. District Court.

The suspects met in locations throughout Worcester County, including places many likely wouldn’t expect: a Dunkin’ Donuts, Best Buy at the Greendale Mall in Worcester, a Bertucci’s restaurant at the Solomon Pond Mall in Marlboro.

At such locations they made deals, and big ones, according to the affidavit. In one instance, the affidavit describes a sale of 125 grams of heroin for $7,875.

In other conversations, there were offers to sell kilograms of cocaine for somewhere between $36,000 and $40,000, according to the affidavit. And there was talk about whether a 2008 BMW would be enough for someone who owed money to Vasquez for “La Morena,” Spanish for “brunette,” which here means heroin.

Suppliers, agents believe, came from places like the Dominican Republic, Guatemala and Mexico, the affidavit said.

When asked about the arrest and the aftermath, Leominster Police Chief Bob Healey noted that dealers, once off the street, do tend to get replaced.

There are always people willing to come in, he said.

And it doesn’t stop, he said.

“These drug dealers (have) paper routes,” he said. “It’s just a bad situation.

“Of course, we need to go after these big drug dealers, these traffickers,” he said, adding that, locally, departments have to focus on street-level dealers.

But the important thing, Healey said, is getting people treatment.

“I think a lot of chiefs would agree with that,” he said. “We have a lot of people that need help, and they need continuing treatment.”

If anything, the focus should be there, because treating people and getting them off drugs would limit the demand side and further damage the trade, he said.

Such programs and initiatives are in the public eye.

Recently, state Sen. Jen Flanagan and the Massachusetts Senate Special Committee on Opioid Addiction Prevention, Treatment, and Recovery Options proposed recommendations that included screening, brief intervention, and referral to treatment to the list of screenings conducted by schools and allowing individuals to include in their medical records binding directives to practitioners to not prescribe opiates in non-emergency situations.

She called the recommendations “the next phase” of combating opioid addiction. If you know someone struggling with alcohol addiction, start here for help to offer your support.

“Addiction is still running rampant,” she said. “We’re all trying to combat this. We each have tools in our toolbox, given whatever level of government we’re in.”

Lunenburg Police Chief Jim Marino agreed with getting people treatment.

“Opiate addiction is out of control right now. The only thing we can try to do is reduce the demand,” he said. “We’re all on the same page there, I’m sure.”

With the drug trade, arresting dealers is like cutting a head off the mythical Hydra, he said. When one goes down, six more come back.

Which is why Fitchburg Police Chief Ernest Martineau said fighting the drug trade is “a multipronged approach.”

Certainly, from a law-enforcement perspective, big arrests affect high-level sources, he said, noting that they make “a significant dent” when you conclude investigations such as the one the DEA conducted, adding that these do slow the drug trade.

“I’m committed to collaborative investigations,” he said.

But there are other areas to attack, he said, such as the use of Narcan, addressing mental health, and making sure there are adequate prevention programs in place.

“It’s an attack at all different angles,” Martineau said. “We’re going to continue to fight it — on a state, local, and national level.”

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